OK. I've been missing for a while now and I apologize.
As I have expressed previously, my research interest is in quantifying environmental impacts at a building scale (then I will perhaps look at larger scales) through its life cycle. I will use this blog as a place to organize my thoughts and hopefully get some feedback from professionals and other people with good common sense.
At this moment I am focusing on what some would call the embodied energy of materials. This is perhaps the area that is most directly relevant to my studies in Structural Engineering. When I say embodied energy, I am referring to the energy requirements to extract raw materials, process them and install them in a building. As one would expect, these are not necessarily values that can be tabulated and used uniformly throughout the world, as they vary from region to region and depend on the "upstream" sourcing and processing.
From a life cycle perspective this would cover all stages up until on-site construction. My next post thus, will attempt to offer a comprehensive overview of life cycle analysis in the context of buildings, focusing on how it helps answer the question of the upstream impacts of building materials.
After that I hope to be able to begin the very important Operation and Maintenance stage of buildings. Look for more posts soon.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Thursday, September 3, 2009
The Story of Stuff
I was interested in watching this and overall, it was a very positive experience. This video is very effective in going deeper than the phases into the social and environmental consequences of how we get things. At 20 minutes, it could be the most succinct introduction to the concept of the life cycle and how analyzing things through this lens can make a difference.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Top Technical Resources
On the technical side of buildings, there are many web sites and I'm guessing that there are plenty more that I don't know of.
Online
One of my recently discovered favorites is Building Science's web site. They have a lot of really interesting topics and they explain them quite well. I could easily spend all day reading their stuff. The site may not be flashy or elegant (OK, truth is it's pretty ugly), but the information is superb. A few recent reads I enjoyed: Wood is good... but strange (.pdf) and Thermodynamics: It's not rocket science (.pdf).
Another very good web site that I recommend is the Green Building Advisor. It has a lot of constantly updated material relating primarily to the residential green building sector and features a lot of good discussions and articles. I believe you can pay for a 'pro' membership that gives you access to drawing details and such (probably more useful if you do this for a living).
Textbook
The most comprehensive and enjoyable text I have found so far is Sustainable Construction by Charles Kibert (ISBN: 978-0-470-11421-6). It closely follows the green building process, which is a huge undertaking. Although the material is not really technical, it offers a solid general overview of the many disciplines that work together to deliver buildings.
So those are my top two. But its is still somewhat questionable how technical the two really are. Which other sites would you recommend for technical information?
Online
One of my recently discovered favorites is Building Science's web site. They have a lot of really interesting topics and they explain them quite well. I could easily spend all day reading their stuff. The site may not be flashy or elegant (OK, truth is it's pretty ugly), but the information is superb. A few recent reads I enjoyed: Wood is good... but strange (.pdf) and Thermodynamics: It's not rocket science (.pdf).
Another very good web site that I recommend is the Green Building Advisor. It has a lot of constantly updated material relating primarily to the residential green building sector and features a lot of good discussions and articles. I believe you can pay for a 'pro' membership that gives you access to drawing details and such (probably more useful if you do this for a living).
Textbook
The most comprehensive and enjoyable text I have found so far is Sustainable Construction by Charles Kibert (ISBN: 978-0-470-11421-6). It closely follows the green building process, which is a huge undertaking. Although the material is not really technical, it offers a solid general overview of the many disciplines that work together to deliver buildings.
So those are my top two. But its is still somewhat questionable how technical the two really are. Which other sites would you recommend for technical information?
First Post
So yes, this blog is different. At this point I am not sure on how much interest there is out there for understanding the very specific calculations that support numbers such as "my macbook's carbon footprint is so and so kg of CO2e." What I do know is that information that can help answer such questions is fragmented and sparse.
My goal for this blog is primarily to promote the accessibility of information. In academia we worry too much about producing peer reviewed journal papers that few people read and even less actually understand.
I believe information should be free, but I also hope that this blog is more than just a collection of information. As I hint in my welcome message, there is too much information out there. This blog will try to give an adequate overview of the big picture with enough detail so that different visitors who may be experts can give their two cents and fill in the gaps.
Finally, this blog is meant to reach a wide audience, because sustainability is about real life and we have to find ways to use all of the knowledge that is already developed but rarely used. So in my mind, I see spreadsheets, videos, links, pdf documents, powerpoints and much more in the future. I hope you take the moment to bookmark this page, and come back often.
My goal for this blog is primarily to promote the accessibility of information. In academia we worry too much about producing peer reviewed journal papers that few people read and even less actually understand.
I believe information should be free, but I also hope that this blog is more than just a collection of information. As I hint in my welcome message, there is too much information out there. This blog will try to give an adequate overview of the big picture with enough detail so that different visitors who may be experts can give their two cents and fill in the gaps.
Finally, this blog is meant to reach a wide audience, because sustainability is about real life and we have to find ways to use all of the knowledge that is already developed but rarely used. So in my mind, I see spreadsheets, videos, links, pdf documents, powerpoints and much more in the future. I hope you take the moment to bookmark this page, and come back often.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)