stephan tanner > integrated design

Climate Change Economics No One Can Dodge

One reason I have this blog is because I'm frustrated with the notion that everybody can define any issue on their own terms even after a body of global consensus has defined it!

The United Nation Department of Economic and Social Affairs has defined "sustainable design" as “Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own need.” And in 1992, 178 governments adopted an action plan called the Agenda 21 that you should definitely read.

And when it comes to Climate Change, Green House Gas Emission or Global Warming and Green House Gas Emissions, I think taking the IPCC findings in their report 1 and 2 as factual status should be as easy as accepting the U.S. EPA emission inventory and that it based on a globally excepted protocol.

After reading through all these reports, I'm left with the question: “Why reinvent the wheel?” Why not act now? The foundational work has been done by so many credible organizations. Why not get going, measure our success or shortcomings on the action taken, and build from there refined national and regional, segmented and appropriate action plans, rather than spending so much time defining and redefining these global issues?

I do understand that this is all very complicated. But I also understand it's time for action. I think too much talk is just a dodge for doing the real work that's necessary right now.

TAGS:

Sustainable Design, Climate Change, Global Warming, Green House Gas Emissions

Sustainable Campus Initiative

I just returned from a very interesting conference in Zurich, the Sustainable Campus Initiative, organized by Novatlantis. One can't be more supportive of the needed leadership provided by institutions of higher learning in respect to sustainability and climate change – though I found the differences in depth and understanding of each institution represented to be quite interesting! The entire conference and the commitment among these institutions to sustainable design was very encouraging to our efforts to further bridge European expertise and U.S. leadership on the basis of measurability through The Green Bridge.
 

On a side note, we presented an introductory poster at the conference titled ‘Be A Bridge’. Photos of people formed these words, not random photos, but pictures of people who quickly rallied to a request for support of The Green Bridge. All photos were received within hours of our request, to me, demonstrating once again that sustainability and climate change are critical issues people are aware of and responding to REAL leadership and solutions!

TAGS:

Sustainable Design, Climate Change, Green Bridge

We've been nominated for a World Clean Energy Award!

Wow! We've been nominated for a 2007 World Clean Energy Award in the construction category. I understand that they are a newly created awards program to recognize global achievement and innovation in integrative use of energy efficiency and renewable energy. And they think Waldsee BioHaus is cool!

The nomination alone is very flattering. Some of the jury members include notables from Worldwatch, ICLEI, The Climate Group, TARAhaat, WWF, Rocky Mountains Institute, Princeton and UNEP. You can learn all about the World Clean Energy Awards when they launch their official website on May 8, 2007.

Until then, track the progress of the Sun 21 – the first solar boat which on May 8, will complete a transatlantic crossing without using a drop of oil. World Clean Energy Award winners will be announced upon Sun 21's arrival in New York City.

TAGS:

World Clean Energy Awards, Waldsee BioHaus, Sun 21, Passivhaus, Green Bridge

Greetings from the International Passivhaus Conference in Bregenz, Austria!

Here I am at the annual Passivhaus Conference this weekend in Bregenz, Austria. I've heard the conference is fully booked – with more than 900 individuals from around the world attending. (Wonder if TIME magazine's recent suggestion of building a Passivhaus in their Global Warming Guide to Survival spiked attendance!) Should be an amazing conference that I'll definitely share more about. My colleague from Concordia Language Villages and I will also make the global debut of the first certified Passivhaus in North America: das BioHaus.

TAGS:

passivhaus, sustainable design, waldsee BioHaus

Alien science key to halting climate change?

Former Canadian defense minister Paul Hellyer, 83, recently told the Ottawa Citizen that "I’d like to see what alien technology there might be that could eliminate the burning of fossil fuels within a generation ... that could be a way to save our planet."

Don’t we just love eccentric, save-the-world-with-one-action type of attitudes?

I frequently get asked, “What’s the biggest challenge to tackling the issue of climate change?” My answer: “Our perspective.”

Impacting climate change is not as much of a technical or financial challenge but more of a social and cultural one. It’s our industrial mindset that got us into this mess and it now needs a new perspective to get us out of it. As Albert Einstein said, “The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we used when we created them.”

I don’t think it’ll take “alien technology” and energy - or maybe it will! Let me reconsider … we all need light to see and do our work … but we currently construct many buildings without any windows then overcome this situation by using technology and wasteful energy like the incandescent lightbulb we used for so long. Now maybe it is time to design more buildings that make use of “alien technology” and energy (called the sun!) and get it without the burning of fossil fuels.

Now that’s a revolutionary thought – still pretty alien to many people, I know. 

TAGS: sustainable design, ENERGY USE, HIGH performance buildings, Paul Hellyer

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Let's tour the BioHaus with Brightcove!

For the public television show "New Energy," Erika Johnson and her team were filming at Waldsee BioHaus last fall. With the help of my friends Troy, Elissa, Jon and another John, we cut their wonderful film footage into a tour of the BioHaus - thank you all!

May I invite you to sit back and enjoy the show on my new Brightcove channel ... it's a solution I intend to bring to more colleges and universities throughout the U.S.

(Please share the videos with your colleagues, friends and families, too. I have to admit, the Brightcove player is as cool as the BioHaus itself!)

