Elemental

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 11th through September 19th:

• BREEAM set to cover communities – Building – Unlike existing BREEAM tools, the assessment will take into account regional requirements. Cotter said: “For example, does the development meet the criteria for employment stimulation? It’s about making sure development complements regional local planning requirements.”

  It has not been decided whether the assessment will include existing buildings.

• Rogers and Foster shun nuclear design framework – Building – “Ethically, we wouldn’t get involved in projects like this. We have a fairly strict constitution set up by Richard [Rogers] which prohibits work on military schemes and power stations.”
• NHF demands stricter CO2 timetable for housebuilders – Building – Orr said: “Currently, private developers are not being compelled to meet minimum standards on greenhouse gas emissions at all. In fact, they are being allowed to put their profits ahead of the survival of future generations.

  “It's time that ministers legally locked private developers into the same timetable as housing associations. We have long been calling for the government to ensure that from April 2008 all new private homes emit 25% less CO2. And we would like ministers to make certain that all new privately built homes are zero carbon by 2016, at the very latest.

  “Unless the government compels the private sector to meet the same standards and timetable, private companies will simply try to wriggle out of their environmental duties, saying it costs too much.”

• The Question of Global Warming – The New York Review of Books – "Environmentalism has replaced socialism as the leading secular religion. And the ethics of environmentalism are fundamentally sound. Scientists and economists can agree with Buddhist monks and Christian activists that ruthless destruction of natural habitats is evil and careful preservation of birds and butterflies is good. The worldwide community of environmentalists—most of whom are not scientists—holds the moral high ground, and is guiding human societies toward a hopeful future. Environmentalism, as a religion of hope and respect for nature, is here to stay. This is a religion that we can all share, whether or not we believe that global warming is harmful."
• OMNIVORACIOUS: Thomas Friedman and Fareed Zakaria: Author One-to-One – via Ben Casnocha, Friedman takes Zakaria to task on the alleged green revolution: "So you'll know the green revolution is happening when you see some bodies–corporate bodies–along the side of the road: companies that didn't change and therefore died. Right now we don't have that kind of market, that kind of change-or-die situation. Right now companies feel like they can just change their brand, not actually how they do business, and that will be enough to survive."
• Felicity Lawrence: We could slash our CO2 emissions if we ate less meat. What a pity Boris Johnson doesn’t agree | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk – Whilst the article is good, the reason I am flagging this one is the fact that McD's are the Olympics 2012 official caterer. Cognitive dissonance, anyone?
• TALL BUILDINGS OFFER ECONOMIC BENEFITS, SAYS REPORT: British Property Federation – Fascinating study on tall buildings (in response to Boris quashing some of Ken's plans, I strongly suspect) in London: "The exercise was one of changing the distribution of employment, rather than total levels of employment. The economic benefit was equivalent to the annual output for each of those 80,000 workers increasing by £2,500 a year. A second scenario redistributing those 80,000 workers to less accessible parts of Central London produced a decline in output equivalent to £1,600 a year for every one of those 80,000 workers."

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