Elemental

These are my links for February 12th through February 18th:

• Building4Change : California to make energy and water saving mandatory – CALGREEN's approach, with its mandatory provisions being inspected and verified by local and state building departments and confirmed in a green label, has led to concerns that it confuses building standards and certification. Questions are being asked in the USA about a number of issues, in particular, lack of third-party assessment and the code's potential to reduce adoption of points-based certification routes, notably LEED.
• The Race to be the Greenest Building – Some great case studies: "The Living Building Challenge, run by the Cascadia Green Building Council, is growing in popularity these days. Referred to as one of the most advanced green building rating systems in the world, it's growing, I believe, in part because of its rigor. The Challenge is performance based, which means a project has to perform as modeled for one full year prior to receiving certification."
• Thoughts on the Renewable Heat Incentive – "As it stands, this incentive will cause oil-fired boilers (as a technology) to be abandoned, without any clear justification. Many people with radiator-based central heating systems looking to replace a boiler will be tempted to switch to a heat pump solely because of the incentive, which looks like it's going to worth around £750-£1,000 a year for 18 years. And yet, unless the heat delivery system is changed (which is unlikely because it would be expensive and disruptive), the energy and carbon burned will actually increase, compared to an A rated oil-fired boiler. For this reason, air source heat pumps, in particular, are ill suited to replacing domestic boilers. There seems little logic in incentivising people to install them instead of efficient fossil-fuel boilers."
• House 2.0: 36 hours in Switzerland – Is a supra-national standard possible? "The Swiss have their own energy saving performance standard called Minergie. It comes in various format. Standard Minergie, Minergie P (roughly equivalent to PassivHaus), Minergie P Eco (with other sustainability features like water saving) and Minergie P Eco Plus (with added renewables). Obviously, this system is never going to be of interest to anyone other than the Swiss; it's all rather like the Code for Sustainable Homes in this respect. Yet another reminder as to how good it would be to have a supra-national standard that everyone could understand."

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These are my links for December 11th through December 17th:

