One to catch tonight on Radio 3 at 21.45 GMT:
Philip Dodd tours the controversial new Terminal 5 at Heathrow airport and talks to architect Mike Davies, in charge of the project for the 19 years since its inception.
Addresses the question can a major airport really be eco-friendly?
But more importantly, Van Morrison is in session and in interview on the Paul Jones show at 19.00 GMT
BBC Radio 3 broadcast a fascinating programme on Saturday …
A sonic meditation on wind turbines and their place in today’s environment, recorded in Norfolk and the Fenlands. Including contributions from poet Kevin Crossley-Holland, architecture critic Jonathan Glancey and local residents, along with music created from the sounds of the turbines themselves.
… strange how those who love turbines hear symphony music and whale like song, yet those against turbines hear machine humming and sleep disturbing noise.
Available to listen again for a short while on Radio 3
Reported in todays Guardian….
A powerful new government climate change committee will meet today for the first time to decide how ministers will meet their commitment to cut carbon emissions by 60% by 2050, and whether the target needs to be strengthened in the face of worsening forecasts on climate change.
But is 60% by 2050 enough – the word from the science community is that it needs to be 80% – as Scotland and other are adopting. And if they do recommend a move to 80% that will affect all (ok most) Code targets and built environment targets set to date.
And Darlings forthcoming budget will be the greenest ever from Labour so I read. It will be interesting to see what home improvement, new home and non domestic building environmental targets and benefits are announced – if any
Two new blogs have come across my desktop in the last day or so:
Hat Projects Blog – this is the blog of Tim and Hana at HAT – covering architecture, planning and regeneration – with an interesting post on eco definitions (covered here on isite some time ago)
and
Public Works Group Blog – this is the blog for the Second Life construction and SLengineer groups.
The other evening I had the opportunity to tour around a new state of the art hospital facility, so state of the art it is calling itself the hospital of the future.
As the press release states: The new facility intends to positively transform the traditional health care experience that is normally associated with staying or working in a hospital. The campus will epitomize Cisco and PPH’s shared vision of a ‘Connected Hospital’ where technology and the physical environment seamlessly integrate to enhance patient care through the sharing of timely, accurate information among the right people at the right time, between hospitals and the extended ecosystem of care.
Following the tour – more comments here soon – I popped into the Blarney Stone pub and shared a Guinness or two with a friend whilst listening to a live singer entertain the regulars.
‘Work’ wasn’t over though – it was then off to a small group meeting to discuss how web technology can assist those working in the built environment sectors. This was part of a regular Tuesday evening get together to learn and share on themes that run from using Skype to dealing with Radon.
Possibly a typical afternoon / evening for those involved in improvement forums and tours, except this one was completely virtual within second life, demonstrating the benefits of such platforms for business, communication and learning.
On February 25 ‘cut the ribbon’ on a new hospital – Palomar West – a simulation of a real world hospital campus due to open in 2011 – gives visitors the opportunity to tour the hospital years before its doors actually open. How that for testing future patient comments and user ‘usability’. The ‘experience’ of users can be monitored prior to the building commencing, and real life designs amended accordingly. This is more than the video fly through we see to promote new buildings. I could sit and chat to others, within the reception and discuss our thoughts on the place.
The live singer was in a pub in London, streamed into a virtual pub, the Blarney Stone, on the Dublin sim. (The beer was real but from my own fridge)
The meeting was part of the Construction Group, with members across the globe, learning and sharing in a setting very similar to the thousands of meetings that occur across the country every night. Except this didn’t involve any traveling, didn’t interfere with family life, and with delegates from around the world, huge potential in global learning.
I am planning a regular meeting get to together to discuss the topics raised through isite – so if you have a second life – join the isite group in world, IM me from within second life or just leave a comment below . For more on second life, how to get into the groups, visit places such as the Palomar, contact me here, or leave comments below.
Hospital of the Future press release … Continue reading
Details and registration information for Lancashire Best Practice events have been posted up to the events page.
Youthbuild Elevate Event – 11th March
CDM event 12 March
Women In Construction event – How to Influence Others 10 April
the Second Life construction group meets this evening to discuss web based tools and sites to help the industry. Meeting will be held within second life at the Public Works Meeting Area, on the Public Works sim (9, 117, 301) starting at 4pm SLT – (LA time) which is midnight here in the uk – gulp
I noticed people are landing on this isite blog after searching, or goggling “top construction blogs usa”. Intrigued, I checked this out – the isite blog ranks number 3 hit in the google return list – thanks!, (Not bad from a remote Lancashire hamlet even though I say so myself)
What a week for sustainability related news.
