- Such business opportunities also move us forward. - Editor

I am so convinced about this from prior personal experience, I am trying to get a roofer to tackle making the roof white while adding insulation to the stylish but dysfunctional flat roofs of Santa Fe.- Editor
 

The Roof as White Knight
Since Dr. Chu, a Nobel laureate in physics, took over as energy secretary last year, he has urged Americans to help cool the planet by painting their roofs a lighter color that reflects sunlight. Now he is following his own advice: on Monday, Dr. Chu directed all Energy Department offices to install white roofs during new construction, when replacing old roofs and wherever an installation is cost-effective over the lifetime of the roof. The secretary urged other federal agencies to follow suit.
“Cool roofs are one of the quickest and lowest-cost ways we can reduce our global carbon emissions and begin the hard work of slowing climate change,” he said in a statement.
As climate change remedies go, whitening roofs is the proverbial low-hanging fruit.  Lighter-colored roofs not only reduce air-conditioning bills for individual buildings but also lessen the “heat island” effect, in which the ambient air in cities is hotter than that of surrounding regions because of a high concentration of dark, heat-absorbent surfaces like asphalt.
A 2009 study found that retrofitting 80 percent of air-conditioned buildings in the United States with white roofs would save $735 million annually in reduced energy bills while achieving an emissions reduction equivalent to removing 1.2 million cars from the road.
Another study found that increasing the reflectivity of those surfaces in urban areas with a population of over one million would offset the heating effect of 1.2 gigatons of carbon dioxide emission annually, the equivalent of taking 300 million cars off the road for 20 years.
http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/21/in-a-climate-quest-the-roof-as-white-knight/

- Good news, but we all need to aim for zero NOW! I have owned a real home for 18 years that has never been on the grid! And it grows food all winter long, too! Advice: don’t wait until the building is completed- get your solar panels running before construction, then you don’t need generators for the power tools. - Editor
EU agrees mandate for “nearly zero energy” homes
All new buildings constructed in Europe after 2020 will have to be virtually carbon-neutral after the European Parliament gave new energy standards the last approval they needed. The standards are expected to have a significant long-term impact on the EU’s bills for gas imports for heating from Russia, Norway and Algeria, worth tens of billions of euros each year. The European Union’s mandate for “nearly zero-energy buildings” will kick in for all new public buildings in the European Union after 2018 and for all new homes and offices two years later.
Environmentalists gave the standards a guarded welcome, but said they would take effect too late and would do little to encourage the renovation of Europe’s existing housing stock. With buildings accounting for 36 percent of the EU’s greenhouse gases, improving their energy efficiency is also crucial for meeting the EU’s climate change goals.”
http://in.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idINIndia-48594720100518

Comcast’s Operations Center in Sonoma County just received one of the highest honors in green building- it was certified LEED Platinum this week by the USGBC. The Operations Center is part of The Sonoma Mountain Village, an ambitious zero-carbon, solar-powered development being constructed. The super green facility was designed from the ground up to have the smallest impact possible.
http://www.inhabitat.com/2010/04/07/comcasts-zero-carbon-sonoma-county-facility-clinches-leed-platinum/
 

Sonoma Mountain Village, an award-winning, deeply sustainable community combines the age-old idea of designing for people with cutting-edge sustainability to create a community that cares for our lifestyle, as well as Earth’s natural resources. As the first community in North America endorsed by the prestigious international One Planet Communities Program, SOMO is a replicable model that is set to prove that we can address our planet’s biggest environmental problems while living well. It’ a community designed to care for its residents, the community and the planet without compromising our richly deserved quality of life.
See- http://www.sonomamountainvillage.com/  and watch the video- http://cbs5.com/video/?id=59994@kpix.dayport.com where 200 homes will all be off the grid, made from recycled metal the equivalent of only 6 SUV’s, and more.

- I had a fascinating dream last weekend that revealed happiness persevering through major shifts that required our society to down-size and share far more. The underlying assumption, of course, is that there was enough food. Utilizing space twice to include food and power could/should become the norm. If/when food becomes very expensive, would you rather be living in a standard apartment or in this one? - Editor

South Bronx New York housing complex will feature a 10,000 square foot fully integrated rooftop farm

The Blue Sea Development Corporation has a reputation for integrating emerging environmental technologies into high quality, affordable housing developments across New York City. Their new state of the art affordable housing complex planned for the South Bronx, NY, will feature a 10,000 square feet (930 sq meters) fully integrated rooftop farm, designed by BrightFarm Systems. The greenhouse will use left-over heat from the residential portion of the building and water harvested from the greenhouse roof. The farm will be used to provide fresh, perishable vegetables to a local non-profit food cooperative. The rooftop farm will be able to supply enough produce to meet the annual fresh vegetable needs of up to 450 people. Like many inner city, low income communities, the South Bronx suffers from food deserts, where residents lack access to fresh vegetables at affordable prices. The rooftop farm will make a significant contribution to food access and public health in the neighborhood.
For Complete Article - Click Here
For website- http://brightfarmsystems.com/projects/blue-sea-developments-new-york