• Is global warming unstoppable? – Another nutty theory or not?: "Garrett says his study's key finding "is that accumulated economic production over the course of history has been tied to the rate of energy consumption at a global level through a constant factor."
  That "constant" is 9.7 (plus or minus 0.3) milliwatts per inflation-adjusted 1990 dollar. So if you look at economic and energy production at any specific time in history, "each inflation-adjusted 1990 dollar would be supported by 9.7 milliwatts of primary energy consumption," Garrett says….
  "Economists think you need population and standard of living to estimate productivity," he says. "In my model, all you need to know is how fast energy consumption is rising. The reason why is because there is this link between the economy and rates of energy consumption, and it's just a constant factor.""
• Kevin McCloud is a Big Hit at TGR/RIBA Conference – "The challenge of combining sustainability and conservation issues were thoroughly debated at the conference with input from conservation officers, architects and engineers. Some questioned the need to debate this issue when there are ‘only’ 380,000 historic buildings in the UK – perhaps we should be concentrating on the many thousands of non-historic buildings that are below current standards of sustainability.
  Others wanted to discuss what should be tackled first and what makes most carbon sense. The contrast between the photovoltaic panels at the nearby Heelis project costing £450,000 and only contributing 10-15% of the building’s electrical needs and Kevin McCloud’s modest but effective eco-refurb of a terraced house in Manchester reducing carbon emissions by over 30% but only costing just over £2,000 could not have been sharper."
• ‘Sustainability’ is a dangerous mirage – Building Design – Owen's on top form: "It’s the very term “sustainability”, which has enabled even Dubai to present itself as if it is touching lightly upon the earth, that is at fault. What exactly is it that we want to “sustain”? Humanity? Nature? Capitalism? As a slogan it’s as awful as “save the planet”. The planet is safe, it’s we who are in danger.
  The problem with the rhetoric of sustainability is that, as a buzzword, it serves to fill the ethical void in the apocalyptic capitalism of the last 30 years. So, we get sustainable supermarkets, green-roofed car parks, carbon neutral desert cities, all of which are a kind of architectural offsetting as moronic as its economic equivalent. A hundred new industrial towns can have the mirage of Dongtan projected onto them. The recent demise of the British “eco-towns” is the pettier version of the same failure."
• Controlling dew point – 2009-11-19 10:00:00 | Consulting-Specifying Engineer – Excellent article (ASHRAE/US bias) which explains the principles of designing to dew point rather than relative humidity: "Not so long ago, HVAC designers did not have to be especially concerned with humidity. With plenty of cheap energy, the industry could afford to wallop the air with heavy-duty cooling to dry it, then fry it with reheat to keep it from freezing the occupants."
• Building4Change : European research gives blueprint for social sustainability – "Tools, instruments and metrics to foster sustainable communities are biased towards environmental sustainability, a European research project has found. The research, carried out by Oxford Institute for Sustainable Development, provides a blueprint for policymakers on incorporating social sustainability into European urban redevelopment initiatives.
  The report recommends greater integration of socially responsible investment and local authority indicators, alongside increased investment in data gathering to improve understanding of social sustainability. It highlights valuable monitoring systems such as the FootprintR sustainable investment policy, created by developer Igloo"
• Abu Dhabi to set school building eco standard – Building – "A new sustainable building standard is being developed for Abu Dhabi's schools.
  The system is being drawn up by Estidama, the organisation behind the emirate's local sustainability code for the the Abu Dhabi Education Council."
• Futerra Sustainability Communications – leading thinking – Another great guide to communicating sustainable futures from Futerra: "In this guide we argue that climate change is no longer a scientist's problem, it's now a salesman's problem. We call upon government spokespeople, climate campaigners and business advertisers to stop selling visions of hell. Instead we must all create and sell a new vision of a' low carbon heaven'.
  This guide is a new approach for us. Most of our previous thought leadership has been very practical – this is stronger, more opinioned and more controversial. There's still a lot of guidance and original research. But we're not pulling our punches."
