Using only water-filled beer bottles and connecting hoses, Ma’s mother now has hot water on demand, and so do more than 20 other families in the village whom Ma has helped build their own system.

He wants to build a public bathroom for the village using the same process, but he needs enough money to buy the beers. He probably has plenty of volunteers to empty them.

Image and source.

Touchless faucets are also available for kitchens, though consumers will need to do some research to make sure they are getting something that fits their habits.  Kitchen touchless faucets clearly carry the same health and water conservation benefits but most are set at one temperature, which might be inconvenient.  Also, if the faucet does not have an override switch, the homeowner will have to hold his or her hand over the sensor while filling a pot or doing dishes, though perhaps running water while doing dishes is a habit we should reconsider.

Touchless faucets are powered either by a battery or with a/c power, so there is a built in energy cost, but the minds over at TOTO have come up with a way to fix even that problem.  Their EcoPower sensor faucets contain batteries that are recharged by the passage of water through the faucet.  How cool is that?  Granted, to remain fully charged the faucet must be used ten times a day, so it might not be a good idea for very low traffic bathrooms or kitchens.  Check out the EcoPower technology and other sustainable ideas at TOTO’s new TOTOLOGY website. 

 For more ideas on saving water, check out these articles on tub sizes, tankless water heaters, and Elements of Building: Water.

Photo by Vlad Iorga

Based in Oakland, TRP is a nonprofit organization that works to reduce the amount of useable construction materials that go into landfills. Since its founding in 1993, TRP has salvaged over 200,000 tons of reusable building materials. The resulting resources are sold to the public, or are donated to a variety of worthy causes, including Habitat for Humanity and Goodwill Industries.

Though the materials can come from a variety of sources, over 90% come from TRP’s own demolition services. In demolition projects, TRP acts like any other contractor, except that they sell or donate the resulting “waste”. Homowners who use TRP for demolition get a bonus - tax deductions, based on the value of the materials salvaged. These deductions can be large, in some cases covering the cost of the demolition itself.

For those looking to build or renovate their own home, TRP is also a great place to look for materials and appliances on the cheap. Regional warehouses in California, Colorado, Illinois, and Washington are open to the public. They even have inventories online, so you can see if specific items are available before you go.

This weekend, the new Pacoima, CA store is hosting a dedication and open house on Friday (10am - noon) and Saturday (10am - 3pm). Friday’s speakers include Founder and President Ted Reiff, UCLA Professor of Operations and Environmental Management Charles Corbett, and representatives from  the EPA, among others. Saturday, May 10th, features a workshop conducted by Reiff at 11am called, “Tax Deductible Donations for Used Building Materials.”

To give you an idea of the kinds of deals available through TRP, the Pacoima site will have doors on sale for $5 on Saturday. Five bucks  for a door, and you keep it out of a landfill. That’s really cool.

Aussie Klara Marosszek has developed a commercially viable hemp building material. Fire and pest resistant hemp concrete is made by mixing hemp hurds (the pithy core of the stem), lime-based binder, water and a little sand. This is not a new technique, as century old bridges in France were made from hemp concrete.

Via: Treehugger

Related posts on hemp and marijuana:

• 5 Pounds of Pot Recycled in San Jose

• Pasties, G-String and Skirt, All Made from Hemp: Meet The “Pastie Lady”

• Audio: Rep. Ron Paul on Medical Marijuana Legislation, in His Own Words

These homes in the ancient city of Maymand, Shahr-e Babak, Kerman-Iran were carved into living rocks 12,000 years ago, representing the peaceful coexistence of man and nature.  The underground homes protect inhabitants from extreme cold or heat in the desert.

See more photos:  Fars News Agency 

But while I’m excited by some of the design presented in this year’s lineup, there are some troubling aspects of the roster as a whole that struck me almost immediately.

There is a strong slant toward a certain general kind of public building in this year’s COTE Top Ten. Of the ten winners (plus one honorable mention) almost all of the projects are buildings with a strong visitor component. Most of the buildings are Visitor Centers, Galleries and Libraries. Only one is a residential building, and the only office building is the honorable mention Internal Revenue Service Center in Kansas City MO.

Of the remaining nine, there are a Sculpture Building and Gallery, a Botanical Garden Visitor & Administration Center, a Learning Center, a University Center, a Center for Science and Art, an Environmental Education/Visitor Activity Center, a Discovery Center, a Library, and an Environmental Center. These are buildings which typically have a sizable budget and which are showpieces, meant to impress visitors. The inclusion of green building elements in all projects like this should be a given.

