The U.S. Dept. of Energy (DOE), seeking commercial projects for its energy-efficient commercial buildings program, has extended a call for potential projects until noon Eastern on May 14. DOE’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory had issued both a call for projects, aimed at commercial building owners and operators, and a request for proposals targeted at commercial building technical experts.The RFP deadline for the technical experts remains 3 pm Pacific on May 10. DOE’s national laboratories will use money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to select and fund technical
A new report from the U.S. Green Building Council highlights more than 30 existing federal programs worth $72 billion that could enhance efficiency in commercial buildings and multifamily housing. Released on April 29, the report concludes the federal government is not fully taking advantage of the opportunities presented by the programs. The report authors note that, as of 2009, green buildings represented only 2% of new residential and commercial construction in the United States. USGBC officials speaking at a panel discussion in Washington, D.C., said they hoped to use the document as a tool to educate policy-makers and building industry
While some are testing the waters of integrated project delivery, a group within the U.S. Dept. of Energy is tilling greener pastures by devising a new design-build project-delivery model for fast-tracked, net-zero-energy buildings, public and private. DOE calls the process progressive, performance-based design-build (DB). Haselden Construction, DOE’s DB contractor for the first application of the model—the $80-million Research Support Facility of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in Golden, Colo.—calls it design-build “on steroids.” The 222,000-sq-ft RSF is the largest known net-zero-energy building in North America, says the DB team. Photo: Haselden Construction + Image Drawing: Stantec Siting, Massing and
The International Code Council and the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers Inc. have merged their efforts, rather than compete, to develop the nation’s first “green” model code for commercial buildings. The model code, released on March 15, is open for public comment through May 14 but now is available to jurisdictions. Version 2.0, based on public input, will be released by Nov. 3. The goal is to develop an adoptable and enforceable model code. “Bringing together the code expertise of ICC with the technical expertise of ASHRAE to create a comprehensive green building code will accelerate our
A multidisciplinary team of U.S. earthquake researchers and design engineers, organized by the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI), is leaving Feb. 28 to spend six days in Haiti. The team, under the leadership of Reginald DesRoches, Professor and Associate Chair of the School of Civil & Environmental Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology, will document scientific, engineering and societal effects of Jan. 12’s magnitude-7 earthquake. The goal is to focus on the disaster’s impacts on people, the performance of structures and lifelines, and the enormous societal challenges of relief, recovery and rebuilding, says the Oakland, Calif.-based EERI. Team members plan
Staying just hours ahead of another snow storm expected to hit Virginia’s Dulles International Airport on Feb. 10, about 40 workers from Miller & Long Concrete Construction, Bethesda, Md., installed 65 towers to shore the sole-surviving aircraft hangar unit at the three-year-old United Jet Center. Three other units at the private hangar collapsed during a Feb. 6 storm, which dumped 35.5 in. of wet snow on the facility’s roof. No one was injured during the three collapses, but many of the 14 aircraft were damaged. Photo: AP/Wideworld Failed Roof of manufactured-steel structure in Virginia had at least 35.5 in. of
A Jan. 22 article in the San Antonio Business Journal headlined “Risk of LEED Decertification Looms Large for Real Estate” contains “several inaccuracies, causing unnecessary anxiety in the marketplace,” says Ashley Katz, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Green Building Council. The Washington, D.C.-based group developed LEED, a popular green-building rating system. Bradley S. Carson’s article is based on a challenge, filed to USGBC last year, to the LEED-New Construction Gold certification awarded in 2007 to Northland Pines High School in Eagle River, Wis. The article said the school could be subject to decertification as a result of LEED 2009 provisions
In its final report on the collapse of the Dallas Cowboy’s practice facility, the National Institute of Standards and Technology recommends owners of other fabric-covered, tubular-steel-framed structures have their buildings evaluated. Some universities already have; of these, at least two have found the structures fail to meet established codes. Photo: Courtesy of the University of New Mexico Engineer’s report found flaws in the Summit Structures practice facility at the University of New Mexico. NIST concluded the Cowboy’s building designed and built by Summit Structures of Allentown, Pa., failed to withstand wind loads that were substantially less than required by design
A preliminary damage assessment map for major buildings and infrastructure in Port-au-Prince is now available from the United Nations Institute for Training and Research's Operational Satellite Applications Programme (UNITAR/UNOSAT). Photo: Eduardo Fierro, BFP Engineers Inc. Collapsed two-, or possibly three-story reinforced concretebuilding in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Sites marked as "No Visual Damage" may have major structural damage not identifiable in the imagery. Damage there is likely underestimated. The same goes for road and bridge damage, says the group. Of 110 selected sites, 58 or 53% are visibly damaged or destroyed. Of these, 88% are government buildings; 60% are churches, 50% are
Damage from landslides is common in Haiti. In Port-au-Prince, there is widespread destruction of nonductile concrete structures. Many rubble or unreinforced masonry walls failed. The E-in-plan Presidential Palace in Port-au-Prince still has much of the first floor intact, with windows unbroken, but there is total collapse above the first floor. There is very light reinforcing evident in failed columns near the entry. At the port, there is a collapsed pier and cranes, and several buildings are under water. Extensive lateral spreading and liquefaction is evident. These and numerous other on-site observations on damage from Haiti’s magnitude 7 earthqauke are from