Kitchen & Bath Sustainable

Were you aware that May is remodeling month?

It’s OK if you missed most of it–let’s borrow of a phrase from the Earth Day folks and say “Every month is remodeling month!”  Here’s to the remodelers, who turn the fixer-uppers into the dream homes of tomorrow, who take a coffin-like galley builder’s kitchen and bust out the walls to make it the fabulous open-plan hot spot of the house.

Remodeling can be spun green, too, especially with this year’s tax incentives to encourage folks (your clients) to increase their home’s energy efficiency.  With more people than ever deciding to stay put (leading to the rise of the Staycation and other silly marketing spins on the word “Stay”) , the government’s push for remodeling comes at a very good time.

Steve Gray Renovations, a smart building company based in Indianapolis, has some ideas about how you and your business can capitalize on the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and market these developments effectively to your benefit. (N.B. — There are some other reasons to visit his site–Steve Gray is a master of promotion and marketing; the company’s Web site alone shows that much off immediately. KBDN covered Gray’s business model in an Industry Profile last year, that you can read here.)  The page is geared toward consumers; his clients know about it from a monthly eNewsletter Gray sends out to direct them to new content on his site.  Check it out here.

HGTV is practically required viewing for us scribes here at KBDN.  Nobody loves a good floorplan like we do.

But apart from its fix-it shows and the remodeling disaster diaries, HGTV has stepped up to the plate for green and really hit it out of the sustainably managed park, so to speak.  From groundbreaking programming to sponsoring an annual Green Home, the network is doing a lot of legwork for the sustainable design cause.

So that’s why I was particularly thrilled to see that the network’s Green Home earn some Brownie points and recognition from the powers-that-be at the Environmental Protection Agency.

The EPA announced this week that the 2009 Green Home in Port St. Lucie, FL  has earned both the Indoor AirPlus and Energy Star labels.  Doesn’t hurt that it’s pretty, either–protects viewers from visual pollution!

For more about the 2009 Green Home including product, process and professionals involved, visit HGTV’s Green Home Web site here.

Read the release after the jump, and let me know what you think of the photos in the comments.

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 We interrupt this regularly scheduled K/BIS to update a story I hope you’ve been following as much as I have.

 Remember Greensburg, KS?  Remember how an F5 tornado 1.7 miles wide flattened 90% of the structures in town on Friday, May 5, 2007?  With virtually nothing left standing in Greensburg but the grain elevator, the New York Times reported on May 7, 2007 that the town of approximately 1,500 would have to be completely rebuilt. 

 Seven days later, there was already talk of rebuilding, and the town leaders were beginning to envision emerging from the tragedy.

 July brought the exciting news that Greensburg was literally going to become a Green burg, and the sustainable building folks rejoiced.  The goal: LEED Platinum, the first-ever city to aim for the rating. Zero-energy commercial buildings, houses and schools. Wind power, solar power, energy efficient everything. mong some donors to the reemerging town are names familiar to us in the k&b world like Caroma, Evolve and on the architectural/building side, companies such as Dryvit and PF Waterworks.

 And after one year had passed, the Discovery’s Planet Green channel announced that a new reality program called simply ‘Greensburg’, which had been in planning stages shortly after the LEED announcement, would follow the town’s journey from grisly scene to lean and green.

 Now, it’s the two-year anniversary of the tornado, the bustling town is well into its restructuring and is holding their annual celebration to mark the event.  Not only that, Planet Green renewed the town’s series for a second season; the season premiere is this Monday, May 4… it’s worth a look, for sure.  Check out details and local air times at Planet Green.

 Important themes here for green building and design in general, and a landmark achievement all around for everyone involved; it’s the making of lemonade from organic lemons, to be sure. I’ll be back with more K/BIS coverage later today.

 Stay green, America!

(To see the New York Times’ extensive coverage of the tornado and the rebuilding of Greensburg, click here).

This year’s Marchin’ right along!  We’re marching to the beat of a different drummer this year!… OK, enough with the March puns, and down to some green housekeeping.  Let’s get caught up with some good green news.

First, a convenient slideshow–TreeHugger shows you what the new Prez is going to help you buy, via tax credits in the new stimulus package.