But do these really represent the best “examples of sustainable architecture and green design solutions that protect and enhance the environment”? Or should the best buildings represent the whole range of building?

As a program of the AIA, superior architecture and design are going to be key in any national awards, whether related to environmental issues or otherwise. So expecting these to be more ordinary buildings may be a bit much to ask of COTE.

The best examples of environmental design should be found in a range of buildings and building types. Monocultures are rarely a good thing in the long run. Too much of the same kind of building runs the risk of developing a public perception of green building being limited to only certain types of buildings, a niche, rather than a direction in which all building must start moving.

All of these projects are fine examples of green building, and I do not want to detract from any of this year’s winners. But if the AIA is going to “Walk the Walk,” it needs to promote a broader range of sustainable building projects. The Committee should take a closer look at its selection process and the methods it uses to arrive at its Top Ten award winners. A wider range of the implementations of green building needs to be recognized as part of the program. Without a greater representation from a wider variety of project types, the COTE Top Ten recognition runs the risk of becoming a marginalized and insignificant award, rather than a standard of excellence for all building design and construction.

My congratulations to all of this year’s winners.

See Also:
What Makes It Green? 2008 Winners

Architecture Week 2008 - Is It Sustainable?

Image: Pocono Environmental Education/Visitor Activity - Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, Architects, via: AIA.org

As part of their Earth Day coverage, NPR’s All Things Considered  took a look at a LEED Platinum home renovation in Washington DC.  Peter Yost from the green building resource BuildingGreen helped to explain some of the possibly unfamiliar green building terms and explained how the elements of this renovation contributed to its being one of the greenest homes in the country.

While building tours on the radio can’t show pictures, the NPR website has several accompanying pictures along with the story and an interactive kitchen tour with more information about the project.

image: NPR 

Our taps, plumbing fixtures, and irrigation systems all draw from the same sources of clean, potable water. After being used, most of the water ends up in the sewer system — all of it, at that point, contaminated. Then it is treated and returned to a body of water. This creates a cycle in which unnecessarily large volumes of water circulate through the built environment and municipal treatment facilities. However, in the last decade or so, major strides have been made in reducing the amount of water that must go through such a cycle.

The maxim “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” can easily be applied to water usage.

To REDUCE:

• Fix any leaks.
• Install low flow fixtures (toilets, faucets and shower heads), and utilize automatic controls for commercial spaces.
• Install Energy Star appliances.
• Choose landscape materials that are appropriate for your climate and that will not need to be heavily watered; reduce evaporation by not irrigating during the heat of the day.
• Use pervious paving materials.

To REUSE:

• Collect rainwater. (Rain barrels work well for residential applications; cisterns can be used for larger buildings.)
• Collect gray water (wastewater from sinks, showers, washers).
• Use a bioremediation system. Many mid-size commercial projects are implementing mini-ecosystems which use plants, bacteria — even fish and snails — to break down sewage.
• Grow plants on a green roof.

To RECYCLE, use reclaimed wastewater to:

• Irrigate plants.
• Flush toilets.

see also: Elements of Building: Energy

Photo Credit: http://flickr.com/photos/refractedmoments/

First up was Simran Sethi of Sundance’s The Green, who’s become a passionate advocate for Greensburg’s resurgence. In introducing the first five episodes of The Good Fight (which all focus on Greensburg), she not only lauded the people who she’s come to know in making the “webisodes,” but also noted that the town is hardly a hotbed of radical environmentalism: Greensburg was a town of 1400 people when the tornado struck, and, like many mid-American small communities, had been in decline for several decades. The population had shrunk, the per capita income was below the Kansas average, and young Greensburgians were generally looking for a way out. She heard plenty of disdainful comments about “treehuggers,” and several people had told her that they just didn’t believe global warming is a reality.

Despite a conservative outlook, though, the people of Greensburg recognized the value the could create for their community by embracing sustainable thinking. Sethi also noted that stories such as these point to the need for more depth in coverage of sustainability: not just showing people how to change their lightbulbs, but also addressing the systemic changes necessary to ensure both environmental preservation and social equity.

