Layman's Blog to Green Building

When we refer to integrated design, we are referring to a building that brings all design disciplines into balance so that the "optimized" building design can be found.  The traditional design approach would typically have mechanical, electrical, structural, civil, landscaping, and architectural elements designed in individual groups, then brought together for "coordination" of the design.  (e.g. shift this duct here, run your electrical services through this open space, increased beam depth on these members, add another catchbasin here, remove some shrubbery, or revise glazing locations).  When design elements are left to individual professionals, it is easy to consider mainly the scope of your own profession, with insufficient consideration being given to what sustainability trade offs other disciplines might have to make in order for you to meet your goal.  When a lack of coordination between the disciplines occurs, you can have disastrous results: (For Examp...

We previously discussed the importance of establishing measurable performance targets for green buildings.  As good as those are, they form an incomplete picture of green building design and construction.  What really brings context to the performance of a green building is when you take your performance metrics, and compare them against established benchmarks. That's where green building design and evaluation systems come in;  Many people know about LEED, BOMA Green Globes, or ASHRAE standards.  These (and other systems and standards) offer baseline performance targets for your building project that establish how good (or bad) your building measures up against an agreed-upon base case. Let's look at a few examples: LEED The Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) system is a set of quantifiable targets that evaluate your building against many of the performance targets we discussed last week .  The system uses a number of different approache...

There is a lot of confusion on what the definition of a “ Green Building ” means today.  The building design and construction, as well as the facilities management industries are pushing for “greener” buildings, yet for a large part of the industry, there is an abundance of differing opinions of what makes a building “green”.  The challenge of sorting through these varying and sometimes conflicting definitions can create fiscal, technical, and legal problems for designers, builders, and operators alike.   One common problem across all industries striving to be more "green" is that it is difficult as a consumer and corporate user alike to clearly distinguish the claims of products or buildings on sustainable measures, unless one is to use a well developed system of metrics for gauging the actual performance of a building or product against established benchmarks.  When it comes to building design and construction, the metrics are often found in a number of...