Green Building Tour at UMass Amherst

On Wednesday, June 25th, the USGBC MA West Branch, in coordination with the Western MA AIA, hosted a Green Building Tour of the UMass Amherst campus.

UMass has seen a major investment in new buildings in the past few years.

The tour focused on 3 facilities: 1) the new Integrated Learning Center, 2) the scholars center residential complex, and 3) the Hampshire Dining Commons

Thank you to the UMass Amherst Campus Planning Department and members of the USGBC MA West Branch, especially Ludmilla Pavlova, and Lorin Starr of the Western MA AIA for organizing this tour.

Below: the Integrated Learning Center - which will hold 20% of the campus' classes next year. It is on track to meet LEED NC Gold and correspond with the state's LEED Plus program.

Thank you to Jeff Quackenbush for leading the tour of the facility. Here is a link to read more about the ILC.

The ILC has a great green roof - very well established plantings already.

Next, we went to the Commonwealth Honors College Residential Complex. This will be a landmark component of UMass Amherst welcoming ambitious students from the entire state university system.

The Honors Complex has numerous sustainability features and you can read more about it at Sustainable UMass.

We ended the tour with a dinner at the Hampshire Dining Commons which has recently been renovated to be a state-of-the-art facility linking local food production to the dining experience on campus. We heard a few brief presentations and enjoyed a great meal. This place takes the concept of a college cafeteria to a whole new level!

Thank you again to to the UMass Amherst Campus Planning Department, members of the USGBC MA West Branch, and Western MA AIA for organizing this tour.

Climate Co-Lab Contest is Open

By Javier Burgos

How can we empower the public and communities to build awareness and demand for green buildings?

Buildings remain one of the key producers of greenhouse gases, consuming up to 40% of the world’s energy and contributing up to 30% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

Green buildings can mitigate the negatives of traditional buildings and climate change contribution, but stakeholders defining the green building conversation have largely been industry groups and governments. Here is YOUR chance - to help the green building conversation go mainstream!

World Green Building Contest (WGBC) Launches MIT Climate Colab Contest to Invite Ideas to Increase Demand for Green Buildings Worldwide.

Proposals are due July 20th, 2014

Through a partnership with the MIT Climate Colab contest, the WGBC seeks your ideas to create public demand for green buildings that can meet the values of the occupants and empower the public to enter the conversation of how buildings are designed and created for them.

The size of our current built environment will double in the next 30 years and most of those buildings will be in developing nations. There has never been a better time to get this right.

Two Key Issues

Building design decisions are generally made with little to no input from the actual people that inhabit these buildings.  We want to overcome the barriers to a greater demand for greener, efficient buildings -- by:

1)   improving awareness and

2)   empowering communities to create impact

-- on sustained public participation in the demand for better, more efficient healthier buildings.

Specifically, we seek proposals to build awareness in the following areas:

· How can we inspire the public to think about the spaces they inhabit, things they would like in these spaces and voice their suggestions?

· How can we empower communities to enter the conversation about the design of buildings that are being built and designed for them?

· How can we create a mainstream conversation that will ultimately lead to greater demand for green buildings by communities and the public?

•    How can we convert the values and desires of the public into real changes in the global building stock?

How can you and your community take a lead role on the green building conversation and increase your access to greener, healthier, more efficient buildings? Visit contest page

The Weekly Bulletin to 6/20/14

Coming up next week:

We have an imported "Green Tea" from the USGBC MA West Branch. On Thursday, 6/29/14 at 5:00pm, we'll be hearing from two Green Building Researchers from the UMass Amherst campus. They will present a comparison of energy modeling software. Check it out!

Calling all Volunteers!

Jump In – Make a Difference

There are many opportunities for volunteer engagement remaining this year. Look forward to expanded educational opportunities around our Education@USGBC Education Partner status. You can help lead a program for the "Green Breakfast Club" or a "Green Tea" evening session.

We have also created a new "Education Partner" opportunity for firms to participate in the creation of LEED CEU content with us. 

Also coming up for volunteer opportunities is the Green Apple Day of Service as well as the planning and execution of our LEED Project Showcase. In short, there are more opportunities than ever before.

Many of our members have made key connections, expanded their business and made a huge difference in the community through their experience as a chapter volunteer. Whatever your interest, we have something for you, like our Funding & Finance or Sustainable Neighborhood Development working group and our collaboration with the Living Building Challenge. Jump in! The world needs you.

Again, I extend a huge thank you to our Chapter Sponsoring Partners, our members, and our volunteers for their generous contributions, dedication and commitment to our continued growth and success.

More Green Buidlings!

New Tools for LEED v4 O+M

USGBC just released a series of new tools for people to use on O+M projects - templates and frameworks of best practices to achieve the LEED Certification more easily.

http://www.usgbc.org/articles/new-tools-leed-v4-om-projects

LEED is more than a set of requirements, it’s a comprehensive program supported by a suite of tools and resources. With LEED v4, in addition to working on the rating systems, USGBC also focused a great deal of attention on the customer experience - that would be us, the users of LEED. And the development process did not end with LEED v4 being launched. USGBC is still looking for new ways to add support for project teams.

Plan and policy templates 

The mothership created templates for the plans and policies required in the LEED v4 Building Operations and Maintenance (O+M) rating systems. These templates serve as examples of plans and policies that meet the requirements of the credits. They enable you to implement the operations and maintenance best practices in your building and be confident that those practices meet the LEED requirements. A similar set of templates for use with the existing buildings rating system in LEED 2009 is coming soon (although you should just get going with v4 already!).

The plan and policy templates are available free of cost in the credit library for all project teams to download, elaborate on and customize for your building, and ultimately, submit as part of your project documentation:

SSp Site Management Policy template

WEp Indoor Water Use Reduction Policy template

MRp Ongoing Purchasing and Waste Policy template

MRp Facility Maintenance and Renovation Policy template

EQp Green Cleaning Policy template

EQc Integrated Pest Management Plan template

Learn about other updates to LEED resources and tools:

First Look: LEED v4 online forms

First Look: LEED v4 online forms (part 2)

Thank you to Megan Sparks, USGBC Manager of Program Integration, for the original posting