I was recently at a dinner party at a home designed by Shelter Architecture.  It was a renovation of a regular old South Minneapolis home, not a huge lot and I thought it was an incredible use of space!

Energy Efficient Windows - The Paris Way

Lowered Counters and Efficient Workspace Design

View From the Master Bedroom

Sustainable can mean more than energy efficiency or indoor air quality.  The Shelter crew takes into consideration designing for aging gracefully without having to move or remodel, the kitchen is laid out to promote a better diet and storage is designed to decrease waste and over-consumption.

First LEED Platinum Home (New Construction) in MN

Kitchen to Age With

Energy Efficient Appliances With Style

I’m inspired!  Are you?  Check out more project inspirations at ShelterArchitecture.com.

The MN Renewable Energy Society (MRES) is hosting the 2011 Minnesota Solar Tour (http://mnrenewables.org/solar-tour).

Have you ever been interested in producing your own renewable energy or seeing how a pv solar array works?  I’m sure some people might be thinking that renewable energy and design don’t go together.  I’m happy to report that MN has a growing number of homes using renewables both in the cities and in rural areas.  You can see both the design elements and learn about the technical aspects on October 1, 2011.

Solar Electric and Solar Thermal Systems – photo via Innovative Power Systems/Minneapolis

Homeowners will be opening their houses for the tour so you can see all the working parts, plus if you follow the provided map you can make sure to stop by the homes that utilize the following sustainable building and living topics.

MN Solar Tour System Components

Here’s a quick overview of some of the system components so you can figure out which homes should be at the top of your list.

Solar Electric (PV – Photo-voltaic):  Harnessing the suns radiation with arrays of photovoltaic cells that convert it into direct current that is either used for current load, stored for later in a battery or resold to a utility (grid tied).

Solar Hot Water:  Using the sun to heat water either directly or by heat transfer and saving either the electricity or fuel that would normally be used.

Solar Hot Water System (photo via Innovative Power Systems/Minneapolis)

Passive Solar:  Using the suns radiation to directly heat elements of a structure that will retain it and/or direct it as heat in the form of infrared radiation.

Ground-Source Heat:  (Geothermal heating/cooling)  Using the earths constant temperature found at levels below the frost line to assist in cooling or heating by providing a baseline temperature that is closer to our desired comfort range than is achieved by heating winter or cooling summer air.

Wind:  Using wind energy to generate energy with wind turbine or turbines.

MN Solar Tour (photo via MN Renewable Energy Society)

Don’t forget to ask the homeowners or professionals about the pros and cons of each component from the pre-planning stage to today.

Interested in building green?  Too much confusing information out there? Not sure which products to choose? Need a contractor referral? Interested in green building tips?

At Build Sustainable Homes we promote sustainability and building green. You should think about choosing green products or resources when upgrading your home or thinking about an addition.

You can find answers, discussions, events and photo and video examples of all those things at our website, buildsustainablehomes.com.

Join the BSH Green Building Movement because you deserve to have the resources and information to decide what’s best for you.   Compare and choose between green and conventional building based on:

- Cost (upfront and lifespan)
- Timeframe for your project
- Your priorities (save money, better health, preserving the environment)

Join the movement by following us on Facebook or Twitter.

Oh, and ask your friends and family to join too…!  Thanks!

Yes those playsets are the hallmark of doting parents that can provide a little jungle gym for their children to interact with for about, and I’m open to comment on this, 6 years. Or considering consecutive litters using these playsets could up it to a maximum of 10-12 years, (you can imagine my enthusiasm when the Obama’s decided to install a redwood playset at the Whitehouse).

Perhaps it stems from my time in the Pacific Northwest among the Redwoods and especially that spent in and around Humboldt County in Trinidad and Kneeland, but I have a hard time seeing the wisdom in any use of Redwoods. It’s hard to instill into someone yet to visit them how massive these trees are and how imposing they are on the area, even with there being less than 5% of historic level of the Giant Sequoia remaining.
Watching the winds coming inland off the ocean, misting about the treetops and then ending up as clouds further inland is an impressive first hand experience of that sustaining cycle of nature, and imagining how much of an effect on the ecosystem these trees, nearly 2000% greater in number would have before they were logged is astonishing.

Considering how much of an impact these trees play on the ecosystem, how many have been logged already, and how large and old these trees are able to grow to makes logging any of them seem unwise, especially in light of the fact that the largest demand for Redwoods comes from kids playsets, specifically Rainbow playsystems.

Essentially we are cutting down the trees that could benefit your grandchildren’s grandchildren and all the generations in between to make a temporary jungle gym for the next six years.
There are plenty of other alternative materials that would seem fit to construct a playset out of; steel (high recycled content), composite wood (high recycled content), recycled plastics (landfill diverted) and probably a few more. So the next time you see one of these advertised as ‘green’ at a home and garden show or on a manufacturers website think about what is being sacrificed.

