Curious about what it means to build green? Then be sure to check out the Grand Traverse Green 2010 expo at the Hagerty Center, Friday and Saturday, February 5 and 6, in Traverse City.
The expo is sponsored by the Green Build Committee of the Home Builders Association of the Grand Traverse Area in an effort to educate homeowners and industry professionals about sustainable building practices and to stimulate the building economy in Northern Michigan. The goal is to foster connections that will enhance green trade, to give people an introduction to the technology and vocabulary of green building and to inform them of the coming changes in the building market as it is affected by green technology.
The weekend will kick off on Friday with a presentation to the general public on what green building represents in today’s market in terms of tangible benefits: energy savings, quality of life and health, durability of structures and resultant financial savings. Saturday will follow up with an all-day workshop for builders, architects and designers, bankers, real estate agents, appraisers, inspectors, homeowners, and anyone else who has a financial or business interest in the emerging green market. The presenters are professionals who have had real, positive impact on the green building field in Michigan as well across the United States.
There will also be an introduction to Michigan Saves, an innovative program to help all types of Michigan energy consumers—businesses, institutions, and residents—afford energy efficiency and renewable energy upgrades by financing the installation of energy measures with no upfront cost to utility customers.
For more information on the event and to register, visit mgconline.org/greenbuild/html_email_gtg2010.html.
Check out this MyNorth content about Green Building.
T.J. Ewing’s Blog: Michigan Saves Program
Up North Green Living Group — Check out the conversation.
Danny Forster’s Cool Green House — video tour!
I just want to comment about that house design by the “Harvard Graduate” Danny Forster. I have been in homes with ceiling heating systems. They are the most uncomfortable environments imaginable. Your face is hot when your body is chilled. To crank up the heat enough for your body to feel warm your face feels near boiling. Apart from that Mr. Forster designed the coils in the ceiling to carry coolant during summer months. I predict in a few years there will be major issues with moisture damage, dripping ceilings, and mold. Condensate is always going to appear on the outside of a surface employed for removing heat from any given space as a principal of simple physics most high school students would know about. Hence refrigerators develop frost that has to be defrosted and drained to an unobjectionable part of the system where a heating coil can convert it back to vapor. Also the reason your windshield fogs up as molecules of warm, vapor carrying air pass through the glass to the cooler air either inside or outside your car. The moisture carried in the air is unable to pass through glass (or metal pipes, etc) so it is deposited on the surface. This is what will be occurring in that home Mr. Forster designed. There was a total design disregard of another principal common to all who understand cooling affect. The sensation of feeling cool is partly psychological in that it is associated with the sensation of air flowing around you. so some form of forced air system enhances cooling. Ideally a great system would have radiant floor heating and forced air cooling. A cooling system without airflow ends up making persons feel like they are sitting in a refrigerator. Its more chilling than cooling.
Speaking of “airflow.” There are problems with his window airflow arrangement that could have better been addressed using a natural convection current design. Last but not least, he permanently diminished the potential for using solar heat gain in certain windows that could have been fitted with the means to exploit this energy source as needed and dampen it when not. In the process the windows would not be wasted with permanent obstructions.
This person was endorsed by the producers of The Discovery Channel? Maybe its a wake up call for everyone not to simply believe what we see or hear without conducting our own exercise in critical thinking and independent research. I do not have a Harvard degree but it seems common sense just can’t be taught at ivy league institutions anyway so save your money and attend the university of your choice. Just an opinion.