  From the report: "Dates, percentages and figures come in action plans, not visions. A 20% cut by 2020 isn’t a vision, it’s a target. Put all the targets together and imagine what the world would be like if we met and exceeded them: that’s a vision."
• Land Securities chief executive accuses Government of lacking courage on sustainability – Modern Building Services – "On the need to dramatically improve the poor energy efficiency of the UK’s existing building stock, he said, ‘Unlike in the USA, the UK always seems to have a reluctance to use carrots and sticks in the tax system to drive behaviour and redirect capital investment. There is good evidence that tax allowances change investment decisions — and these allowances can be temporary.
  ‘I would certainly advocate a much higher level of Enhanced Capital Allowances for investment in energy-saving plant and building adaptations. However, I think the simplest route may be to use the property rates system to reward those who occupy energy-efficient buildings .’"
• Leeds given more power over regeneration – Building – "Rosie Winterton, minister for local government, has signed a programme to give Leeds and its regions more power over housing, planning and regeneration.
  The Leeds City Partnership pilot programme brings together 11 councils, regional partners and central government to create a devolved housing and regeneration board."
• Building4Change : New plant produces energy by mixing fresh water and sea water – "World's first osmotic plant opens, but commercial version will not be available for several years.
  European renewable energy producer Statkraft this month opened the world's first power plant generating energy by mixing fresh water and sea water in Norway.
  The energy is based on the natural phenomenon of osmosis, the transport of water through a semi-permeable membrane. When fresh water meets salt water, substantial amounts of energy are released, which can be used to generate power.
  At the osmotic power plant, fresh water and salt water are guided into separate chambers, divided by an artificial membrane. The salt molecules in the sea water pull the fresh water through the membrane, increasing the pressure on the sea water side. The pressure equals a 120 metre water column, or a significant waterfall, and can be used in a power generating turbine."
• Design Activism: Coming across chemicals: in plastics and in schools – "the main problem with the chemicals is that not enough of them have been properly tested for health effects, and the result is that we only regulate chemicals that we know about. A classic example is BPA, a chemical additive found in bottled water containers, baby bottles and the like. Last year mounting evidence about adverse health effects from BPA caused it to be withdrawn from the market.
  The long term solution to this problem is hatching in the Green Chemistry movement, which is aiming to put the burden of proof of safe chemicals on the manufacturers. Currently a chemical is innocent until proven guilty, however, there are simply too many chemicals and, based on the evidence we do have, no reason to assume their innocence. Proposed green chemistry policies also recognize that health problems might arise for interactive, multiple exposures."
• Ben Casnocha: The Blog: 10 Easily Implementable Life Problem-Solving Strategies – Some great thoughts on procrastination from Ben: ""Can I fail at this?" It's like Raymond Chandler said: there is no success without the possibility of failure. Therefore, something I can't fail at is also something I can't succeed at. I can fail at conducting an interview, writing an essay or making a video. I can't fail at meandering around the internet in search of "neat stuff to read." In a recent tweet, I defined procrastination "the temporary displacement of tasks at which it is possible to fail with tasks at which it is not possible to fail." I suspect I'm less far off the mark than ever, especially regarding why procrastination is not a productive tendency."
• ippr – Institute for Public Policy Research – Left foot forward – "Increased birth rates and an ageing population, coupled with a fall in net immigration into the UK means that natural change, births and deaths – is now responsible for a greater component of the UK’s population increase, rather than immigration.
  But what should a progressive UK population policy look like? It will have to deal with issues such as family size, retirement age, population distribution across the UK, as well as immigration control.
  Attempts to restrict immigration to a zero net immigration level… will have major economic consequences. At present younger immigrants make a greater fiscal contribution than do the older UK-born population. Big restrictions on labour immigration would result in higher taxes, among other outcomes. Fiscal deficits could be alleviated if everyone worked longer… Family impacts on population size, but how would British adults react to being told to stop at two children? What incentives could be offered to families who stop at two?"