The webisodes themselves provided a inspiring look at the people of Greensburg and the choices they’ve made since the tornado. Like victims of southern Louisiana’s hurricanes in 2005, Greensburg residents were living in trailers provided by FEMA after the tornado, and desperate to get back to “normal.” The choice to rebuild green meant extending the period of transition for many people… yet the residents in the videos all expressed hope and optimism about their community’s future. Young people were excited about the greening of Greensburg, and economic possibilities looked bright with new wind turbines, a biodiesel plant, and the promise of twenty different manufacturing facilities interested in joining the GreenTown redevelopment project. (A side note: our own Adam Bowman was involved in the production of The Good Fight)

That sense of hope continued as Sethi moderated the discussion with Wallach and Hardy. Wallach (who also appeared in the webisodes) was effusive in his praise for the residents of Greensburg, noting that most people, after suffering the trauma of losing everything, just want to find comfort… quickly. The people of this town, despite their loss, chose to take a “different turn,” and put off that immediate need for comfort in favor of a brighter future. Hardy, in looking at the physical rebuilding of the town, noted that the planners and architects involved in the project weren’t implementing any new ideas in terms of building practices, but the concept of a greener community had taken hold firmly in Greensburg. Not only did the town decide to rebuild to LEED Platinum standards, but also passed a net metering ordinance, making Greensburg the only town in Kansas to offer this incentive for shifting to renewable energy sources. This “community without a town” (Hardy’s phrase) may not be completely rebuilt yet, but was already a very different place.

It was a privilege to both hear the stories that have come out of this little town’s disaster, and to talk with some of the residents themselves prior to the formal program. Dealing with these ideas day in and day out, it’s easy to get caught up in the concepts themselves. Greensburg is just one community showing that a more sustainable way of life isn’t just a pipe dream of the environmental community, though: it’s a practical alternative to “business as usual” that can create real viability for communities struggling with economic stagnation, a shrinking population, and even a life-changing disaster.

You can assist Greensburg’s efforts to rebuild green by contributing to Greensburg GreenTown. The Good Fight will air on the Sundance Channel’s web site beginning on Tuesday, April 22. Many thanks to the Kansas City chapter of AIGA, and other event sponsors, for their contributions.

Image credit: soldiersmediacenter at Flickr under a Creative Commons license

Fittingly, the film begins with a group of incredulous workers in hard hats listening to a project manager describe what a green building is. It turns out he doesn’t exactly know himself. “What does it give you?,” “what’s the point?” they ask. “I can’t answer that exactly,” he responds. But the skeptical laborers make jokes, dismissing the whole idea. After the manager explains that the condos will have “double flush” toilets, one man jokes, “I use that a lot - that system. One never seems to do the job.”

The film makers succeed by not explaining to us what green building is. Instead, they ask different people involved with the project to explain it, resulting in wildly different accounts of what it means to be green. One will focus on the location of the project, across the street from public transportation. One will speak of the regional materials used on the project. Another believes that everything in the building is made from recycled materials (not true - though many renewable materials were used and 90% of material hauled off the site will be recycled.) When asked why a tree was being taken up to the roof, one man guessed, “for good luck?”

What comes across quite clear in the film is the disdain many people involved, including the project owner/developer, have for greenies. Laborers huff about what a waste of time and money building green is. The owner/developer says that the building is not green in the sense of “eating simple cheeses or eating plain meats or something weird like that,” a comment that I had to rewind to make sure I heard correctly. A member of the waste management team says “I viewed green as dorky,” but then by the end of the project has a tattoo of a roll-off truck on her “bum,” which she shows off. I didn’t rewind that one.

The true star of the film is Wayne Phillips, a laborer who at first is skeptical but intrigued. But as he tries to explain his work with the Macallan building to his children he can’t hide his pride, and when his daughter continues to show interest in it - even asking if they can buy a condo there, he responds with a comment more profound than he intended: “I always tell you a good education will get you anything you want in life.” Green building, it seems, is viewed as a luxury for the wealthy, and even the local bar owner fears that buildings like the Macallan will price him and others (and perhaps the south Boston culture) out of the neighborhood. The class conflict in the film is subtle but well done.

The film shows the green successes of the building, rainwater collection tanks, FSC wood decking, energy saving windows, to name a few, as well as the failures. The bamboo flooring buckled, perhaps due to the new VOC free glues, and 72 floors had to be ripped up and replaced. The wheatboard cabinets swelled, causing installation headaches, but none, it seemed, had to be replaced. The green roof represented the largest disconnect between idea and installation, as every slow step had to be done by hand. The installers didn’t hold back their displeasure. And then all the plants died.

By the end, many of those working on the building come around to the advantages of green building, and even the man who joked earlier about “double flush” toilets argues the merits of green building. Others say that they will tell their grandchildren one day that they built the first green building in Boston. Mr. Phillips takes his daughter on a tour of the completed building. She says it makes her want to join a club at school on being green.

