Conference Theme: Building the Movement

Conference Dates: March 20–21, 2025

As NESEA celebrates our 50 year anniversary, this year’s BuildingEnergy Boston conference is all about working together to Build the Movement.

Are you a practitioner looking to share the benefits of high performance design beyond our current NESEA community? Are you a small business owner training new staff to meet the growing demand for sustainable building design? Are you a developer itching to push your consultants beyond “business as usual”? All of us are building this movement together, honing the “cutting edge” and bringing it to the mainstream, codifying best practices, and working to eliminate barriers to adoption.

Building the movement requires reaching beyond our traditional networks and silos: engaging with utilities regarding electrification and thermal energy networks, training emerging professionals and career changers, collaborating with finance providers to unlock capital for bold new projects, and much more. It also means including and empowering those from backgrounds and identities traditionally underrepresented in this space.

Our industry faces a great challenge in transitioning to a zero carbon building sector. This can feel overwhelming and impossible as an individual practitioner or company, but when our efforts are aligned and supported in community, we find possibility and opportunity for great change. By building the movement together, we can bring about the changes at scale required to achieve a sustainable and equitable built environment.

Within the scope of this year’s conference theme, we are particularly interested in receiving session proposals relating to:

• Finding allies and building solidarity to support our work, especially across traditional boundaries and divisions
• Effective and collaborative application of new technologies and advances in building science
• Bringing in those not (yet) on the cutting edge of high-performance sustainable building
• Vision for where our field is headed in the years to come, including engagement with students and emerging professionals
• Policy, standards, program development, and other industry-level actions
• Workforce development and training initiatives
   

About the Review Process

• Feature sustainable and high-performance building practices, solutions, or governance.
• Present innovative material and ideas.
• Have rich data to support claims.
• Include multiple perspectives or companies (especially when discussing specific products & services).
• Describe learning from mistakes as well as from successes.
• Are designed to actively engage attendees in dialogue.
• Feature diverse speakers and panelists.
• Are comprehensive and complete upon submission.