I should try and get to do more weekly round ups – the last couple of weeks have been quiet on the blog posts so here are things that hit my radar last week. (The WordPress linking seems to be broken at the moment – so I will repost with the links later)
Top of the list was probably Eco-Build, which although covered by Building and others, including Phils blog, hasn’t clearly communicated its message (whatever it was) outside of those attending but led to confusion – more thinking and more targets. People I have talked to who attended all volunteered that event itself didn’t feel sustainable and got a lot of carbons to get people there.
Good news then that Building are promoting the (worlds?) first virtual on-line sustainability conference on the 15th and 16th April.
I thought one spark from Eco Build was in the message I picked up in a number of reports that the drive and demand for greener homes, buildings and lifestyles should come from communities, business and individuals, not rely on legislation to led us… (sustainablity2.0 on which more later)
Paul King from the UKGBC did get good coverage (Friday Interview in the Guardian) – a must read article to understand the UKGBC intentions
The most depressing news this week by far was that Isle of White council cannot afford low or zero carbon homes – presumably they can continue to afford the high cost of low price, the on going high cost of wasted energy and the 30% or so wastage in the construction process. What the IoW, along with others, cannot do is align capital budgets with operational and life cycle budgets – the out of date focus on 1, not the 5 or even the 200. Standing in the future, looking back we may see that we fumbling with easy options, a luxury we may not have again – as the Stern report indicates tomorrows cost of in-decision today.
The cost of going low or zero increasingly is perceived as a barrier. In the US as reported here many times it is seen as a commercial opportunity. I fear our green agendas may well be funded by US led green finance arrangements before too long.
Environment Property Codes were launched with a fanfare by IPD and others – but at first glance looked a bit of a damp squid. Hard to see anything new other than (another) standard format – but until the benchmarking gets underway, and the scale of take up known, it may be too early to comment on. What is worrying is the fee to use approach a lot these schemes are adopting – in the face of open source movement elsewhere.
I scanned a copy of the Green Marketing Manifesto in Borders during the week. I thought it was in itself another greenwash book, with advice such as ‘add ECO in front of anything to increase its desirability’ (Eco-Build, Eco Homes, Eco Villages perhaps) until I saw the ‘blurb’ and forward by leading respected thinkers. A closer look revealed this gem – it’s the greening of the business that is important – not the greening of product. Taking this into the built environment – organisations will only be able to deliver low or zero carbon construction, provide environmental fm etc if they themselves are green at heart. A new way of cutting through greenwash perhaps.
Oh and the plastic bag story. Anyone traveling through Europe will know this is not leading edge thinking to ban or reduce plastic bags – we are playing catch up. At its worst it is a blatant retail and government greenwash – focus on the easy carrier bags and smokescreen the bigger issues. Supermarkets need to focus on packaging, open cabinet fridges, the energy inefficient stores (with one or two exceptions) and the travel miles they generate. Salisbury’s advert today tells us they are making it easy for us to reduce, reuse and recycle, nice green wash words when what is needed is rethinking.
And then the interview with James Lovelock who happily tells us we are past the tipping point, to enjoy life while we can (for which he gives us 20 years). But insists this gives us plenty to do – except they will be the things we don’t want to do.
And then I had my eyes opened to Twitter … but more of that later.
Having posted on the Welsh drive to zero carbon yesterday, only fair to note the The Scottish Government last month launched its consultation on pushing for 80% reduction by 2050 … signaling Scotland’s serious intent to lead the global effort to combat climate change.
This is significant as it is based on the now recongised carbon level of 350ppm that scientists agree we must acheive, not the out-of-date 450ppm level upon which the English and other targets are based on.
Also significant is the high profile that the contribution of housing and built enviroment within the launch article,
a particular focus on housing-related products and services such as green mortgages and loans for domestic energy efficiency works. The energy efficiency of Scotland’s homes is improving, partly as a result of existing Government programmes, but more needs to be done to achieve the carbon emission reductions needed. Lenders have a potentially significant role to play through products such as green mortgages.
Fairsnape 