Next article, FSC endorses redwoods?

Visitors to our house, recipients of our flyers, attendees of our events and us here at Build Sustainable Homes all have used recycled or rapidly renewable materials for our consumable paper products. And unless you asked, you probably didn’t even realize it.

It is just one of those things that make sense to me, ethically and even more so lately financially. Mariesa has been great about recruiting people to purchase the Enviro 100 copy paper from Eureka Recycling. It costs less than copy paper from the big box office stores also! And we can find tissue paper for competetive prices at many of the places we shop. (check the chart at the end) After spending a good amount of time in the Pacific Northwest, and especially in Northern California’s redwoods, it definitely changes how you think about trees. Somehow I think that down the road, the fact that we used virgin forests to clean our fannies might not sit too well with our following generations. So, recycled content tissue paper = great concept, and now Van Hotum from the Netherlands has just raised the bar.

From GreenBiz News,

[ AMSTERDAM, Netherlands — "Claiming that it has made the world's first carbon neutral toilet paper, manufacturer Van Houtum last Friday at the ISSA Interclean conference in Amsterdam, rolled out its new product, Satino Black.
(look how edgy these guys are! here we have giggly pink teddy bears pitching 0% recycled pillow soft toilet paper, and they use boxers, goth punks and firefighters to sell their 100% recycled product)

At the conference, the company highlighted its many environmental attributes, saying that over the course of the last two years, the company has overhauled its production processes to achieve the following results:

• 100 percent recycled content, at least 85 percent of which is post-consumer
• Cradle to Cradle certification at the Silver lever
• Ecolabel certified since 2008
• Manufactured using 100 percent renewable energy

When added up, Van Houtum says this is the world's greenest toilet paper."

"Black is the new green," Nick op den Buijsch, Concept Manager of Socially Responsible Entrepreneurship at Van Houtum, said in a statement last week. "Satino Black has been developed to get a step closer to the set environmental objectives with one simple act. This makes it possible for everyone to make a contribution to breaking through the unnecessary exhaustion of the natural resources on our planet."

According to the brochure for the new toilet paper and hand-towel line (available here as a PDF):

Satino Black is the end result of thinking ahead for many years about, "How can we minimize our impact on the environment?" Just before the environmental summit in Copenhagen, publications appeared to the effect that the use of toilet paper is among the top 5 domestic daily environmental 'eco-crimes'. Many consumers don't realize that most toilet paper is still made from live trees that are cut and processed for toilet paper. This is completely unnecessary. Toilet paper itself is a disposable product that disappears down the drain, it can not be recycled. ]

Since we are not in Holland however,
check out the NRDC’s Environmental Ratings of Household Tissue Paper Products no carbon neutral rating on that chart, but it rates total percentage recycled, percentage post-consumer, fsc, and chemicals used in the process.

For those that have been following the Twins Stadium and its sustainable design and attributes, which by the way was just this month awarded the LEED Silver rating by the USGBC , may recall the earlier decision by the Minnesota Plumbing Board to recommend using low flow units instead of the specified waterless urinals. While this may have initially seemed to be a disappointment, in hindsight the board may have made a prudent decision. Two other buildings that had installed waterless urinals previously have now made the decision to remove them due to smell and back up issues; Chicago’s City Hall and the Environmental Protection Agency’s office in Sacramento . So not to imply an apples to apples comparison here , the Chicago City Hall fixtures were part of a renovation on an existing building within a city that’s code requires copper plumbing and the Sacramento EPA offices are a 25 story high rise. All of these having the same principles but with distinct dynamics affecting each of their plumbing systems.
These fixtures do require a bit of maintenance; an oil reservoir that keeps odors down by maintaining a film of oil over the drain needs to be refilled and it’s recommended to pour a few gallons of water into them every two weeks or so. They also do not have the anti-splash qualities that most users are perhaps accustomed to, resulting in a bit of residual ‘leftovers’ around the units. Considering the literal volume these units would have experienced, I can understand the reluctance behind the initial request for these in the Twins ballpark. Could the ballpark have used these successfully? Perhaps, but with more strikes than hits for waterless urinals, I think the decision to use a proven method to reduce water usage with low-flow fixtures was a good call.

This episode does underscore our mission here at Build Sustainable Homes, that experienced professionals are the difference between a projects’ success and difficulties. Specifying new materials and products is a risky endeavor, and finding the professionals who have the first hand knowledge and consensus on how they perform for the life cycle is our best resource in helping sustainable and green practices succeed.

Posted using ShareThis

a few follow ups to this link.
FSC wood? down to 13% more than conventional according to Buy LEED Lumber.