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These are my links for November 27th through December 2nd:

• Smart Vendors: Biomass Supply Chain (UK) – Innovation & Cleantech – Possibly interesting (but very expensive – £150!) report on biomass (not sure how independent the authors are?): "The future evolution of the UK biomass supply chain will be significantly impacted by the opening of proposed major biomass power generation plants by firms like Drax Power and Prenergy in the next 3 years."
• Debt storm threatens Dubai’s ambitions | Last Word | MEED – The most understandable commentary on Dubai which I have come across this week: "Dubai World has gone into a form of protective bankruptcy, similar to the US’ chapter 11 arrangements. It is a situation fraught with difficulties that could damage Dubai and the UAE. And the true scale of what Dubai owes is still unknown.
  But it is Dubai World’s creditors that face the biggest immediate problem. None can expect to receive any money until Dubai World’s assets and liabilities have been fully assessed, a judgement made about how big the gap between the two is and a schedule defined for when creditors will be paid, and how much. It is tough, particularly for those who are owed money today. But it is fair."
• Regulation shapes revolution in Gulf sustainable buildings | Last Word | MEED – Interesting summary of green building accreditation throughout the Middle East. Will the Dubai ripples have an impact?:
  "Abu Dhabi’s new building code, regulations that make sustainability compulsory in all buildings and major retro-fits throughout the emirate, come into force on 1 January 2010."
• First Net-Zero Neighborhood in the US Being Built in Boulder | Inhabitat – At last, some aesthetically pleasing (to my eye at least) net zero homes in my favourite US city, Boulder. Still enormous compared to the UK – 280m² for a townhouse is 3.5 times larger than the average new build UK home (76m² according to swing a cat):
  "Located on Broadway and Poplar Ave in Northern Boulder, the 1.5 acre neighborhood is conveniently located across from a market, shops and restaurants and with easy access via bus to the rest of the city. Six townhomes border Broadway, while six single-family homes sit back behind around a communal park. All the homes will be orientated to the south and photovoltaic systems can installed on the roof, which will completely provide the homes with all the energy they need."
• Rebooting Britain: transform cities into lush jungles – Another article from Wired. This time, I have to disagree slightly – IMO London is currently the *only* UK city suitable for walking and public transport?: "Cities are at present vulnerable to the smallest interruptions in oil and gas supply. The first step in cutting this dependency should be a ban on private car ownership in metropolitan areas. Even a sprawling city like London can be comfortably navigated by walking, cycling, and use of public transport – powered, like delivery vehicles servicing businesses and homes, by batteries, biofuels, or hydrogen fuel cells. The great tidal flows of commuters could be reduced by rezoning commercial areas for residential use and introducing workshops and offices into residential areas, as in the human-scale, mixed-use street plans of medieval cities."
• Rebooting Britain: tax people back into the cities – Really looking forward to PD Smith's new book. Here a flavour from Wired UK: "To create a low-carbon economy we need to become a nation of city dwellers. We tax cigarettes to reflect the harm they do to our health: we need to tax lifestyles that are damaging the health of the planet – and that means targeting people who choose to live in the countryside. We need a Rural Living Tax. Agricultural workers and others whose jobs require them to live outside cities would be exempt. The revenue raised could be used to build new, well-planned cities and to radically upgrade the infrastructure of existing cities."
• When provided a choice, do people choose? – The Social Enterprise – Suw is spot on about adoptation of social media within companies (my experience on Yammer and Skype backs this up): "The successful implementation of social software doesn't stop with a technically successful roll-out. In fact, that's when the process begins because that's when your adoption strategy should kick in.
  Adoption is ultimately about behaviour change: persuading people that, for example,
  instead of sending an email to everyone with a new version of a document they are working on, they should put it on a wiki where it's easier to collaborate. This might seem like a small step – and for a few people it is – but for the majority that's a fundamental change to the way that they have learnt to work on documents."
• Gordon Brown’s ‘eco town’ vision quietly shelved – Times Online – "Gordon Brown’s vision of establishing distinct “eco towns” across the country has been quietly shelved, it emerged today.
  The Government tried to keep up the project’s momentum by announcing a further 14 locations where “green developments” have local council backing.
  But it became clear the new sites will not be for the self standing towns of up to 15,000 homes originally envisaged by the Prime Minister.
  Most will be developments of no more than 5,000 homes on the edge of urban areas, which will be cheaper, easier to plan and attract much less local opposition than those first proposed by the Government."
• Futerra Sustainability Communications – Conspiracies, Climate and Communication – More climategate fallout – Solitaire from Futerra defends her position (well said): "So in my own voice I want to get one thing straight; I hate climate change. I really really hate it and wish it wasn’t happening. Some of the climategate posts seem to imply we’re part of a ‘pro’ climate conspiracy. Considering how deeply and passionately I wish the darn thing wasn’t happening that accusation left me fish-mouthing in surprise. I don’t want climate change, I don’t like climate change, and I’m bloody annoyed that my best years will be spent trying to combat the darn thing.
  The horrible irony is how much I want the deniers to be right. If I had one wish it would be for climate change to be untrue, a blip, misread data, to slope off in embarrassment. If only."
  Now, can we stop being distracted by the semantics and arguments and get on with some design? Thank you.
• CRED Guide | The Psychology of Climate Change Communication – Via Joanna Yarrow, a fascinating document on communicating climate change. Niggets include: "balance information that triggers an emotional response with more analytic information to leave a mark in more than one place in the brain."
• A Climate Scientist Who Engages Skeptics – Dot Earth Blog – NYTimes.com – Read the whole article: "In grappling with this issue, I would argue that there are three strategies for dealing with skeptics…
  Most scientists retreat into the ivory tower. The CRU emails reflect elements of the circling of wagons strategy. For the past 3 years, I have been trying to figure out how to engage skeptics effectively in the context of #3, … Some of the things that I’ve tried in my quest to understand skeptics and more effectively counter misinformation include posting at skeptical blogs, such as climateaudit, and inviting prominent skeptics to give seminars at Georgia Tech. I have received significant heat from some colleagues for doing this (I’ve been told that I am legitimizing the skeptics and misleading my students), but I think we need to try things like this if we are to develop effective strategies for dealing with skeptics and if we are to teach students to think critically."
• The Guardian – Poignant and depressing: "But I find I can't say this stuff anymore; not because I have stopped believing in climate change, but because I have stopped believing we can prevent it.
  Which is not to say that the End Times are here. One of the other problems with the climate change narrative is that it offers only two futures: Saving the World, or Apocalypse Now. We will probably get neither. More realistic is that we will experience what most previous human societies experienced – a painful decline after a period of over-expansion. We hear a lot about the year 2050: it is a handy date on which to hang our hopes of a "sustainable society", which has come to mean business as usual but without the carbon. It seems much more likely that by 2050 we will be mining our landfill sites for valuable metals and struggling to keep the electricity on, while we dream of the coral reefs that once flowered in the emptying oceans."

