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Sunday, May 03, 2009
Green Buildings and Green Jobs: What’s Up?
I provide my answers to the question: “Green Jobs, Where’s The Beef?” as part of a series of short video commentaries on green building trends and sustainable development practices distributed to the public via YouTube.
The new green jobs will come from three areas. The first area is green buildings, both new and existing, where the growth is already tremendous - about 80% in 2008. The second area is renewable energy development, particularly wind and solar. And, the third area is efficiency upgrades for older buildings.
These are the same drivers of future employment that President Obama is promoting in his proposed budget and policy projections. Assuming the President and the Congress keep the momentum going, investments in green building, renewable energy and energy efficiency literally could provide millions of sustainable new jobs over the next four years.
Many of these new jobs in the building and construction industries will be created by the need to retrofit the hundreds of thousands of structures that were built for an era of cheap energy, without regard to environmental consequences. Now, we have to go back and make design and operational changes that are consistent with our new knowledge of the financial costs and environmental consequences of building without sustainability in mind.
This new green building consciousness is crucial for the success of this transition. I learned the hard way in the late seventies and early eighties when I was director of the California solar energy program designed to establish a permanent solar industry in the state. We had a good start, but in 1985 the federal and state governments took the props (tax credits) away simultaneously, and the industry collapsed overnight. For me, this is a valuable lesson to remember today.
What do we have to do to make the growth in green jobs permanent? My list of requirements includes making sure building codes accurately reflect the current realities of global warming and the cost of carbon emissions, establishing governmental economic incentives that will not go away after a few years. Finally, we need to create a lasting infrastructure connecting building owners, facility managers and government agencies to ensure that green practices will guide future construction and operations.
To view the brief video of highlights of Jerry Yudelson’s perspective on green jobs, click here.
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Monday, April 20, 2009
What’s in Store for Green Homes? Chapter 11 of Choosing Green
Suppose you’re just not ready to buy a new home now, but you’re interested in buying a green home in the future. Where are we headed? Here are a few educated guesses. First of all, I predict that the green home market is going to grow rapidly and become a dominant part of the homebuilding market by 2010.
To read the entire chapter, click here to download the PDF version.
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Monday, April 06, 2009
What is a Green Home? Chapter 2 of Choosing Green
We’ve explored why people are building and buying green homes. But what exactly do we mean by the term “green home?” Reading the first chapter, you might surmise that there are many possible definitions, depending on what features a builder includes in a home and what rating or certification system a builder uses. There are no “Consumer Reports” or “J. D. Power” ratings for green homes, as there are for cars, home appliances and so many other consumer products, so to some degree you’re on your own in looking for a green home.
To read the entire chapter, click here to download the PDF version.
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Thursday, April 02, 2009
Green Building through Integrated Design Gets Accolades from Architectural Record
To quote from the review, “Tucson, Arizona—based engineer Jerry Yudelson offers Green Building Through Integrated Design as a practice manual, packed with actionable information and showing the design process from many professional points of view. In lengthy quotes from architects, engineers, and building owners, he gives firsthand accounts of innovative teamwork. In this, the meatiest of the three books, the author specifies the characteristics of high-performance buildings, explains LEED categories in detail, and offers no-nonsense descriptions of collaboration at each design phase. Uniquely qualified, with degrees in both engineering and business administration, and a nationally recognized expert in green design, Yudelson describes the barriers perceived by clients and presents a business case for building green. The book includes an extraordinary, 400-item list of questions to consider at successive design phases.”
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