I’ll try to write more when I’ve had some time to process, as well as when I have a full keyboard to write on. In the meantime enjoy my iPhone’s photo of Seattle scenery.

Briefly, I wanted to pass on a link that a friend of mine stumbled upon:  it’s a study conducted by Maastricht University, the Netherlands, and the University of California, Berkeley which determined that

“…Buildings with a high Energy Star rating are attracting rental premiums of three percent per square foot compared with non-green buildings of the same size, location and function…”

I mean, how do you like them apples?!  The study, entitled “Doing Well by Doing Good?“, provides the first credible evidence of the economic value of energy efficient buildings in the commercial sector by showing that the “greener” buildings were able to charge a premium on rents over more “standard” buildings, aka energy hogs.

Check out the study!  And if you have time, peruse the RICS Research page, there are some other great studies* about buildings on there, including one that poses the question, “Can building codes deliver energy efficiency?”

*Maybe I’m the only one that thinks these are cool.  Oh well.

What do you see?  Do you see a happy polar bear, playing with a butterfly?

Perhaps he’s taking a nap next to his “friends”, the baby seal and the baby polar bear…

Or, maybe you see a polar bear that’s running… you see, the sun came out and it started to melt the ice underneath the polar bear’s feet.  He needs to get somewhere, and fast!

What these animations are depicting, if you were perceptive enough to figure out from the dashboard on the left-hand side of the page, is real-time energy usage on the campus of Dartmouth University.  Unlike many other institutions, which have mandated efficiency programs and/or building goals that were set by the university or the government, Dartmouth sought to reduce energy consumption in their dorms – solely through behavioral changes – by 15%.  From their Web site:

Launched on April 24, 2008, the goal of the program is to change behavior by providing energy information in meaningful and compelling ways. … We encourage students to change the way they use energy in their daily lives by monitoring and displaying information about the resources students have control over, such as plug loads for electricity, heat and water use. We hope to help students understand the larger impacts of their actions and develop tools and approaches to energy conservation that can carry over into their everyday lives.

This program at Dartmouth is innovative, educational, interactive, and fun.  It’s also an example of a hybrid energy efficiency system that exists in very few places in the United States – it’s a behavior modification program that relies on a building monitoring system for real-time data.  The polar bear reacts to the energy load on the building at any given time, and the students can therefore react to the amount of energy they are using immediately.  And it’s not presented in a boring way, either … it’s an animation of a polar bear that lives a happy life or dies based on the energy consumption by the students at Dartmouth.

And by all accounts, it’s been a great success.

This is a good example of an innovative system that buildings might want to employ in the future to encourage occupants to save energy.  The polar bear may not work in all circles, but I, for one, do not want to see any majestic animals suffer because of climate change, so this would have worked on me like a charm.

Kudos to the students at Dartmouth for thinking outside the box to achieve massive energy savings on their campus!

• a 20 percent mandatory reduction in indoor water use, with voluntary goal standards for 30, 35 and 40 percent reductions;
• Separate water meters for nonresidential buildings’ indoor and outdoor water use, with a requirement for moisture-sensing irrigation systems for larger landscape projects;
• Requiring diversion of 50 percent of construction waste from landfills, increasing voluntarily to 65 and 75 percent for new homes and 80 percent for commercial projects;
• Mandatory inspections of energy systems (i.e. heat furnace, air conditioner, mechanical equipment) for nonresidential buildings over 10,000 square feet to ensure that all are working at their maximum capacity according to their design efficiencies;
• Requiring low-pollutant emitting interior finish materials such as paints, carpet, vinyl flooring and particle board.

All of this and more information about CALGREEN can be found here.

So what does this mean for the average homeowner?  Well, if you live in California, you may start to see the changes immediately, especially if you are building or planning on buying a house in the next few years, as this new code will affect all new buildings.  Although on the other hand, the changes may not be as noticeable, since California has been at the forefront of energy efficient design for many years, so this code is more like an incremental step rather than a big jump.

Even gas stations in California are designed sustainably: The LEED Certified BP Helios House in LA

Now, if you don’t live in California, you should still pay attention, because you may not be off the hook:  the CALGREEN is the first green building standard in the nation, but it won’t be the last.  There are many states that are not too far behind California in discussing adjustments to their state building codes to make buildings more energy efficient, and those changes to the code might be coming as soon as this year.  States like New York, Minnesota, Florida and Colorado are no strangers to green building guidelines, while Wisconsin, Oregon and Washington have energy efficiency programs in place already.  California has many challenges facing it right now – its crazy budget problems, its constitution, and various other calamities notwithstanding – but it has always been good at leading the pack with regards to energy efficiency.  The CALGREEN program will test the system, and if it works, it will be a great model for the rest of the country.

