Several technologies at different stages of market readiness promise to take windows far beyond low-e triple-glazed.
Green Home & Building
A Paradigm For Prefab Passive Houses
A modular prefab home on the U.S. market meets the passive house standard and comes close to meeting the Living Building Challenge.
Soft House Explores Flexible Response To Climate
A new passive house responds actively to efficiently meet the energy demands of different seasons and weather.
Diagonal Tower Adds New Slant To Skyscraper Efficiency
The 64-story Diagonal Tower planned for Seoul, South Korea, includes several passive energy systems and will use 25 percent less structural steel than similarly sized buildings.
Nifty Walls Remain Just Around The Corner
An energy-saving wallboard product is in use in Europe and has a manufacturer in the U.S., but remains unavailable here.
Moisture Harvesting: Pulling Water Out of Thin Air
These three applications — one in practice and two conceptual — demonstrate the potential for buildings of the future to pull water literally out of thin air.
D*Haus: Home Design As Origami
Looking more like an origami crane than a home, the modular D*Haus concept can be bent and unfolded to create a virtually limitless number of configurations.
Warehouse Adapted For Collaborative Innovation
A massive maritime warehouse in Rotterdam is converted into modular classroom space, saving on building costs and reducing the raw materials needed to build new classrooms.
Attractive Net-Zero-Energy House On A Budget
A Seattle couple shows how to build to net-zero-energy standards economically.
Net Zero Challenges Of A Wet, Windy, Remote Island
For affordable living in extreme circumstances, these design contest winners show how net-zero can be the answer.
Living Roof Goes Back To School
At Nueva School, green roofs and rainwater systems aren’t just on the classrooms, they are classrooms.
A Park Will Sit Atop Large SF Bay Mass Transit Hub
San Francisco has broken ground on a grand transit terminal with a four-block park on its roof.
Breathable Façade Concept Pivots On Sunlight
This bizarre design for a shifting, “breathable” building façade provides automated ventilation via basic principles of physics, powered entirely by the sun.
Active And Passive Green Homes: What To Know
First in green home design there was the Passive standard, and now a new one called Active is getting notice for subtle differences. We talk about them.