“The Greening of Southie” will air at 9:30 eastern and pacific.

For articles on other Sundance Channel “The Green” features, click below:
TV Review: Sundance Channel’s Big Ideas For A Small Planet - Wear Episode
Eco-Libris: A New Film from the Creators of “King Corn”
Sundance Channel Launches Season Two of “The Green” with “Garbage Warrior”

Designed to promote green building, alternative energy, and sustainable technologies and practices, the Expo brings together all members of the building and construction community. This includes architects, contractors, designers, government representatives, as well as the interested public. And really, aren’t we all interested these days?

Though I didn’t attend last year, I did go to the event’s transportation equivalent, AltCar. I found AltCar to be very interesting, with tons of great information available to those looking to learn more about sustainable options. If AltBuild is as good, it will be well worth attending.

This year, AltBuild has moved to a new home at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium at 1855 Main Street. On Friday the 25th, the focus is geared toward those in the building trades, while Saturday’s agenda focuses on the general public.

Though admission is free, the event features many top speakers in addition to exhibitors. On Friday at 1pm, a special presentation will be made by Green Cities of California, a collaborative made up of cities throughout the state dedicated to accelerating efforts to achieve sustainability. The group will share its goals and impacts thus far.

Also of note, Victoria Johnston, LEED AP and board member of the US Green Building Council - Redwood Empire Chapter, will deliver Saturday’s Keynote address. Her topic: “Things that work to manifest your green vision.”

A few other panels and presentations that look interesting include:

• Exhibitor Paul Mosier from InvestGreen will offer insight into socially-responsible investing resources.
• SoCal’s Edison and Gas Co will showcase their latest professional and homeowner energy efficiency programs and rebates, and conduct extensive giveaways of showerheads, aerators, and light bulbs. That means free stuff!
• The “Developments Go Green” panel of residential developers and homebuilders will discuss financing sustainable homes and communities, and the integration of deconstruction and reuse into the development of green homes. The panel will be led by Greymar Associates founder and CEO Wally Geer, who brings an extensive background in design, construction, marketing, and finance of both conventional and alternative housing systems.

In addition, workshops and panels on landscaping, climate, interiors/remodeling, and affordable solar applications are scheduled. Check the full schedule for more details about dates and times.

To wrap up the event, the City is hosting free Green Building Tours on Sunday, April 27th. Tours include homes, offices and gardens. Check them out if you need a little inspiration!

You see, in many poor countries of the world, as it were in ancient Egypt, Sumeria, China, Japan and India, it is not uncommon to use animal waste and other by-products to build houses. Or plant materials like straw bales, bamboo, grass, reeds, sedges, and rattan, as well as plant fibers and leaves. Cow dung and goat skins are very valuable building materials, but human waste!

In ground-breaking findings by Sheffield University’s School of Architecture Professor, Jeremy Till, it has just been discovered that your urine is good for green building. Urea, the main ingredient of urine, has been known as an excellent binding agent, working even better than water. “They are sustainable in literal, temporal sense…some answers are found in unexpected places. Like the bladder. But are effective in their simplicity”.

As part of work for Architects for Aid or A-4-A, the building environment charity, urine bricks were put to rigorous tests all which proved their toughness and durability. The study included sniff tests, crush tests, scratch tests, pounding with water jets and soaking tests and all showed the toughening effects of urine compared to water. Several hundred standardized bricks were made and dried and pummeled in various controlled situations.

Inspiration came from A-4-A’s Dr Victoria Harris who had seen the dire shelter situation in Darfur, a part of the Sudan known for its Janjaweed militia, genocide and refugees than its scarce timber or water.

Urine refuses to be underrated in its super-renewable attributes. Like Nanologix’s “Hydrogen Bioreactor” seemingly too far-fetched in an Amy Winehouse showstopper, Urinetown is more than a satirical comedy show in a Broadway theater.

Can urine be part of viable, sustainable built solutions? If you are convinced and believe the answer is yes, sooner than later, you could be selling your penny’s worth of pee for green building and helping in conserving the environment.

Resources: Live Projects, Sheffield Live Project 2007 Blog

Photo Credit: Eürodäna via Flickr

Water saving innovators Kohler and TOTO made green the focus of their booths, proudly displaying the Watersense stickers on their high efficiency toilets. TOTO, who recycles 100% of their china, has developed a universal toilet bowl whose tank can be interchanged from a 1.6 gallon per flush to a 1.28 gpf e-tank.