Nick Grohe of Hansgrohe addresses low-flow, aeration and the various green benefits water products can provide in this handy-dandy Q&A.

The USGBC has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (doesn’t that sound peaceful?) with BREEAM, Green Star, Green Building Council Australia and the UK Green Building Council to get the beginnings of a standard metric of CO2 emissions assessment in new home and building construction started.  Read it here.

It’s that kind of Monday: the jobs report is bad, the NAHB and NAR are reporting that everything everywhere is down, so let’s cheer ourselves up with some good news about some great green products.

Snaidero Greens Up, Christopher Peacock Cabinetry Gets Smart and Merillat and Quality Think About Tomorrow…

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It’s very likely, if you live in the northeast that you’ve heard of Davis & Warshow.  The Maspeth, NY-based company has been a major supplier of kitchen and bath fixtures, tiles and plumbing products for 83 years. KBDN has featured D&W for its achievements in the past, and now K&B Sustainable is working with the company to bring you a snapshot of Implementing Green in action!

So what the heck am I talking about?  Davis & Warshow, which has eight sales showrooms and four distribution centers in New York City, Long Island and Westchester County, NY, is turning its original 8.5-acre Maspeth headquarters into what they are calling “Practically Green.”

“Practically Green” is D&W’s sustainability manifesto, a kind of small business model for committing to green in what the company calls a “pragmatic, progressive” way.

“There’s no way to flip a switch and be carbon neutral overnight,” says v.p. David Finkel.  The company has begun implementing the changes which it hopes will eventually lead the Maspeth location to qualify for LEED status.

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If you’re anything like me, you probably have a stash of change somewhere in case of a vending machine emergency.  (I never know when I might require peanut M&Ms.) I don’t know if it’s the economy, or if it’s because of the transition in government, or the frantic tone of the news agencies, or the fact that my bank keeps changing names, but I find myself looking at the housing numbers reports and breaking into my emergency vending machine fund more and more often these days.

So any news from the USGBC, which is made up of a bunch of generally bright and cheery folks, is good news and the latest from them is the greatest: a flurry of recently released reports seem to confirm that no matter what ups and downs occur in the building sector, green is going to be a driving force in the overall recovery.  Terrific!  We’ll all have jobs, and I can save my change for New York City parking meters.

Read on here for the better news. (PDF format)

• The keynotes are available to stream live here.  Definitely, definitely, definitely check out the closing plenary with E.O. Wilson which I, myself, just finished watching.
• For those of you who deal on the commercial side of the business, you might find this interesting: LEED for retail is now open for comments from the industry.  Check that out here. (Fair warning: it’s in PDF format)

Want to get caught up on the changes in LEED for 2009?  You can watch the update streaming live here.  Broadcast begins at 1 pm today, Thursday, November 20.

Enjoy!  If you miss it, or can’t make it, I’ll have the full rundown in the changes for next year available right here next week!

My final day of Greenbuild has been a rousing success already, and I haven’t even been on the exhibit floor yet!

• Made a contact who’s going to give me the low-down on the new CARB regulations next week.  Get ready for everything you ever wanted to know about California air regs, but were too afraid to ask.
• Had a bang-up interview with the VP of Underwriters Laboratory about the soft launch of the company’s new environmental certifications program.  UL’s new program is going to be a one-stop shopping for manufacturers looking to conform to green standards and get a third-party seal of approval to take to market.  Very cool stuff.  More on that tonight.
• The AIA’s “Walk the Walk” program has a presence here; they’re fully launched now beyond their statement of purpose. For more info, go here–going to stop by and learn all about it, so more on that to come, as well.
• There’s insulation here made of sand.  I thought spray-foam was ingenious, so I’m totally bowled over by this.  This isn’t directly related to kitchens or baths, but as insulation is often the cheapest and easiest way to improve a home’s energy efficiency, this is a basic building block to get acquainted with. And, of course, there’s an organization just dying to tell you all about it: the North American Insulation Manufacturers Association.

The long-awaited photos will be up tonight.  Hope you’re all having a great show, and remember, if you’re not attending but want to stay connected, you can get a variety of content on Greenbuild365, including the opportunity to watch the remainder of speeches, as well as the closing keynote tomorrow, streaming live on your computer.  More info to come later.

Stay green and stay tuned!