Green Building

A task force that included our AIA chapter has concluded that our area would be better off if each jurisdiction passed a Green Building Ordinance, similar to those that have already passed by the cities of Monterey and Carmel, RATHER than each jurisdiction having to adopt the new state code, called CALGREEN, on 1/1/11. The task force concluded that the marketplace will have more consistency if local ordinances that are all similar are in place, within our region, and that the methodology of the local green ordinances contain a lot of flexibility for the owners and designers. We uncovered that the way CALGREEN’s adoption was set up was that it must be chosen if a local green ordinance is not in place. It is unusual for a code to be written this way, but it does create a way to keep green building more straight-forward and less complicated, which should help the marketplace. For more information on any of these topics, please contact Michael Waxer, AIA, LEED AP, at [email protected]