IES Blog

Eco-friendly living can come in many shapes and forms - from recycling paper and aluminum to placing solar panels on your home, to the more extreme option of living in an eco-village.  An eco-village focuses on organic farming, green building, communal spaces and many other aspects of sustainability.  For those that remember the communes of the 1960s and 1970s, eco-villages do have some similar characteristics as they both center around sharing and using the land to farm and eat but the main difference is they aren’t solely for hippies anymore.  From Sweden to Missouri and everywhere in between, these new settlements are popping up and prospering.

“The future of housing, in general, is sustainable communities,” Laura Mamo, a sociology professor at the University of Maryland and co-author of Living Green, tells Green House. She argues that single-family homes on large suburban lots have failed society, because they’ve created social isolation, dependence on personal cars and intolerably hefty mortgages for homeowners. 

Each village differs - but for the most part, residents own the home but not the land it sits on, helping to significantly reduce the taxes. Residents of these communities are usually responsible to help out by cooking communal dinners, tending to the wood-burning furnace that heats all the homes or maintaining the surrounding gardens.  Each eco-village or community has its own set rules and way of life but they all share the same principles of living a more simplified life and reducing their overall carbon footprint for a better tomorrow.

If living in an eco-village isn’t for you, then try looking at some of the unique ways these residents live and try adapting them to your neighborhood. Why not unite with your neighbors and try growing a few items in each of your yards and sharing the crop? Or set up a monthly volunteer day to plant new trees or flowers in your neighborhood parks? These are small ways to make an impact in your own community and make your own pseudo-eco-village!

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Tags:Building, communications, housing, recycle, reduce, Sustainability, Sweden

Football season kicks off in the US this month, and the Big Apple has a brand new green home for its two teams.

2010 is the first season for the New Meadowlands Stadium, the new 82,000-seat home of the Giants and the Jets, in East Rutherford, NJ, just a few miles west of New York City.  The $1.6 billion venue was constructed right next to its now-demolished predecessor, Giants Stadium.  It has twice the square footage, holds more people, and boasts many more amenities than the old stadium.

Its builders say it’s “one of the greenest stadiums in America.”  Last year, the EPA signed an agreement with its owners to “incorporate eco-friendly materials and standards into [its] construction and operation.”

But did it apply for LEED certification?  No.

According to Sports Business Journal, the stadium would have been “one or two points shy” of the total needed to be LEED certified because of the glass used to enclose its 200 luxury suites.  The mullions that seal the insulated glass that they could have installed would have obstructed fans’ view of the field, so the stadium’s management chose less-insulated (and less energy-efficient) glass, and elected not to pursue LEED certification because they knew they would have come up short.

Still, there are plenty of features that would have given the New Meadowlands Stadium plenty of LEED points, including:

- The stadium is on a brownfield site in the New Jersey Meadowlands

- It was built with 60,000 tons of recycled steel, including some from old Giants Stadium

- The seats are made of recycled plastic and scrap iron

- A new rail service takes fans to and from the stadium, cutting down on auto traffic

- The men’s rooms have waterless urinals

The stadium has gotten plenty of positive publicity in the green community, and rightfully so.  Its builders went above and beyond to make it as green as possible, despite its lack of LEED certification.  But still, it’s a shame that windows are the obstacle preventing the new crown jewel of America’s favorite sport from really leading the way.

Besides, aren’t you supposed to watch the game outside anyway?

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Tags:communications, LEED, LEED Certification, recycle, recycling

What country are you cheering for in this year’s World Cup games?  As a billion viewers watch the World Cup with anticipation of their country winning, they may not realize all the work that went into prepping for this massive sporting event.  Transportation, lodging and security were key components in preparing for these games, sure. But have you thought about the construction and refurbishment of the 10 stadiums that are being used for this global competition? The A/E/C community might be happy to know that BIM (Building Information Modelling), a tool which you more than likely use every day, played an integral role in building the new stadiums, home to over 40,000 people attending each of the 32 games.

In a recent article in Constructech Magazine, it’s mentioned that 5 new stadiums were built in preparation for the World Cup in Johannesburg, South Africa - 2 of them using BIM techniques and software.  The Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium and the Mbombela Stadium were both constructed using BIM since “arenas are typically unique structures, with complicated rooflines, curved beams, and heavy structural steel design.”  The Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium had to be devised and constructed within a very quick timeframe, since Africa had few arenas that could support the World Cup audience so the designers used BIM technology to streamline 4,200 drawings between multiple participants including designers, architects and building managers.

While BIM might not be an everyday word to most, high profile projects like these provide great proof points for the A/E/C community.  This technology has continued to grow over the years and continues to be a subject people want to learn more about, including the audience at the recent AIA convention in Miami.  According to Reed Construction Data, “BIM was the hot topic” at this year’s show.  The constant buzz around BIM just helps to further underscore its importance to the design process and longevity within the market.

As you watch your favorite team compete for the highly prized cup, keep a close eye on the stadiums, too. You’ll see that BIM played a pivotal part in the 2010 games.

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Tags:AIA, Architects, BIM, Building, communications, Fifa, World Cup

On August 22, 2008 we started this blog with the intention, like many companies, to give IES a voice within the market as well as draw an audience to our website. As the social media train continues to move full steam ahead, we are proud to be an active participant. Along with our blogging initiatives we also started tweeting in May 2009 and started a Facebook Fan Page shortly thereafter. Using these platforms, we are able to communicate our thoughts more freely while being be less formal and more direct with immediate responses.

We recently came across a blog post on AEC Café asking why the AEC community has been especially slow in adapting these new techniques into their marketing campaigns - “Is the A/E/C industry using social media?”

At IES, we feel like we have moved confidently into the social media space, using tools such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and our blog. We’ve learned a lot along the way, and we encourage the A/E/C community to join us. Whether a company in the space, an end-user or an editor writing about the AEC community, we all have something unique to say.

We look forward to connecting with you soon!

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Tags:communications, Facebook, IES, Twitter

After Greenbuild last year, it seemed like greenwashing was a thing of the past. As we saw in November, the theme of the show was a lack of greenwashing. Not to say a lack of hype, but it seemed the industry was moving in the right direction.

But then today we read this. And this, which left us with this closing thought:
“Going green, being sustainable, being a good corporate citizen. Today, too many corporations attempt to present themselves as all these. In truth, it seems it is often business as usual for many large organisations.

How long clever marketing campaigns will allow companies to go on pretending is an open question. The Internet and social media mean closer examination of these messages by consumers. If you get caught, good luck to you in rebuilding your ‘green’ reputation.”

So where does that leave us? How can we as consumers get through all the fluff and determine what companies are truly sustainable, and which ones are trying to pull the wool over our eyes? For starters, here are some guidelines, courtesy of Marc Gunther:
“We should absolutely not support green products from companies that use them to distract us from their larger negative environmental and social impacts. We need systemically green companies to address the challenges we face, not business-as-usual companies that hold up one green hand while hiding another toxic, CO2-emitting, waste-producing one behind their backs.”

And as we know, the power of the Internet, most notably Facebook and Twitter, will call out those companies that aren’t doing their part. We just hope it’s sooner rather than later…the industry seemed to have come so far, and this could be a big step backwards for the industry.

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Tags:communications, Greenwash, internet