Green Building

 

A blooming industry, green building is rising with greater public demand, legislative focus, and code and standard mandates. With programs like Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) becoming more popular, contractors are finding new building processes and technologies to be more efficient and environmentally minded. The below articles dive into alternative energies, energy efficiency, the smart grid, and more and include editorial from our annual special issue on the subject.

New Year’s Day brought wind-energy developers a belated holiday gift when Congress included in its fiscal-cliff budget deal a one-year extension of the production tax credit (PTC) that helps wind farms operate profitably.

Transformative change often requires major societal shifts to reach and cross the proverbial tipping point.

In the ongoing push for a cleaner and more sustainable energy society, growing popular and political support for renewables are two strong indicators of success.

The American National Standards Institute (ANSI), which is the coordinator of the U.S. voluntary standardization system, and the Interstate Renewable Energy Council Inc.

NSi

More on Green Building

 
Energy Storage Expands Worldwide

Those who follow the emergence of renewables know that one of the biggest drawbacks is intermittency. The wind and the sun are not necessarily most plentiful when electricity is in demand.

READ MORE
 
Largest Fuel Cell Power Project in North America

Dominion, one of America’s largest energy companies, recently announced an expansion of its clean-energy portfolio by developing a major fuel cell power generating facility in Bridgeport, Conn. The new facility uses a reactive process that converts natural gas into electricity.

READ MORE
 
North America Leads the World in New Smart Energy

With all of the attention given to new, clean sources of power in this country, it is sometimes surprising, if not a little disheartening, to learn that other countries actually have bested us in one measure or another.

READ MORE
 
Initiative to Bring New Energy-Efficient Technologies into New York

New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo announced the launch of a $30 million initiative to accelerate the market utilization of emerging, cutting-edge energy-efficiency technologies.

READ MORE
 
Wind Power Hits Peak in the Midwest

In the ongoing national conversation about the role of clean, alternative sources of power, various measures exist to gauge the success of these industries in grabbing a bigger share of our nation’s total energy consumption.

READ MORE
 
Sun Setting on Sky-High Solar Prices

If the high installation cost of solar photovoltaics (PV) has been the one thing preventing it from being a completely viable clean-energy alternative, the industry may finally be over that barrier.

READ MORE

Pages