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These are my links for November 14th through November 19th:

• Welcome to amazonails – Enerything you ever needed to know about straw bale building.
• Footprint » Common carbon language – "The ‘Common Carbon Metric’ will be piloted by the leading green building rating tools and made available to anyone dedicated to promoting the understanding and development of a low-carbon built environment. The real impact of this initiative lies in the detail which has yet to be announced, but it is an indication of the growing consensus about the role the built environment can play in mitigating climate change."
• Publications – News & Publications | BioRegional: solutions for sustainability – via Hattie at AJ, I find that BioRegional are making lots of their reports free. Will be interesting to read the One Planet Communities and compare to BREEAM, LEED and Estidama. Communities (rather than buildings) will be the buzzword for 2010. Unfortunately Pooran Desai's book is not free, but can be ordered from Amazon.
• marklynas.org | Closed because of geoengineering works – Mark Lynas on geo-engineering (something I'm really not comfortable with): "Geoengineering deeply divides scientists and environmentalists. Should we really consider spraying sulphates into the stratosphere, planting artificial trees across deserts or dumping iron filings in the Pacific as legitimate options to cool down our planet? Kruger, whose preferred solution involves spreading billions of tonnes of lime in the oceans (see cquestrate.com), likens the approach to having an airbag in a car: it’s better not to crash, but also sensible to insure against the risk that the worst will happen. Plus, “the time to design an airbag is before you are skidding on ice”."
• Predicted vs. Actual: Closing the Gap – "Marcus Sheffer, chair of LEED’s Energy and Environment Technical Advisory Group (TAG), shared some ideas under consideration for the next update to the rating system slated for 2012. The group is closely looking at LEED’s energy credits so that energy simulations more accurately predict performance. For example, the TAG is looking at ways to encourage modeling earlier and more frequently in the design process. “We need to change the practice of validation modeling at the end of a project,” said Sheffer. “We need more iterative modeling.” "
  Interesting comment after the article – can we *really* predict performance?
• Three older houses to be Passivhaus retrofitted – "An architects practice is being funded by the Technology Strategy Board to undertake design and feasibity studies into a proposed scheme to retrofit three empty houses to Passivhaus standard. The Retrofit for the Future competition is designed to address the challenge laid down by the government's target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by the year 2050."
• Announcing Living Building Challenge Version 2.0 — ILBI – For those unfamiliar with ILBI, think of it as uber-LEED: "Version 2.0 of the Living Building Challenge expands its focus to local food production, unrestricted access to nature, no gated communities and other equity issues."