- Let’s make these young visionary, innovative students our politicians- we would quickly have a fantastic climate/energy bill and a positive Copenhagen agreement! Houses requiring zero net energy don’t frighten them, and they made their houses affordable and partly prefab for simplicity and cost savings! - Editor

A look at the technologies, designs and people behind some of the homes competing in the U.S. Department of Energy’s 2009 Solar Decathlon. The event brought 20 teams from around the world together to see who’s solar-powered home would rise to the top.
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/video/solar-decathlon-2009-home-showcase
For inspiring virtual tours of the houses- http://www.solardecathlon.org/virtual_tours/#

The biggest opportunity to improve the nation’s energy situation is a major investment program to make homes and businesses more efficient, according to a study released Wednesday by the consulting firm McKinsey. An investment of $520 billion in improvements like sealing ducts and replacing inefficient appliances could produce $1.2 trillion in savings on energy bills through 2020, the study found. The report acknowledged substantial barriers to achieving the savings, foremost among them the initial costs. The $52 billion annual investment envisioned by McKinsey is four or five times more than the nation currently spends on energy efficiency, and would have to be maintained over a decade. The economic stimulus package passed in February barely makes a dent; by McKinsey’s estimate, it contains $10 billion to $15 billion in spending on energy efficiency. Peter Lehner, executive director of the Natural Resources Defense Council, said even greater savings were possible. The McKinsey report made conservative assumptions, he noted, and it did not account for savings from changes in behavior — people turning out lights in empty rooms or turning down the thermostat in winter, for example. Nor did the $1.2 trillion figure take account of a possible cost for greenhouse gas emissions, which could be capped under climate legislation pending in Congress, and could bring about increases in energy efficiency.
For the report:  http://www.mckinsey.com/clientservice/electricpowernaturalgas/downloads/US_energy_efficiency_full_report.pdf
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/30/business/energy-environment/30energy.html?_r=1

- While Climate Today can not endorse specific products, when a company has moved forward by leaps and bounds, we should pay attention. The government’s label of Energy Star sounds good, but it fails to require the level of conservation needed- and possible. Here is one example of going 4 times Energy Star! Building codes need to require high standards, even when the majority of manufacturers must catch up. - Editor

This chart’s orange line is the Serious Window at R11.2
and 4 times Energy Star

Serious Materials Launches Line of Windows Designed for Weatherization Projects
Green building materials manufacturer Serious Materials is now offering a line of super-insulating windows that can be deployed by states and other agencies looking to make low-income housing projects more energy efficient under the U.S. Department of Energy’s Weatherization Assistance Program. The company says the product was specifically designed for use as replacement windows in WAP projects and can deliver as much as 12 times more energy savings per household than other weatherization measures. Weatherization can provide “the single greatest immediate impact on the environment,” and it’s “the immediate biggest bang for the buck,” Biden said in April while visiting the window factory in Chicago that Serious Materials brought back to life this spring.
Chart shows an amazing  R 11.2 Go to http://www.seriousmaterials.com/html/seriouswindows.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/gwmBuildings/idUS311757160520090721

- Is the definition of insanity doing something that will cause your own demise? Santa Monica is on the ocean, for Pete’s sake! Wouldn’t you think that they would proudly and visibly be promoting every single renewable, carbonless energy source possible? Maybe they all have snorkels. - Editor
 

A Push to Hide Solar Panels in Santa Monica
See how solar powered panels are used as a design feature on a building in Santa Monica, Calif.?  Would a pending city ordinance outlaw such things? Want to put solar panels on a condo in Santa Monica, Calif? Just keep them out of sight, please. That’s the sentiment behind a pending city ordinance that would require solar panels to be installed in a way that is “least visible.” (Single-family homes are excepted.) The ordinance was adopted on June 30th, but still needs to go through a second reading before becoming final. The provision has angered solar advocates.
http://greeninc.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/09/a-push-to-hide-solar-panels-in-santa-monica/

Urban Re:Vision’s contest calls for an innovative, sustainable city block. The juried competition- led by The City of Dallas and Urban Re:Vision- sought visionary ideas in sustainable urban and architectural design by asking the question, “What if one block in Texas became the sustainable model for the world?” XERO Project envisions a high-density, zero-energy, agriculturally oriented pair of buildings on the site of existing surface parking lots in a derelict district adjacent to Dallas City Hall. At the center of the greenways’ “X”, Lone Star Square will function as the public heart of the new food/agriculture district, with orchards, garden plots, and historical elements from the city’s past. Running through the system of greenways are a series of water features that filter harvested rainwater and convey it in a stream to the agricultural fields to be used for irrigation. As a complement to neighboring arts and historic areas, the XERO District is focused on urban agriculture and food. Public orchards, community gardens, private planter boxes, food stalls, and locally supplied restaurants contribute to the district character and buzz.
http://www.dbarchitect.com/words/news_blog/148/XERO%20Takes%20First%21.html