Browsing Archive: June, 2010

ARRA Projects: Energy funding for sustainable buildings

Posted by John Noriega on Monday, June 28, 2010,

On June 17, 2010, U.S. Department of Energy secretary, Steven Chu, announced that $76 million dollars of energy funding would be awarded to 58 selected projects for the advancement of sustainable buildings. As part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), these task specific projects cover many aspects to advance the energy efficiency in the sustainable construction and operation of buildings in the United States. Proprietors of these projects include universities, research gr...

Sustainable Construction ROI: the true value of sustainability

Posted by John Noriega on Saturday, June 26, 2010,

McKinney Green Building: sustainable ROI project

An engineering consulting group, HDR, based out of Omaha, Nebraska has developed a new process that is used to evaluate sustainable project benefits. The process and its viability are becoming accepted by the building industry as a means of justifying the value of sustainable investments. Now project owners can compare a financial return on investment to a sustainable return on investment and clearly see a reason to build sustainably or not...

Architecture 2030 for sustainable building codes

Posted by John Noriega on Thursday, June 24, 2010,

Building codes and standards are undoubtedly the answer to overall sustainability in the commercial and private building sectors. While sustainable construction projects are becoming more popular, incentive to build sustainably only convinces some of the population of business owners, and homeowners. For now, building standards not affiliated with mandated building codes offer no official financial incentive. Sustainable construction is left to those who understand the necessity to build...

The sustainable classroom: Project FROG

Posted by John Noriega on Tuesday, June 22, 2010,

Project FROG is a company based out of San Francisco, California that has developed and produced a complete line of prefabricated modular classroom buildings. These state of the art structures achieve net zero energy standards and provide an optimal learning environment. The company was founded in 2006, when co-founder Mark Miller set out to design “the most technologically advanced, energy efficient building system on the planet.” As it states on their website, they claim they have ...

A sustainable building joins the Charlotte skyline

Posted by John Noriega on Sunday, June 13, 2010,

On June 7^th, 2010, Wells Fargo & Company announced that their recently constructed Duke Energy Center in Charlotte, NC has achieved Platinum certification under the USGBC’s LEED for Core & Shell version 2.0. LEED for Core & Shell is a very compelling category that proves a skyscraper to be sustainable. Duke Energy announced its long term leasing agreement with Wells Fargo back in February 2009. Duke Energy supplies and delivers electric and natural gas to customers all over the United ...