Countertop manufacturers like Silestone and Cambria showed off their Greenguard certification while new, funky recycled material countertops like Alkemi, with its aluminum shavings in a clear resin, or Vetrazzo, with its large chunks of recycled glass in concrete, caught my attention.

The appliance section featured the best in ENERGY STAR appliance manufacturers like ASKO, LG, and Bosch, to name a few.

The area that I was most interested in was cabinets. There were a couple of small bamboo cabinet makers (though one I discovered was simply a laminate product) as well as several major cabinet makers showing off their KCMA-ESP certification of green manufacturing practices. I spoke to many cabinet companies who continue to struggle to adapt to low formaldehyde level requirements like California’s upcoming CARB requirements, which are pushing manufacturers to lower emissions. The company that caught my eye was Executive Kitchens, who use a water-based, non-VOC stain and/or paint on all of their cabinets, and offer anything from their catalog in a formaldehyde-free plywood.

What this influx of green into KBIS means for those products that are clearly not green remains to be seen, but I couldn’t help but notice the juxtaposition of the low flow toilets only a couple of booths away from bathtubs that would require three water heaters to fill with warm water - or the showers with six showerheads sharing a booth with efficient bathroom fixtures. This only highlights that it is consumer demand that determines product offerings, so if you want green products, demand them!

Simran Sethi, host of the Sundance Channel’s The Green will moderate a panel on the green redesign of tornado devastated Greensburg, KS. The green salon will feature BNIM Architects’ urban planner, Stephen Hardy and Greentown director, Daniel Wallach. The Sundance Channel will screen segments from The Good Fight Series.

Tickets are only $15, are no one will be turned away for lack of funds… The cocktail reception preceding the forum will feature food and drink from Blue Bird Bistro (and I’ve eaten there… it’s really good!), Eden Alley Cafe, Local Burger, Benzinger Family Estates winery, and New Belgium Brewery. The fun begins at 5:30 pm on April 17th at the Scarritt Building Ballroom in Kansas City. All funds raised will go to Greensburg GreenTown.

I’m heading over to cover the event, so please say “Hi!” if you’re decide to come…

Image source: Kansas City chapter, AIGA

Through the use of REGREEN case studies, interior designers can find how to make their current project more green. ASID does point out that the case studies are not to be used as a list of what materials and practices a designer should use, but rather a guideline of what has been used in the past. These case studies, along with a green product checklist and public comments, will provide interior designers with plenty of resources and strategies to tackle their own green remodel.

Though the case studies were done before the creation of REGREEN, it is clear that they were influenced by LEED for Homes. They tackle all of the areas of green, including energy and water conservation, interior air quality, and sustainable materials. Four of the case studies were done in California. The rest were from areas as diverse as Colorado, Texas, New York, Michigan, Georgia, and Florida.

Included in the program are in-depth strategies on, to name a few, how to “ensure durability,” “manage noise,” “employ universal design,” “design to support connection with nature,” “minimize site disturbance,” “make use of trees and landscaping to reduce cooling loads,” “landscape to minimize chemical use,” “provide rainwater collection system,” and “install on-demand hot water recirculation systems.” A read through the manual will show that the program offers specific answers to many green remodeling questions while leaving designers free to use the best materials for their remodel.

If you are looking for more resources on green remodeling or interior design, here is one on modern green living as well as a humorous one on New Levels of LEED.

If you have some experience with REGREEN, please leave your own thoughts. I’m interested in some feedback on the program.

Link: REGREEN

Two weeks ago Eylon Israely conducted an interview with King Corn’s Director and Producer, Aaron Woolf . Today we’ve got interesting updates on the film and its creators.

Firstly, If you haven’t seen this documentary yet, here’s your chance - King Corn airs on PBS on April 15! So mark it down in your calender.

And there’s also a new film from the creators of King Corn - The Greening of Southie. The film will have its world premiere on the Sundance Channel on Earth Day, April 22 at 9:40PM. This time, the filmmakers explore green building, and they’re focusing on the first green residential project in one of the favorite neighborhoods: South Boston, or Southie as everyone calls it. Here’s a little bit more about it:

The Greening of Southie goes behind the scenes and onto the scaffolds to follow the construction of Boston’s first green residential structure, a luxury condominium complex called the Macallan Building. Located in the city’s storied working-class neighborhood, South Boston, Macallan was conceived with the ambitious goal of securing a LEED Gold rating from the U.S. Green Building Council. Moving between the idealistic young development team, distant suppliers, and the salty union construction crew, The Greening of Southie maps each step––and misstep––on the road to move-in day.

