How will the recession affect green buildings, codes and development?

It’s a timely question and one I’ve been wondering about for some time. It also happens to be the topic of a panel discussion I am moderating on Thursday evening for the Cascadia Region Green Building Council at

What to do?

Seattle University.

The event features a number of great panelists: Michael Weinstein of the Urban Innovations Group, Bruce Herbert of Newground Social Investment, Jayson Antonoff of the City of Seattle Green Building Program, Ric Cochrane of King County Green Tools Program and Aaron Fairchild of G2B Ventures. Come eat, drink and discuss with us! The discussion costs $10. To register, go here.

However, our event is not the only good thing happening on Thursday evening. If you’re not at Greenbuild, here are a number of local things to keep you interested:

On Wednesday and Thursday, Alex Steffen of Worldchanging.com will host a two-day lecture to flesh out a pathway to a great sustainable future. On Wednesday, the lecture is called “A new Global Future,” and on Thursday it is called “Seattle’s Bright Green Moment.” Each lecture costs $5.

On Thursday, Tacoma will host a talk on its Center for Urban Waters. The center, an environmental research space, is seeking LEED platinum certification. The talk costs $10 at the door or $7.50 in advance. More info here.

On Friday and Saturday, the Northwest Energy Coalition is hosting its fall conference on energy efficiency. The conference features a keynote talk by Rob Bernard, chief environmental strategist for Microsoft, and multiple panel discussions. More info here.

Teams install the solar panels

In June, the Seattle Aquarium installed its first solar hot water demonstration system. The system preheats water used in the second flood cafe by way of five solar panels that are located on the building’s south facing wall.

A press release from A&R Solar Corp., the company that installed the system, says the solar system isn’t just doing well. It says the solar collectors are offsetting almost double their expected amount. Reeves Clippard, president and co-founder of the company, said if solar works this well in Seattle, “the rest of the country has no excuse not to act now.”

Honestly, I don’t really know what to make of this. It’s a good thing that the system is performing so well. But a system that produces double what the models said it would makes me wonder what exactly that baseline was. Then again, we have had an amazingly hot, bright and sunny summer.

The system has a monitoring device that will eventually allow visitors to see how it is performing in real time. It uses Heliodyne Gobi flat-plate solar hot water collectors.

An outside view of the solar and the aquarium

Looking up at the panels

This morning, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. keynoted the BuiltGreen Conference 2009 at the Washington State Convention and Trade Center. It was not your typical green conference keynote.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

Most talks focus on one topic and explore it. At green events, that talk is usually centered around a project, a theory or a problem that we need to fix. This talk was mostly political and discussed everything from the benefits of “true free market capitalism” (many), to how the Bush administration tore down environmental rules and tenets (disastrously), to who was who in Washington, D.C. politics (lobbyists), to how much mercury human beings have in their bodies (a lot), to how the press has covered these issues (very poorly).

Honestly, he spoke about so many different things I don’t really know what to tell you, dear reader. So I’ll start with energy.

Kennedy spoke a lot about the energy grid. The largest technical problem in weaning ourselves off oil, he said, is that we don’t have a grid that can handle new sources of energy like wind or solar. Developing a system that would reach every American home would cost $1 million per mile, he said, or $150 billion. It’s a one-time expenditure, he said, and would benefit national security. He said we’ve done it before with computers and the Internet; all we have to do is make the commitment.

He also said we need to change the way the energy business works. Utilities today, he said, benefit by creating and selling more energy. We need to redevelop it to focus on conservation. “We have to change that incentivized system,” he said, “So that they can make the same money by getting people to conserve, not consume.”

He also spoke a lot about a business he is a part of called Better Place. Better Place is a venture-backed company that seeks to build an electric car network based on today’s technology. Kennedy said the company is beginning with Israel, where it hopes to transform the market over the next three years. The company will give electric cars away for free - made by Renault and Nissan - to anyone who signs a contract with the company. Under the contract, the person owns the car while Better Place owns the car battery (which costs $20,000). The company pays itself back by charging a premium on the power the car needs to run, outlined in the contract. He said the company has similar contracts with Denmark, Australia, Hawaii and north California, and would love for all of North America to follow suit.

“The electric car is the way this country is going to go,” he said.

Kennedy also took a hit at the mainstream media, calling it “negligent” in reporting important stories over the past decade. Instead, he said the media has become entertainment rather than information, which appeals to the prurient interests in the reptilian parts of our brains. Ouch.

Were you there? If so, what did you think was the most interesting thing he said and how would you rate his speech?

P.S. The information Kennedy shared about his personal levels of mercury (if he were a woman, he said a doctor told him his children would have cognitive impairment) was pretty frightening. If you want to test your mercury levels, visit the Waterkeeper Alliance, another organization Kennedy is affiliated with, here.

 This is from a series of guest posts by representatives of the Northwest Building Efficiency Center. This post was written by Gary Nordeen. 

Since the 1930s radiant barriers have shown to be beneficial in reducing cooling loads in structures located in hot climates. A radiant barrier is a material, usually aluminum, which is highly reflective and has a low emissivity. A material with low emissivity absorbs little radiant energy.

Radiant barriers are usually installed in attics to reduce radiant heat gains into the attic that are transferred into the living space. Radiant barriers can be installed on

Figure 1

the underside of roof rafters; laid on top of rafters or trusses prior to installing roof sheathing; laid flat on the ceiling insulation; or “chips” of reflective material can be added to the ceiling insulation.

Proper installation of the radiant barrier is important. Refer to Figure 1 at left, courtesy of Florida Solar Energy Center: 

• Applications #1 or #2 of sheet type radiant barriers are preferred to #3.

• Dust will accumulate if sheet type radiant bareriers are laid over the ceiling insulation.

• Chips or multi-layer radiant barriers are acceptable to be installed at location #3

Recently, there has been an effort to market radiant barriers in the Pacific Northwest with unbelievable claims of energy savings. One radiant barrier company has stated that their product can reduce energy bills by more than 50%. In hot southern climates, where radiant barriers work best, energy savings range from 2% to 10%. Tests by Oak Ridge National Laboratories have shown that the percentage reductions for winter heat losses are lower than those for summer heat gains.

Radiant barrier chips

While radiant barriers can reduce cooling costs, houses in the Pacific Northwest consume more energy for heating than for cooling. Before installing a radiant barrier to reduce heating costs, the following issues should be considered:

At times radiant barriers may actually result in higher heating bills.

When the sun is out on cool winter days, it provides some heating of structures by radiant heat transfer through the roof. A radiant barrier will negate some of these gains.

Radiant barriers may create moisture problems.

If placed on top of the ceiling insulation, a radiant barrier will get cold in the winter and may become a surface where moisture laden air escaping from inside the house may condense. This may cause the ceiling insulation to get wet and become less effective.

Investing in additional insulation and better windows, and stopping air leakage are proven methods to reduce your energy use. Be wary of any salesperson making exorbitant claims about reducing your energy bill. As the old saying goes: If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Contact the Northwest Building Efficiency Center at Info@nwBuildings.org if you have questions about energy efficient buildings.