Green Construction News

Greenhouse (Eco-Structure, May/June 2007) reports on the National Association of Home Builder's (NAHB) February announcement of the development of a new residential building sustainability standard. To be produced in cooperation with the International Code Council, the new National Green Building Standard will be an ANSI certified consensus standard and will replace NAHB's current Model Green Home Building Guidelines.

Unlike the Guidelines, the new standard will be administered nationally, rather than at the local level, and will apply not only to single-family residences and townhouses, but to apartments and other types of multi-unit residential construction as well. Three levels of certification will be offered, Bronze, Silver, and Gold.

The standard is planned for release in February, 2008.

Trends and Challenges in Green Building (Building Safety Journal, April 2007) discusses coordination between sustainable design standards and building codes.

Historically, building codes have focused  on life-safety concerns and regulated construction so as to achieve immediately tangible benefits (such as higher resistance to fire or improved egress). More recently, some code requirements, such as energy efficiency in buildings, have been developed with the intent to provide benefits in the longer term and extending beyond the immediate users of the building.

Outside of energy efficiency regulations, coordination between long-term sustainability goals and building codes has been limited to date. Green building techniques relying on alternative building practices (for example, rammed earth construction) are frequently not addressed in the model codes. Green building programs, such as USGBC LEED or GreenGlobes, were originally formulated and continue to operate outside of the building code regulatory infrastructure.

Efforts to improve coordination between the model codes and sustainability initiatives include:

• Newer provisions within the codes themselves recognizing sustainable design practices such as insulated concrete formwork construction, unvented conditioned attics, waterless urinals, and greywater recycling systems
• Incorporation of energy efficiency standards meeting green building assessment criteria into the building codes, such as the proposed Standard for the Design of High-Performance Green Buildings Except Low-Rise Residential Buildings (ASHRAE/USGBC/IESNA Proposed Standard 189)
• The National Green Building Standard for residential construction, currently under development by the NAHB and the ICC (see above)
• Establishment of the USGBC committee Greening the Codes
• ICC's Industry Advisory Committee's comparison of Green Globes and LEED building assessment criteria (see Reports, IAC Task Group Report Green Buildings (March, 2007)

More Info
NAHB Research Center National Green Building Standard home page
ICC Green Building page