Penn Green Fast forward to the year 2020…Friendship and Garfield have been named Pittsburgh’s most progressive climate friendly neighborhoods. Penn Avenue is the new “Green Seam” where businesses are flocking to be part of the community.  What would be in the now vacant storefronts?  EvolveEA will propose businesses that provoke us to think about our neighborhoods’ future. Join us to discuss these ideas. Climate Migration Services Body Power Urban Agrifitters  →

We are at Greenbuild 2009 in Phoenix this week! To say the least–it has been eye opening. Although we’re enduring difficult economic times, it seems there is quite a bit of optimism inside the convention center. We will likely look back on Greenbuild 2009 as emblematic of significant change on many fronts. Anxiety and uncertainty are being replaced by a newly emerging optimism and sense of purpose in the sustainable business professional community. The conference continues to draw more and more young professionals and new attendees. And most importantly, we’re... 

Imagine, for a minute, the future of our neighborhoods in a carbon constrained world. What will they look like and how will they function? Neighborhoods and regional leaders should be asking this question and search for solutions that take an integrated approach. Enter the low carbon zone, climate benefit district, or low carbon neighborhood. While we’re not the first to propose this concept–we like the idea. The tools we need for a low carbon future are at hand, but we’ve yet to develop the toolkit for implementation. Our urban neighborhoods hold the highest... 

The USGBC’s LEED rating system has become a transformative force for change (issues aside-which are relevant and will be covered in a later post). Consider; over 260 million square feet of space are now certified under the LEED NC and O&M programs, 60% of LEED credits have some aspect of energy savings embedded in their achievement, and that the resulting projections for the built environment suggest that between two and four billion tons of CO2 emissions will be avoided by 2050 as a result. Further, national trends suggest LEED has achieved full market penetration; locally,...