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These are my links for September 25th through October 1st:

• "Passive" Heating and Cooling Is a Misnomer. It’s Active. : TreeHugger – "there are 36 Billion square feet of non-residential buildings from the 50s through the 80s that need to be retrofitted and greened. It ain't going to be easy."
• AIArchitect This Week | Buildings Brought to Life: The First Project to Meet the Living Building Challenge Is Only Months Away – "For a building to meet the Living Building Challenge it must consume net-zero energy and water. It must produce net-zero waste. It must choose an ecologically responsible site and maintain it. Inherently unsustainable materials (like lead, mercury, and formaldehyde) are not allowed, and there’s a limited radius from which materials can be transported to the building site during construction. Indoor air quality must be maintained, and, among many other requirements, all of these sustainability features must be featured in educational materials and programs at the building. Since the challenge was formulated in 2006, no building has met it."
• Don’t Underestimate the Power of Information in Pursuing Sustainability | GreenerBuildings.com – "The Energy Passport is a related idea that could be implemented much more easily. Conceived in the early '90s by Dr. Yuri Matrosov of the Moscow Center for Energy Efficiency (CENEf), Energy Passport programs were first adopted in Moscow, then in Germany, which is now pushing for it to be implemented in the EU as a whole.
  The initial Energy Passport is based on modeled energy use and then actual energy use is compared each year with predicted use, which then could be accessed by tenants and others. Clearly, comparing actual energy use with predicted energy use, as well as consumption trends over time, would give designers and developers an incentive to get the prediction right in the first place (parenthetical note, without clear modeling rules it is shockingly easy to game the results of energy models), as well as provide a clear benchmark for operators to manage their buildings more closely."
• Glass Industry Raises Concerns Over ASHRAE 90.1 Revisions That Could Reduce the Use of Glass in Nonresidential Buildings – Impact of potential changes to prescriptive route for ASHRAE 90.1 (similar to old elemental method for Part L) for glazing: "The proposal does not recognize or accommodate the need for different glazing solutions across climate zones. It is a "one size fits all" approach and will limit the glazing choice to a small range of high transmission, clear low-E glazings. They are not the appropriate products in all climate zones, especially the Southern cooling-dominated climates because of the sunlight intensity. Use of such high transmission glass in those climate zones will likely result in greater use of blinds resulting in increasing lighting energy usage.
  …There is only limited possibility for saving energy in buildings unless the space also includes automatic daylighting controls. Even with recent proposals, daylighting controls are only required in rooms where the "primary side-lighted area" is less than 1,000 square feet. …"
• How to keep your mouth shut « Scott Berkun – Oh, I have been here many times. Like Scott, I'm recovering ;o). Read the whole post: "But then later on, in a new job at Microsoft in a group known as MSTE, I discovered a world of dysfunction, despair and passive/aggression. No one spoke their mind in public. Few people worked hard or asked tough questions. Quality of work, and morale, was low. So I soon felt obligated to mention these facts as often and as loudly as possible to leadership. I even expected to be rewarded for telling people how bad things were. Why wouldn’t they want to hear this? I thought.
  Before I knew it, I was that guy. The guy who always complains."
• 500 Internal Server Error – 500 Internal Server Error
• Constructing Excellence in the Built Environment » Blog Archive » Ethics and the Built Environment (by Jon de Souza) – If consultants only get involved at the Jus in Bello stage, is it ethical to build immoral buildings? Waiting avidly for part 2: "At present, the discussions about ethical behaviours in construction largely consider what happens after a decision has been taken to construct – the Jus In Buildo stage if you will. (Told you). What is missing is consideration of that former stage – the question asked is “can we build it”, but not “should we”. This seems to chime with our view of the world – that there are some things that simply shouldn’t be built. I mean, can any of us really morally defend snow domes in Dubai?"
• UK notches strong gains in renewable capacity in 2008 – Politics – Renewable energy news – Recharge – wind, solar, biofuels, wave/tidal/hydro and geothermal – "The UK’s installed renewable generation capacity surged 19% in 2008, thanks largely to a 727 megawatt (MW) increase in onshore wind capacity and a 192MW boost in offshore wind, according to new government statistics.
  At the same time, the amount of electricity produced from renewables in the UK rose a more modest 10%, to 21.6 gigawatt hours (GWh)."

