In keeping with President Obama’s “Federal Leadership in Environmental, Energy, and Economic Performance” executive order, we’ve seen a decisive push for greener federal buildings over the past year. It even appears that different agencies are actually vying with each other for the most sustainable buildings—NASA seems absolutely thrilled that the new Propellants North Administrative and Maintenance Facility, at the Kennedy Space Center, will be its greenest facility ever.

The building will be “a future hub for spacecraft fueling support and a storage facility for cryogenic fuel transfer equipment,” so I was expecting suitably fancy, futuristic technology. Instead, the design and construction team is gunning for a LEED Platinum rating with some good old-fashioned methods—recycling and Dumpster diving. Read more…

This year’s Metropolis Conference at the International Contemporary Furniture Fair, in New York, featured a cast of “design entrepreneurs” who are reinventing their practices through creative approaches to the new economy. Even if you couldn’t make it to the daylong conference, you’re still in luck: video of the complete event is now available. Watch the one-minute teaser above for a quick look at a few of the speakers’ presentations, and keep scrolling for the conference schedule with links to all of the videos. Read more…

The Aeron Chair has about 200 parts—all of which have to be analyzed to determine its carbon footprint. Photo: courtesy Herman Miller

There’s a reason why big companies are almost duty bound to take the lead in sustainable design. To get a handle on the complexity of the task—whether it’s designing a zero-energy building system, or truly closing the loop on a task chair—requires time, money, and expertise. Recently I spoke to Gabe Wing, Herman Miller’s Design for the Environment manager, about the unique challenges of achieving carbon neutrality for products.

Is carbon neutrality for products even possible and, if it is, what has to be done to get there?

We’ve been working in this area for several years. With products, there are some pretty significant challenges to approaching carbon neutrality. The first thing you have to do is determine how much energy is used to assemble and extract all the raw materials from the ground through your production and delivery. Then you need to look at how you handle end-of-life disposal. To go into that process is a significant endeavor and the best way to do that today is through some proprietary software packages. Read more…