Kitchen & Bath Sustainable

Green Certification Reported Up Sharply

New York — The number of home builders, remodelers and other members of the real estate and construction industry who hold the Certified Green Professional (CGP) educational designation now tops 4,000, the National Association of Home Builders announced.
The milestone, according to the Washington, DC-based NAHB, “is the latest sign that NAHB green building education and training initiatives continue to find an enthusiastic audience”.
The NAHB Research Center, which administers the National Green Building Certification program for new homes, developments and remodeling projects, is also reporting “solid growth,” according to the NAHB. More than 350 homes have been certified and there are 4,500 projects in the certification pipeline, the association reported.
“When the housing market rebounds, it will be accompanied by increased demand for green and energy-efficient new homes and remodeling projects,” the association observed.
CGPs must successfully complete three days of classroom training, have two years of industry experience, and commit to continuing education requirements.
The coursework is now being enhanced to reflect the requirements of building to the National Green Building Standard, the consensus standard for green homes, developments and remodeling projects approved by the American National Standards Institute in January.
In addition, NAHB said it is creating advanced training for CGPs that will result in a new designation for building practitioners: the Master Green Builder Remodeler.

In an ideal world, all buildings would be zero-energy.  They would have garden rooftops to clean rainwater and cool the city in which they are built.  Every lightbulb in the building would come with a lifetime warranty, each plank of wood used, ounce of concrete poured, metal metallurgized (probably not a real word) would have come from someplace else, some other less efficient building, torn down (sustainably) to provide parts for a better, cleaner, greener building.

In a less ideal world, the building would still exist.  It would have CFLs, a green air conditioning system, no-formaldehyde wood components, working windows.  Some of the materials would be recycled, but some would not.  The developer might have purchased some carbon offset credits to adjust for this, but probably not.  Still, there would be recycling/composting facilities and solar panels on the roof to offset the impact on the fossil fuel-run energy grid.

In our world, there are still forests which aren’t sustainably run, pH-destroying nitrogenous fertilizers, formaldehyde in our processes, high-VOC stains and paints being used, and buildings which, although there might be a wealth of CFLs and LEDS, aren’t using any solar or wind power, let alone a green garden on the roof.

But that’s why we’ve got green building programs, I hear you say.  Or, do we?  The New York Times is reporting this week that some buildings certified by the USGBC aren’t meeting the program’s standards once certified and in use.  The USGBC doesn’t deny it, either.

The council’s own research suggests that a quarter of the new buildings that have been certified do not save as much energy as their designs predicted and that most do not track energy consumption once in use. And the program has been under attack from architects, engineers and energy experts who argue that because building performance is not tracked, the certification may be falling short in reducing emissions tied to global warming.

Yikes. 

The tack most of us in the green journalism community have taken on the subject is to say that if there weren’t organizations like the USGBC making their certifications desirable for tax credits and energy savings audits, the building community at large might have had less pressure from the green movement as a whole.  Basically, any movement toward sustainability is better than none at all.  Still, it makes this reporter wonder why a developer would bother going through the paperwork, the energy audits, and the bureaucracy of the process to attain LEED certification in the first place if the building’s overall performance wasn’t going to be tracked, monitored and, in some way, monetized.  Theoretically, it’s just as much as savings for them in the long run as it potentially is for the environment.

Let me know what you think! Leave your comments.

Quick update on something potentially neat: we got a little note this morning about Hakatai tiles being delivered in a reportedly “carbon neutral” state thanks to carbon offsets. 

From the company’s public relations rep:

Hakatai Glass Mosaic Tiles are now delivered carbon-neutral in a partnership with GreenShipping.com and the Bonneville Environmental Foundation. GreenShipping.com uses a CO2 emissions calculator and to provide a total, and Hakatai purchases carbon offsets from BEF to help fund the development of renewable energy.Neat stuff.  How do carbon offsets sit with you?  Would you consider buying them if they offset the footprint of a major project like a new home construction or massive addition to/remodel of an existing space? 

It’s a controversial topic, an attempt to reconcile those who believe minimalism and the “leave no trace” philosophy of environmentalism with the very carbon un-neutral building industry.  Thoughts?

It’s never too early, in my humble opinion, to start thinking about Greenbuild, so here we are: THINK ABOUT GREENBUILD!  Last year, it was impossible to find a hotel room if you didn’t book in advance, so I recommend getting on that ASAP if you plan to attend this year’s festivities in Phoenix.  It’s going to be quite a scene: Al Gore and Sheryl Crow the night before the show starts?  I’ll take it.

 But a little bit more from the USGBC, with links:

“The 2009 show will be held on Nov. 11-13, 2009, in Phoenix, Ariz. This past year’s conference in Boston, Mass. drew more than 28,000 attendees and featured more than 800 exhibit booths. Visit www.greenbuildexpo.org for more information. To view last year’s Greenbuild show, go to www.greenbuild365.org and to watch a video recap, visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghqw9WqZ_i4“

• Cifial USA has partnered with the EPA’s WaterSense program; the company has announced that two of its collections (Quadra and Techno) are now WaterSense labelled.
• The USGBC says “If You Lived Here, You’d Be Green By Now”; new headquarters at 2101 L St. NW in Washington DC is LEED Platinum certified. Tours available, no kidding. Check out the specs here.
• Samsung Staron announces SCS certification for recycled material content for 7 Staron products (all with fun names like Pebble, Seastar, Fennel and Noir); Prods certified by SCS qualify to help meet LEED standard MR 4.1 and/or MR 4.2.  Read more here. (at Green Lodging News’ site)
• Habitat for Humanity is expanding their green building efforts; a home in Alabama is striving for LEED Gold and Caroma donated a toilet to this effort. Read the full release here. (Document will open in Google Docs)

DuPont has announced that a variety of products from its portfolio have been awarded the National Association of Home Builders’ Approved Product Seal.  This is big news for the company, as its DuPont Surfaces division is the first in that product category to receive the third-party certification.

Read the full release after the jump. 

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Good morning!

• So this is a little off the beaten path for us, but I received a product release about some pretty little alternatives to paper towels.  File under: Implementing Green Style!  Who doesn’t like a chance for everything in the kitchen to coordinate?
•  The USGBC gives a big thumbs-up to the House of Reps for passing green incentives legislation.
• Natural Home magazine gives yet another peek into the massive design/build project that is the rebuilding of Greensburg, KS. 

All this, after the jump! (more…)

Two years early! 

Miele has announced its new G 2002 series dishwashers, like the one at left, are compliant with the EPA’s shiny new Energy Star requirements which are rolling out in 2011.

 According to the company, “Miele’s previous Normal program used only 6.1 gallons of water per load, making the new series 17% more efficient – saving about a gallon per load. In its Economy cycle, the new Miele series only uses 1.2 gallons (for those who want to save even more water and energy).”

Miele’s been taking further steps to reduce its carbon footprint, and the footprint of its products. Check out the company’s sustainability report here.

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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