Affordable Renewal Energy

Author Archives for ENN: Green Building

To slow global warming, install white roofs


Builders have known for decades that white roofs reflect the sun’s rays and lower the cost of air conditioning. But now scientists say they have quantified a new benefit: slowing global warming.

5 ways to ride wave power


How Green Is Your College?


Last week, the Sustainable Endowments Institute released its 2009 Green Report Card. As GreenBiz reports, it compiles the green and not-so-green aspects of 300 colleges and universities through the United States and Canada. The Report Card was designed to identify those schools that are leading by example through their commitment to sustainability initiatives on campus.

Regulations Demanding Actual Data Are Leapfrogging LEED


“It’s not how efficient the building is but how much energy it really uses that matters.”ť That’s the gist of many comments in a thread on BuildingGreen’s blog (and, simultaneously, on several email discussion groups) about how to measure the actual energy performance of LEED buildings.

Eco-show launches four-city expansion


Go Green Expo, a business-to-business and consumer showcase for green living products and services, has announced a four-city tour beginning in January 2009 that includes Los Angeles, Philadelphia, New York City and Atlanta. The event debuted in New York this year during Earth Week.

Is LEED green enough? Conversations from Dwell on Design LA 2008


At this past week’s Dwell on Design LA conference and expo, one of the most striking conversations centered on whether LEED standards are enough to meet the growing climate challenge. Energy consumption by buildings contribute to almost half of carbon emissions in the U.S. As a result, many city governments, including Los Angeles, have created ordinances for new buildings to comply with LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) standards.

Green Building: It’s not pretty, but it runs clean


Anyone who thinks all green buildings are shimmering towers of glass and steel can be forgiven for that mistake. Landmarks for the movement, after all, are soaring temples of natural daylight and engineering wizardry.

But experts say most U.S. commercial buildings can be turned green without spending tons of money, bringing in construction cranes or making any change that can be seen from the street.

Solar Incentives Threaten Local Ownership


Large, remote concentrating solar power systems are the new darlings of the solar industry. Some observers now see centralized, not decentralized solar as the future. But a new report by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance reveals that the economic advantage of centralized solar and absentee owned solar arrays rests on federal tax incentives that discriminate against locally owned, decentralized solar arrays.

Lighting an Efficient Future, Minus the Mercury


More and more countries are banning incandescent light bulbs in favor of energy-efficient compact fluorescent lamps, or CFLs. But options to recycle the mercury-laden alternatives are often scarce.

Johnson Controls Aims for LEED Platinum


As I’ve remarked on numerous times in the past (links here), Johnson Controls remains one of the great unsung leaders in efficiency – having been making buildings more efficient since long before it became trendy.

Now, they’ve taken their expertise to their own operations with a complete gutting and renovation of their corporate headquarters with LEED platinum as the goal.