Beyond Energy*

 Why do we need to pay attention to behavior in buildings? You can design a building to the highest energy efficiency codes and specifications, but once it’s occupied, what happens to affect the baseline? People who have done deep retrofits and ZNEB projects can find these efforts undermined if occupant behavior is not addressed. Occupant engagement should ideally address several stakeholder groups, including landlords, facilities management, lessors, and tenant employees. Each of these falls under the label of “engagement” but requires a different approach.

High-R or super-insulated walls are a common component of high performance housing. However, in cold climates, these walls run the risks of cold-weather condensation, and general durability issues due to reduced heat flow. Two practitioners have been monitoring the moisture performance of several high performance walls, and will share their results. Chris Corson has been examining highly vapor-open walls based on classic European Passive House designs, without the use of plastic foams.

Never get the R-15 wool insulation pulled over your eyes again! Separating green from greenwash is getting harder as standards proliferate. Tristan and Paula from BuildingGreen bring you the latest in clever greenwash with this lively and interactive chat on what makes a label truly green. Even if you come knowing nothing about green building labels, you'll leave with new knowledge--as well as new wisdom. We'll show you how to ask the right questions and make your own judgment next time a company tries to convince you that its pet metric or label is the greenest of them all.

Americans say energy efficiency and renewables are important, and that they’re worried about their ability to pay for energy in the future, our dependence on foreign countries and depleting resources. But what are they doing about it?
Research shows Americans’ propensity to act on energy generation and efficiency options is in a three-year decline. Why?

Why do we need to ventilate homes? How much air do we need to do it? Once we’ve figured that out, what systems should we install? These are big questions, but this session will hopefully provide useful answers. We’ll begin with a discussion of health impacts of ventilation and different ventilation rates. The latter part will explore various ventilation systems: pros and cons, costs and benefits, and tips for installing the best systems for your project.

A number of multifamily affordable housing developments in the New York City area were hard-hit by Superstorm Sandy in 2012. Affordable housing organizations have learned from that experience and are working to improve the resilience--and sustainability--of their facilities, in ways both large and small. Alex Wilson and Jim Newman have been facilitating some of this work. This session reports on these efforts and presents practical strategies for making multifamily affordable housing--and all multifamily buildings--more resilient.

Resiliency has become about how many inches or feet of sea rise we will experience before 2100. It's currently a data driven goal, but it should not be. What about past 2100? How about we design, build and live for true resiliency, by making decisions with which we create no new problems, and even solve several issues at once (think green infrastructure)? Learn some concepts to drive true resiliency, and understand how these conceptsshould be applied to our work with individual projects, communities, and teams.

Paul, Chris, Andy, Tom and Heather went to Scandinavia to learn about what the Swedes and Danes are doing about climate change. In two sessions, we'll present what we learned in visiting buildings, building professionals, city officials, and researchers in these two countries, and how it may or may not relate to our efforts here at home.