Last week, two interesting reports were published analysing how regulations can better support ‘sustainable’ material use. Very esteemed colleagues, united in a Dutch ‘Gideons tribe’ to make the buildings sector move faster, have been working on this. [1] I can… Continue Reading
Everything is renewable – classification after growth rate – renewal time, flow rate . As a result of some recent projects new insights developed over resources, that any resource is renewed. Its only a matter of time. But that implies… Continue Reading
Last week I published a letter in the Netherlands, in which I indicated that about 800,000 hectares of land would be needed for the construction of new homes. That’s how it works in a transition: We have to significantly reduce… Continue Reading
There is growing need for information of embodied energy impacts. As I argued in a Linkedin article last week: Needed: A international Embodied Energy Data Authority’.* But here I want to address the lack of data for especially installations. Mainly… Continue Reading
Before we hurry covering everything with solar panels, let’s reason a bit further, because since my first experiences with renewable energy, many new insights have emerged. Those first experiences I had when building a “Bicycle wheel windmill”, as described in… Continue Reading
As we want to get rid of fossil fuels, we will at least have to develop everything now without fossil fuels. And in any case the operational energy. In the case of new buildings this leads to “0-energy buildings”, which… Continue Reading
What is better , a friend active in the beverage world asked, recycling aluminium cans or recycling glass bottles? Neither, I immediately replied: always reuse, and never use aluminum. As the Dutch national environmental center reports: a deposit beer bottle… Continue Reading
Why didn’t we realize this before… Since a year or two there has been a working group of a number of collaborating researchers in Europe, under the wings of an international NGO (iiSBE) who are investigating what the ‘carbon budget’… Continue Reading
Some time ago , I was in a meeting for writing a biobased building manifest. Very interesting discussions, which were hardly ever held at the policy level. Although I get signals that the discussion about the impact of materials, as… Continue Reading
This is an extended version of a previous post on linked in, which had a lot of reactions.. {april 2019} When it comes to Embodied Energy, we are used to normalize this over the lifespan of a building (… Continue Reading