Jun 18 2008

CAD and the Rise of the Green Building

Posted by: Keely Wachs

This week has unexpectedly been dominated by the topic of Green Buildings. 

On Monday, I attended a presentation at PG&E by UC Davis Professor Deb Niemeier on energy use in the context of neighborhood design.  She presented research on a comparison of energy use by two distinct communities in Davis, Village Homes and Mace Ranch.  Created by Mike Corbett 25 years ago, Village Homes is a seventy acre subdivision designed to focus on the conservation of energy use and natural resources.  Mace Ranch, on the other hand, is a typical 1990's style subdivision, with little conservation design philosophy.  It makes for an interesting comparison as household income and size do not very much by each community. 

Not surprisingly, Dr. Niemeier's research based on PG&E energy use data, found that Village Homes used considerably less energy annually than the homes in Mace Ranch.  The smallest design considerations - such as which direction a home faces, how it heats its water, the use of trees for shading, and the types of construction products - can have a significant impact.  More surprisingly, Village Homes had considerably older appliances than those in Mace Ranch.  With updated appliances in Village Homes, the energy use variances would have been even greater, according to Dr. Niemeier. 

On Tuesday, I attended a panel on green buildings called "Going Green" and hosted by iReuse, Studley, and Skyline Construction.  The panelists included David Hayes, CEO of Skyline Constructionn; Lynelle Cameron, director of sustainability for Autodesk; Steven Wolmark, vice president of SKS Investments; and Eunice Barnett, a business manager for PG&E.

Two points from this panel really stuck out:

1.  David Hayes said that, if done correctly, there is now only a one-two percent marginal difference on building a LEED Certified building and a traditional building. In the last couple of years he's really seen the price of LEED inputs decrease.  David also made the point that buildings account for 50% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, so there's a huge opportunity and responsibility for

2.  Lynelle Cameron made a very compelling case for why Autodesk's CAD technology is at the center of the green building industry and alluded to some very cool new technology that will help planners and builders account for sustainability when beginning the design process.

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