Of course, you could just get ahead of the curve and start greening your own home without any codes or lawmakers telling you to do so… 

The ultimate goal of the AIA, and of all proponents of green building, is to see a day where “building green” no longer exists, and green design is integrated into all buildings.

Hear hear, AIA.   Thanks for writing that.  Now if we could only get more architects to live it, we’d be in better shape…

Nationally, the AIA has adopted the Architecture 2030 Challenge and is committed to developing and promoting the means to reach at least a 50% carbon emission reduction by 2010 and carbon neutral buildings by 2030.  As stated in the AIA SustAIAnability 2030 program, “This exciting challenge offers many opportunities for integrated, high-performance, environmentally-conscious buildings that will become valued assets for future generations.”

So, from my perspective this is pretty much awesome. Because it means that it’s getting the best designers in the city to recognize that in order to have a really great building, you need to have a great design AND be environmentally sound as well.  And AIA Portland is helping out, by providing all applicants for the awards with the following 2009 Carbon Calculator.  It’s a simple Excel spreadsheet that requires a few inputs to yield your building’s percentage of carbon emissions, which compare to baseline numbers that you determine by filling out the Energy Star Target Finder.  It may seem like a lot of numbers but frankly designers need to become more familiar with these processes… finding your building’s carbon emissions, and then figuring out how to reduce them, is going to be absolutely key if we are going to fight global warming!

First the definition:  Dictionary.com says that weatherization is the process of making (a house or other building) “secure against cold or stormy weather, as by adding insulation, siding, and storm windows.” All right!  That’s a good starting point.  But perhaps we should expand this definition to include all types of small gestures in and around homes or other buildings that makes them “weather tight” and more energy efficient.  To me, weatherization could include something as simple as putting plastic wrap over drafty windows during the winter, or something as intensive as tearing out old insulation and putting new insulation in your walls.

So how do people achieve these results?  Where do they start?  Well, as usual the Department of Energy seems to be one step ahead.  Behold the U.S. DoE Weatherization Assistance Program, which “enables low-income families to permanently reduce their energy bills by making their homes more energy efficient.”  And, just in case you’re wondering why ALL families don’t get this kind of assistance, check out the DoE’s reasoning:

“By reducing the energy bills of low-income families instead of offering aid, weatherization reduces dependency and liberates these funds for spending on more pressing family issues. On average, weatherization reduces heating bills by 32% and overall energy bills by about $350 per year at current prices. This spending, in turn, spurs low-income communities toward job growth and economic development.”

I think growth and economic development is a concept that we can all get behind.  So let’s hear it for weatherization!

View Larger Map

Included in the map are instances where the General Services Administration (the GSA) is using allocated funds to affect 250 buildings, with an emphasis on converting them into “high performance green buildings,” under one of the following categories:

• New construction, including Land Ports of Entry
• Full and partial building modernization
• Limited scope projects
• Small Projects

So, the good news is, the stimulus IS stimulating and the funds are going towards green building projects.  If anyone has any suggestions on how to get involved in working on those green building projects, aka, for a salary, please let us know!

Which is why, in my most recent e-newsletter from Architecture 2030, I was pleased and not surprised to discover that they had spent so much time poring over the 1428-page Waxman-Markey climate bill in the House of Representatives.  I am going to take Ed’s word for it, as I do not have the energy (or enough caffeine) to read a 1428-page bill, when he tells me that the 29 most important pages of the bill are contained in Section 201, which requires updating national building energy codes to meet the following energy reduction targets:

• in 2010, 30% below the baseline energy code (IECC 2006 and ASHRAE 90.1-2004),
• in 2014-2015, 50% below the baseline energy code, and
• every three years after, out to 2029-2030, an additional 5% reduction.

Simply put, this is totally awesome. If designers and architects are going achieve lower energy buildings, we are going to need the building codes to be our guides, because our clients usually won’t pay for it on their own.  This is starting to change, certainly, but frankly there are not a whole lot of people in the building industry that are getting paid for anything right now.  This portion of the bill will not only regulate new construction, but it will encourage people who can’t afford new buildings to reconsider renovation as a viable option.  And both of these things NEED to happen:  new construction should be more energy efficient, while renovation should happen on a broader scale.  The GOOD NEWS is, clients, developers, and builders need to work openly with architects, designers and engineers to make this happen.  Which means, everybody gets back to work!

To read more about the awesomeness of energy efficiency in buildings and the implications of this climate bill, read the complete analysis (with fun graphs and everything) in Architecture 2030’s latest e-newsletter.

And this is why Portland is leading the country on sustainable design issues!  Awesome.