TAGS: waldsee BioHaus, concordia Language Villages, sustainable design, Brightcove

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"The Biggest Market Failure the World Has Ever Seen"

That's a phrase from Sir Nicholas Stern during his U.S. Senate presentation yesterday.

And from Paul Volcker in his presentation in Cairo, Egypt: “Global warming is bad for the economy.”

It's very interesting to follow the U.S. political debate about global warming and to read about top economists like Sir Nicholas Stern and Paul Volcker stepping up to the plate.

It's also eye-opening to read scientific information defining stabilization of CO2 in the atmosphere at about 1 ton of CO2 per person a year and then go to the World Resource Institute’s Climate Analysis Indicators Tool CAIT to look at the CO2 emissions of each continent and country.

Two other great resources to better understand greenhouse gas emissions and global warming are the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (they've been collecting detailed U.S. greenhouse gas emissions since 1990) and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change website.

I think this calls for true U.S. leadership! Not with more words, but with real actions!

I believe these leadership actions need to come in leaps, not incremental steps. I know what's possible in construction: 80% to 90% in energy use reduction and increased user comfort while the remaining energy needed can easily be generated by renewable energies. Case in point right here in the U.S.: Waldsee BioHaus.

Let’s do it!

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My 5 minutes of TV fame!

This Sunday, skip the football games and watch me!

My work on Waldsee BioHaus at Concordia Language Villages will be featured this Sunday in the Twin Cities on KTCI Channel 17 at 7 pm. The show is called "New Energy: A Fresh Look at How The Midwest is Creating a Green Energy Economy. (Download New_energy_tpt_show.pdf to learn more.) And my interview at Porextherm this past fall (the manufacturer of Vacupor® vacuum insulated panels) will also be aired on the German TV show "DIE  THERMOSKANNE  DES  HERRN  BURGER."

Of course, the stories aren't about me. They're about our collective responsibility to put our existing knowledge, technology and talent to work for a more sustainable planet.

Hope you get a chance to watch the shows! (I'd love to hear what you think about them, too.)

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Merry Christmas

:)

R-10 windows, the thermos-bottle principle and urine analysis: what's new in the world of cutting-edge sustainable design

Just returned from my travels to Switzerland and Germany and wanted to share a little about the different people, products, companies and experiences I had. It was very inspiring to see so many breakthrough, high-end building materials and concepts for high performance buildings.

Klaus Müller from Optiwin probably makes the most energy-efficient windows in the world. We used his "Three3wood" window at Waldsee BioHaus. As a Passivhaus-certified window, it was rated at R-8. But his newest creation is the "Four3wood" window with an overall rating of better than R-10! As an option, this window can also incorporate a Venetians blind system to reduce summer heat gains. He made a sample for me to bring back to the U.S. and it boggled the minds of all family members I showed it to during our Thanksgiving get- together!

On my way from Zurich to Munich, I stopped in Kempten. That's the location of Porextherm, the manufacturer of vacuum insulation panels called Vacupor® VIP’s for the building industry. I believe this technology, based on the "thermos- bottle principle," may play an important role in the future of buildings meeting the 2000-Watt Society vision. A team from the German station SWR-TV was also present during my visit to conduct an interview with me on the "thermos-bottle principle," high-performance buildings and the status of energy in the U.S. (I promise to share some of the video as soon as I get my hands on it!)

In the outskirts of Munich, I then met with Thomas Brandmeier, from Lüfta, a company specializing in high-efficiency, air-handling units with a flat plate heat recovery unit with efficiencies above 80%.

I love to meet with and talk to people who are dedicated to taking on the challenges of today’s world and working hard to find new solutions – especially in the building sector. Besides the three product manufacturers I connected with, I also had lunch with my friend Roland Stulz from Novatlantis – now that was fun – thank you Roland!

And there's never a trip where I don’t tour a completed building or one that's under construction! On this trip I did both. I visited the construction site of the new "Letzigrund Stadium" for the City of Zurich. This multi-purpose sports stadium for the world-famous track & field event, "Weltklasse Zurich" and the location of the 2008 European soccer championship, is being built to meet all necessary functional requirements and is going to be a beautiful piece of architecture. (live webcam) It's also going to meet the City of Zurich's strict goals for building performance and sustainability such as the Minergie energy standard. For example, when I was touring the construction site, crews were installing eight inches of insulation to the ceiling of the underground parking to the occupied spaces.

The other building project I visited was the new office building "Forum Chriesbach" of EAWAG, the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology in Dübendorf. This building is representing the leading edge of sustainability by meeting the 2000-Watt Society vision. In respect to energy, it meets or exceeds the Passivhaus standard. In respect to water, it uses the building itself as a research tool. For example, it has urine-separating toilets that collect the urine by gender to analyze residual chemical substances!

To me, both of these projects demonstrate that it is possible to build buildings with outstanding performance characteristics – that it is not an issue of technology or budget, but one of a client clearly understanding and demanding a certain building outcome.

Thanks for reading about my journey ... now back to the work at hand here in our own country!

Tags: High Performance Building, Energy Efficiency, Minergie, Sustainability,  2000 Watt Society 

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