Appraisal Podcasts

Transcend Equity is a 6-year-old privately held Dallas-based company that greens buildings at no cost and creating no debt for the owners. Transcend Equity contracts to pay the utility bills for ten years, and the owners/managers pay a fixed rate to the company. The average reduction in energy consumption – 30 percent. Transcend Equity is under contract now to green more than 33 buildings from Washington, D.C., to Dallas. CPNTechnology recently spoke with Steve Gossett Jr., President of Transcend Equity, about his company’s approach to the green retrofitting buildings.

For the full Q & A follow this link.

Saving the Earth Inside the Office

Larry Laque, an executive with Silver Spring-based Discovery Communications, felt something amiss last year as his company began gearing up to announce a 24-hour television channel devoted to an all-green lifestyle. Discovery would be preaching environmental awareness around the clock on its Planet Green network, but Laque thought the company was not doing all it could do to recycle, conserve energy and pollute less.

Follow this link for the full article on how they made the transformation.

Building Green - Graphic

Follow the link above to a full size image of this graphic. It shows various components of a building that have a green flavor. 

The World’s Endangered Lakes : Running Dry

You need not go to the Middle East, North Africa or Southeast Asia, where there are already reported water shortages, to understand the value and scarcity of the life-giving liquid. Just look in America’s own back yard. The American Southwest has been in a protracted drought for nearly a decade, with sinking water levels in lakes and rivers and decreasing snowpack in the mountains. And now a prominent scientist from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, says that Lake Mead, which supplies water to 22 million people throughout the region, could be bone dry in just 13 years.

For the complete story, follow this link.

Kite Power Could Finally Pull Global Shipping to the Green Side

Parasailing may no longer be just for your Caribbean vacation. This month, a commercial cargo ship will become the first to go into service employing a large parafoil lashed to its bow to provide a cheaper—and cleaner—way across the waves.

If the 459-ft. vessel, built and operated by the Bremen-based Beluga Group, demonstrates the practicality of its SkySails system, the global shipping industry might have a new way to mitigate its environmental impact—for every single vessel—as the world’s biggest contributor to greenhouse gases.

For the complete article jump to this link 

Green Lodging News ~ Lodging’s Leading Environmental News Source

Finding energy efficient schools, supermarkets, offices, and other facilities throughout the country has become even easier for Americans interested in being green. Now they can find the Energy Star not only where they live but where they work, shop, play and learn. The number of commercial buildings and manufacturing plants to earn the Energy Star for superior energy efficiency is up by more than 25 percent in the past year, and the amount of carbon dioxide emissions reduced has reached an all-time high of more than 25 billion pounds.

For the full story follow this link.

Los Angeles Times : Green building trends

To review a the latest happenings in green building (as observed at the International Builder’s Show in Orlando, Fla.), follow this link.

Americas 50 Greenest Cities

Want to see a model for successful and rapid environmental action? Don’t look to the federal government—check out your own town. Here is a list of the 50 communities that are leading the way. Does yours make the cut?

The top 5 include:

1. Portland
2. San Francisco
3. Boston
4. Oakland
5. Eugene

The complete list can be found here.

Company Tops EPA Green Power Partner List, Vows to Drive for Greater Efficiency While Spurring Growth in Renewable Market

SANTA CLARA, Calif., Jan. 28, 2008 – Intel Corporation said today it will purchase more than 1.3 billion kilowatt hours a year of renewable energy certificates as part of a multi-faceted approach to reduce its impact on the environment, making Intel the single-largest corporate purchaser of green power in the United States, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The company said it hoped the record-setting purchase would help stimulate the market for green power, which should lead to additional generating capacity and ultimately, lower costs.

The purchase placed Intel at the top of EPA’s latest Green Power Partners Top 25 list, and also at the No. 1 spot on EPA’s Fortune 500 Green Power Partners list. The EPA’s Green Power Partnership program encourages and recognizes voluntary green power purchases as a way to reduce the impact of conventional electricity use.

“EPA applauds our Fortune 500 partners for protecting our environment by purchasing green power,” said EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson. “By voluntarily shifting to renewable energy, Intel is proving you don’t need to wait for a signal in order to go green.”

“We have a long history of commitment to the environment and energy efficiency is an important consideration in everything we do, from building transistors to designing microprocessors and running our factories,” said Intel President and CEO Paul Otellini, who is also a member of the Copenhagen Climate Council, a global group of leaders working to achieve an effective global climate treaty at next year’s UN Environmental Summit in Copenhagen. “Our renewable purchase is just one part of a multi-faceted approach to protect the environment, and one that we hope spurs additional development and demand for renewable energy.”

Renewable Energy Certificates
Renewable energy certificates, or RECs, are the “currency” of the renewable energy market and are widely recognized as a having credible and tangible environmental benefits. The EPA estimates that Intel’s REC purchase has the equivalent environmental impact of taking more than 185,000 passenger cars off the road each year, or avoiding the amount of electricity needed to power more than 130,000 average American homes annually.

Intel’s REC purchase, which includes a portfolio of wind, solar, small hydro-electric and biomass sources, will be handled by Sterling Planet, a leading national supplier of renewable energy, energy efficiency and low-carbon solutions. The purchase will be certified by the non-profit Center for Resource Solutions’ Green-e® program which certifies and verifies green power products.

“Intel’s outstanding commitment to renewable energy provides significant support for market-based mechanisms for renewable energy technologies of all types,” said Mel Jones, Sterling Planet president and CEO. “We commend Intel for their vision and leadership in all aspects of corporate responsibility. Intel’s support for renewable energy technologies echoes its mission to deliver advancements that become essential to the way we work and live.”

Intel, EPA, and the Environment
Intel and EPA have worked together for several years on a variety of fronts, from Energy Star® to Climate Leader and Performance Track programs, to broad industry efforts such as the Climate Savers® Computing Initiative. The Agency recently recognized Intel with a 2007 Water Efficiency Leader award for its efforts to reduce, reuse and recycle water in its Chandler, Ariz. manufacturing facility. Intel was also recognized by the EPA as the most commute-friendly employer in the nation in 2006.

In addition to promoting and funding ideas for greater energy efficiency in its facilities, Intel has consistently specified high-energy-efficiency equipment in its manufacturing facilities with a view to ensuring greater energy efficiency and environmental benefit. Over the last 7 years, the company invested over $20 million in more than 250 energy conservation projects that saved in excess of 500 million kilowatt hours, enough energy to power about 50,000 U.S. homes.

To learn more, visit the press kit at www.intel.com/pressroom/kits/green/rec.

Building a Bright Green Future: Financing Home 2.0

While predatory lending practices in the mortgage industry have been getting a lot of press lately, there’s a far more positive trend within the same industry: green mortgages.

Jon Lebkowsky blogs:

“What do I know about finance? Though in these columns I focus on social media, I’m often in discussions about sustainability, and many of those focus on the built environment. I’m aware that big developers like Stratus here in Austin are completely serious about green buidling, and there are more and more LEED-certified construction projects in development, and various green building experts looking beyond LEED for better ways to ensure sustainable design and building.

Large construction projects are incentivized by the energy-efficiency ROI realized through green building practices, but how about smaller residential builders and buyers? Are there sufficient and completely clear bottom-line incentives for sustainable residential building and retrofitting? How is sustainable defined at that level?”

For a complete review of the article, jump here.