BuildingGreen announces top 10 products for 2018

BuildingGreen announces top 10 products for 2018

For the past 16 years, BuildingGreen has selected ten green building products that significantly improve upon standard “business-as-usual” practices. These products improve indoor air quality, consume less energy and water, reduce waste, and can even have a net-positive impact on the environment.

Building Green – TreeHugger

NRC seeks updated climate data to revamp building codes

The National Research Council is asking for help to figure out what kind of weather to expect in the coming years, so it can revamp national building codes to ensure everything from houses and office towers to bridges and wastewater systems can withstand the consequences of a warmer planet. Since 2011, the federal disaster financial assistance program has spent an average of $360-million a year, three times what the average annual cost was over the previous decade.

Globe and Mail

Can carbon-dioxide removal save the world?

Carbon Engineering, a company owned in part by Bill Gates, has its headquarters on a spit of land that juts into Howe Sound, an hour north of Vancouver. Until recently, the land was a toxic-waste site, and the company’s equipment occupies a long, barnlike building that, for many years, was used to process contaminated water.

New Yorker

Making the rounds at Greenbuild 17

Every year, the massive Greenbuild International Conference and Expo promises news and networking opportunities within the ever-evolving green-building industry. This week in Boston, there was a focus on everything from biophilic design to hazardous building materials to greening the rapidly accelerating transportation sector.

GreenBiz

Stretch codes and the green building marketplace

This week building industry professionals converged at Greenbuild 2017 to share their excitement and progress toward advancing green buildings. While the number of green buildings has grown dramatically over the last decade, the pace of construction still falls far short of what is needed to make a meaningful difference in reducing carbon emissions from the building sector.

GreenBiz

Workplaces offering paid extreme-weather leave

Even the workplace has to adapt to the warming world. As climate change creates more intense storms, companies have started preparing for work disruptions due to extreme weather. In a sign of the times, Fog Creek, a software company based in New York City, recently announced it would provide up to five days of paid “climate leave” for employees who can’t work because of extreme weather events.

Toronto Star

Why sustainable communities must look above the street level

I can’t recall a period in which the sustainability of our communities has captured the public attention quite like the present. Bike lanes, pedestrian-friendly city-planning, electric vehicle charging stations, green belts and, of course, public transportation seize the public imagination and quite often become the subject of heated debate.

GreenBiz

	Manulife first life insurer to offer a green bond
	Manulife Financial Corporation has priced an offering in Singapore of 500 million Singapore dollars principal amount of 3.00% subordinated notes due November 21, 2029.
	Canada Newswire, November 14, 2017

 

Efficient usage of space could save $1.5-trillion

Philips Lighting has released research saying businesses around the world could realize savings of up to USD 1.5 trillion in reduced rental costs alone if their office buildings were refurbished to the most efficient standards of today. The report says with energy efficient appliances and lighting firms can cut the office space required per employee by up to 50%.

Energy Manager Today

Emissions cuts should start with buildings

A new study co-authored by an MIT professor says the best way for cities to reduce emissions is to focus on residential buildings, not transportation.  “Intersecting Residential and Transportation CO2 Emissions,” analyzes how extensively local planning policies could either complement the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan (CPP) of 2015 or compensate for its absence.

Energy Manager Today

Still a bumpy road along B.C.’s ‘green highway’

British Columbia hit a milestone this spring, when one out of every 25 new passenger cars purchased was electric, making it the leading province in the country for EV sales. But there are some potholes along the West Coast’s “green highway.” BC Hydro signed a deal with a San Francisco company four years ago to expand a network of fast-charge stations.

Globe and Mail

Loblaw takes step toward zero-carbon deliveries

In an effort to reduce its carbon footprint, Loblaw has taken the first step toward moving its entire corporate-owned trucking fleet to electric vehicles. At a ceremony in Vancouver on Nov. 3, the grocery giant officially unveiled its first fully electric Class 8 truck, a 53-foot vehicle that’s able to make commercial grocery deliveries with zero carbon emissions.