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These are my links for September 14th through September 17th:

• When ‘the business case’ gets exciting – With BDRV we’ve pulled all of our past work – and all the other examples we can find – into a single, flexible guide. We want practically any company to be able to find a financial technique which helps them on practically any decision. We’ve done this by aligning the types of business case for sustainability with the drivers of shareholder value, so it is universally applicable.
• workinproperty News: Balfour Beatty is to buy Parsons Brinckerhoff for £380m – "The acquisition of Parsons Brinckerhoff represents the realisation of a number of key strategic objectives for Balfour Beatty. In particular, we believe it makes us one of the world's major players in professional services, substantially strengthens our US presence and puts Balfour Beatty in an excellent position to take advantage of increased infrastructure spending. It is a key step in becoming a global integrated leader in infrastructure services."
• Women forced out by long hours and sexual harassment – 07/09/2009 – Contract Journal – Damning report: "Women managers experience challenges not faced by their male counterparts because of the dominant masculinist ethos of corporate management culture that privileges men, ranks some men above others and places women on the periphery of the managerial class."
  I have some great tales, including the one where one senior manager accused our branch office of too high a proportion of admin staff (as obviously we couldn't possibly have 3 female engineers). Fun times ;o)
• The Market LEEDer | GreenerBuildings.com – Fantastic rebuttal to the anti-LEED post NYT article brigade (read the whole thing): "I mean, heaven forbid that we update the energy conversation from the '80s when it was all about operations. Depending on the building, the induced transportation energy, the embodied energy of the materials or the energy to provide and process water (which outside of the building requires almost 4 percent of the nation's TOTAL energy!), can exceed the operational energy, all of which LEED addresses directly or indirectly. Everyone agrees that LEED is not perfect and frankly it never will be because "perfect" is a relative term, not an absolute (theological discussions aside)."
• FT.com / Global Economy – France to count happiness in GDP – "The commission suggested a series of improvements to the way GDP was measured. It proposed accounting for people’s well-being and the sustainability of a country’s economy and natural resources. “The world over, citizens think we are lying to them, that the figures are wrong, that they are manipulated,” said the president. “And they have reasons to think like that. "
• EU to introduce new indicator to complement GDP – "The European Union will introduce an index in 2010 to track life qualities such as a clean environment, social cohesion and wellbeing to complement the gross domestic product (GDP) indicator in shaping policy.
  The environmental index will chart progress in areas such as greenhouse gas emissions, pollution, water use and waste generation to better reflect economic and social progress, European Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas said on Tuesday. "
• Modern Built Environment Knowledge Transfer Network secures funding until 2012 – Good news: "The MBE-KTN is delighted to announce that it has secured a further three years of funding from the Government's Technology Strategy Board. The funding will enable the network to build on its success in stimulating increased innovation across the whole built environment supply chain for real business benefit."
• BRE :: News – Who will win in the global market of building accreditation? It's like the board game Risk – BREEAM have just taken Russia: "BRE Global has signed an agreement with the Russian Green Building Council for the adoption of BREEAM. The agreement will accelerate the development of BREEAM for the Russian market." But will LEED take Kamchatka?
• BREEAM Bespoke to become BREEAM other Buildings – Sustainability Blog – New blogger on the block, BREEAMER, outlines the changes to BREEAM Bespoke (now to be known as BREEAM Other Buildings).

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