• From: eco-structure 2010
• Posted on:
  March 15, 2010

On the heels of the publication of ASHRAE Standard 189.1, a new code addressing sustainability in traditional commercial and high-performance buildings is now open for public review and comment. The International Green Construction Code (IGCC) Public Version 1.0 addresses energy use, water use, material and resource use, indoor environment quality, and building impacts on the environment such as greenhouse gas emissions, site design, sustainability owner/facility management education, and exiting buildings. Designed to provide a regulatory framework regarding sustainability in commercial buildings, it was developed by a Sustainable Building Technology Committee (SBTC) created by the International Code Council (ICC) board of directors. The American Institute of Architects and ASTM International served as cooperating sponsors.

Rather than compete with other codes or standards, the IGCC is designed to coordinate or integrate with existing International Codes (I-Codes) to provide minimum regulations for buildings and systems using prescriptive and performance-related provisions. For example, the IGCC uses the requirements of the 2012 International Energy Conservation Codes as its baseline energy provision.  In addition, recognizing potential conflicts in the marketplace, the ICC worked with the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE), the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), and the Illuminating Engineers Society (IES) to incorporate Standard 189.1 in the technical content of the IGCC as an alternative path of compliance.

In creating the initial provisions, the SBTC sought to create baselines and guidelines that do not unnecessarily increase construction costs; do not restrict the use of new materials, products or methods of construction; and do not give preferential treatment to particular types or classes of materials, products, or methods of construction. As a model code, the IGCC requires adoption by a governing jurisdiction before becoming law. Recognizing that the model language can be modified as needed to address local conditions, the code includes a set of “project electives” that will give jurisdictions options to customize the code beyond the baseline sustainability options.

The first version of the code is available for download at iccsafe.org, and the ICC will be accepting public comments via the web site until May 14. Comments will be posted on July 2, and public hearings will take place August 14-22 in Rosemont, Ill. Public Version 2.0 will be issued in November, and final action hearings are planned for 2011, with the end goal being the publication of the 2012 IGCC.

]]> http://buildsustainablehomes.wordpress.com/2010/04/06/international-green-construction-code-released/feed/ 0 buildsustainablehomes http://buildsustainablehomes.wordpress.com/2010/03/30/23/ http://buildsustainablehomes.wordpress.com/2010/03/30/23/#comments Tue, 30 Mar 2010 22:28:12 +0000 buildsustainablehomes http://buildsustainablehomes.wordpress.com/?p=23 Continue reading →]]> Minneapolis figures in newly published Green Building Opportunity Index

March 26th 2010; Sustainable Business Oregon

A new green building market ranking by Cushman & Wakefield and BetterBricks pegs Minneapolis in the No. 13 spot for commercial real estate development opportunity specifically for “green” office buildings.

The Green Building Opportunity Index surveyed 25 U.S. central business districts based on six different factors. While the recent Energy Star efficient building ranking just counted up the number of certified energy-efficient building, the index looks at market conditions, investment outlook, green building implementation (which includes LEED and Energy Star ratings), state energy initiatives, general green culture and local mandates and incentives.

“The goal behind this was to relay information to our clients in a holistic way so they could make informed decisions,” said Matt Johnson, a Cushman & Wakefield broker based in Portland who helped develop the index, “not to tell them what’s important and what’s not.”

Looking at all six attributes, San Francisco ranked at the top of the index, followed by Oakland and Midtown Manhattan. Seattle was ranked 11th.

Of the individual categories Portland ranked No. 2 for its “green culture,” between Downtown, New York City (No. 1) and Miami (No.2). The variables study for the culture criterion, as tracked by SustainLane, include green economy, city innovation, planning and land use and transit ridership.

Tags: Economic development, Green building, Transportation

]]> http://buildsustainablehomes.wordpress.com/2010/03/30/23/feed/ 0 buildsustainablehomes http://buildsustainablehomes.wordpress.com/2010/03/19/excel-launches-its-solar-rewards-program/ http://buildsustainablehomes.wordpress.com/2010/03/19/excel-launches-its-solar-rewards-program/#comments Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:20:18 +0000 buildsustainablehomes http://buildsustainablehomes.wordpress.com/?p=13 Continue reading →]]> Solar*Rewards Program Details

Residential and commercial customers with Xcel Energy electric service in Minnesota can apply for the Solar*Rewards program. The system size requirements are between 0.5kW to 40.kW DC.
System Size     0.5kW- 40.00kW DC
Who Qualifies     Locations Served by Xcel Energy in Minnesota
Building Types     Residential and Commercial
Incentive Payment     $2.25 per Watt*
Contract Term     20-year contract

http://www.xcelenergy.com/Minnesota/Residential/RenewableEnergy/Solar_Rewards/Pages/ProgramDetails.aspx

This program is in addition to any state and federal programs

]]> http://buildsustainablehomes.wordpress.com/2010/03/19/excel-launches-its-solar-rewards-program/feed/ 0 buildsustainablehomes