Canadian Grocer

	Prefab, passive house, wooden and beautiful
	The idea of Passive House design is often confusing, particularly in North America, where a house is, well, a house. In Germany, where Passivhaus came from, Haus means building.
	TreeHugger.com, November 9, 2017

 

A look inside Google’s biophilic Chicago offices

Increasingly, green building project teams have attempted to incorporate biophilic design into their projects, but often their efforts amount to adding trees and plants or water features to their buildings. I believe this is because nothing in their training or backgrounds has prepared them for this exercise.

GreenBiz

What’s going on at COP23

Because the UN Climate Change Conference taking place now through Nov. 17 is a massive event spanning so many topics, it’s impossible to cover it all. Instead, I pulled together a sampling of articles and press releases across the web looking at the earlier days of the gathering, to offer a basic overview of the buzz in Bonn, Germany.

Environmental Leader

COP23 developments to watch

As the 23rd session of the Conference of the Parties (COP23) to the U.N. Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) proceeds, it would be hard to exaggerate how different this year feels compared to recent years’ meetings. There is no Paris Agreement to forge, as there had been two years ago. And then there’s the matter U.S. withdraw from the Paris Agreement, even as it will still attend COP23.

Green Biz

How S&P credit ratings change by environmental factors

S&P Global’s corporate credit ratings – the organization’s predictions about a company’s capacity and willingness to meet its financial commitments as they come due – were affected by environment and climate (E&C) factors for more than 700 companies.

Environmental Leadership

Products, Technology and Design

Metal fabric optimizes solar control without jeopardizing views

GKD’s new Solar Omega stainless steel metal fabric panels are geared for sun shading. As the sun rises higher in the sky, the stacking effects of the horizontal metal rods shade the building façade. As the sun descends, more daylight is allowed through the mesh.

BDC Network

Market Trends and Research

Worse climate change in the offing

The world has been given a stark warning by some of its leading scientists: there is much worse climate change on the way. The UN climate summit meeting here has been told: “There is no room for complacency. Climate change is here. It is dangerous. And it is about to get much worse.

Globe-net.com

Municipal Policy and Urban Issues

London’s Oxford Street may go pedestrian only

Should bikes be banned too? Or would that be “an unqualified disaster for cycling in London”? London’s Oxford Street is a horror show, particularly at this time of year. Even though private cars are not allowed there, the two lanes are filled with taxis and buses.

TreeHugger

Renewable Energy

Wyatt wants Winnipeg to generate and sell solar power

Coun. Russ Wyatt wants Winnipeg to create a new arm’s-length corporation that will generate solar power and sell it back to Manitoba Hydro. The Transcona councillor has authored a motion to create a new non-profit entity to set up solar farms on city property, sell solar power and promote the benefits of green energy.

CBC

Residential Green Buildings

Modular shipping container to be staff accommodation in Banff

With golden shovels in hand, Canadian Rocky Mountain Resorts (CRMR) and Ladacor Modular systems gathered at CRMR’s project site on Banff Avenue today to launch construction of an exciting new staff housing project, which will see the replacement of old staff accommodation on the site with a beautiful new infill-addition to the property made from upcycled shipping containers.

Canada Newswire

Corporate Sustainability

This real estate developer has a passion for sustainability

With a passion for sustainability, Veronica Mainetti, President of Sorgente Group of America, is committed to developing and restoring buildings that are both luxurious and environmentally conscious. She has traveled around the globe from Greenland to Vermont in order to learn about climate change and find new, energy-efficient ways to create projects that are truly green.

Forbes

Waste Management

7 common waste myths, debunked

When it comes to trash and recycling, it can be difficult to determine what’s fact and what’s fiction. So I wanted to set the record straight by addressing some of the common waste myths and misconceptions taking up precious, unwanted space in between your ears – and provide you with the real truths that lie behind them.

Environmental Leader

Lafarge seeks permission to start burning tires

Lafarge Canada Inc. has filed an application for industrial approval to launch a one-year pilot program to burn tires as fuel at its cement plant in Brookfield, N.S. The provincial Environment Department is reviewing the application. Assuming it is complete, staff will have 60 days to make a decision.

CBC

Other

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