While the AIA has another program it also began last year titled “Walk the Walk” that offers a good number of resources on sustainability both for architectural clients and the general public, as well as for architects and other building professionals, the topic is not highlighted in the Architecture Week program in any significant way.

Architecture Week provides a chance for the architectural profession to draw some attention to the issues of buildings and energy use.  And while sustainability is only one of a number of issues that architects must address in meeting their clients’ needs, the opportunity seems to have been missed for a stronger message and more outreach to educate clients and building owners (from individual homeowners to corporate office managers) about the importance of buildings in the perspective of energy use and energy savings.

While increasing the efficiency of every vehicle on the road today by 10% would require a huge technological development, it would only save a bit less than 3% of our present national consumption of energy.  Transportation represents slightly more than 25% of the national energy consumption, while buildings represent nearly half of all energy used in this country.  So while research into improving vehicle efficiency is an important step to be taken, improving the efficiency of buildings will have a significantly larger overall impact.

Moreover, many of the developments needed to improve the efficiency of buildings are known and existing technologies, rather than requiring new technological developments.  By taking better advantage of daylighting, passive heating and cooling and other design techniques, we can build better buildings that will not leave a legacy of wasteful energy use.  And, new and improved technologies will help further improve building performance to be able to reach a goal of carbon-neutral buildings as a standard by 2030.

Better buildings need to be part of the steps we take today in order to move toward creating a sustainable future.  Architects should use the opportunity of being in the public spotlight to encourage greater public awareness of these issues.

Links:

AIA Architecture Week

Article about Architecture 2030

Architecture2030.org

Of the ten homes in Patrician Place, one will be certified LEED-H platinum, one will be certified gold in the NAHB’s Model Green Building Guidelines, and seven will be ENERGY STAR rated homes with slight variations, such as with or without SIPs, or foam insulation as opposed to spray fiberglass, to name a couple. The tenth will be the control house, built to standard, non-green building practices. The layouts of the homes will be identical. Click here for the spreadsheet of materials used in the different houses.

In addition to testing energy used with the help of local utilities companies, project coordinators will survey home owners to factor in their family size and energy practices. I will update here if and when the results of the Patrician Place study are made public.

Photo: Nick Jackson

Business events like the AeA soponsored, “How Does Going Green Affect the Bottom Line?” further the cause. Held on March 20th at UCLA, technology companies discussed their successes along the journey to sustainability, and shared lessons learned related to different areas of greening.

A few key takeaways for companies interested in going green:

Green Building - Alan Ball, QualComm: In QualComm’s experience, higher initial costs can be offset by good planning. Multiple revisions allow costs to get out of control. And QualComm should know, as they have built the largest LEED certified building in the US. This is key, as it is well known that green buildings save money in the long run, but many companies balk at perceived higher initial costs.

Solar Energy - Carrie Norton, Energy Innovations: EI Solutions is the solar provider for Google’s installation, the largest in the country, as seen in the photo above. In their experience, the economics of solar are improving as the consideration of externalities, including environmental benefits, are being brought into the equation. This appears to be the case, as more stories regarding large scale solar projects hit the news, like SoCal Edison’s plans for rooftop installations.

Business Drivers - Doug Hileman, Consultant: Hileman made the case that sustainability is being driven by many developments in the general business environment, including globalization, outsourcing, and regulations like Sarbanes-Oxley. The movement is also being driven by human resources concerns as companies fight for top talent: it’s been reported that 92% of workers want to work for an environmentally friendly company. Now that’s a figure no firm can ignore.

Branding - Tom Feegel, Brand Neutral: According to Tom, the key for branding a green product is moving consumers from the awareness phase through to the advantage phase, where people feel that they are part of the solution by using the product. This emotional tie is what branding is all about, and green products are certainly no exception.

Event sponsor AeA, the nation’s oldest technology trade association, serves its member companies by lobbying all levels of government, providing access to capital and business opportunities, and offering networking and business services. At this particular event, AeA did a good job pulling panelists from different industries. They did such a good job, in fact, that I would have liked to have heard much more on each panelists’ views and experience - the large number of panelists meant that each had very little time to speak and answer questions.

Overall, the sense in the room was that this whole sustainability thing is just getting started in our offices and boardrooms. People want to make a difference, and are working on gaining the knowledge needed to do so. That’s definitely a move in the right direction.

Photo credit: Google.com