February 20, 2009

Not just a pretty facade...

Zerofootprint has just announced the Z-prize. The "Zerofootprint Skin Renewal Award" will be launched at the Discovery '09 Conference this May in Toronto.

More than just an anti-aging cosmetic approach, this award will challenge designers from across the wold to come up with new solutions to an old problem...old buildings. The largest greenhouse gas emissions in cities come from buildings. Rebuilding cities is not an option and retrofitting can be inadequate. Re-skinning, however, has many advantages:
· It can be used to hide a cheap retrofit
· It is potentially non-invasive
· It can make a ho-hum building into a handsome green role model
· It can be used to engineer an energy reduction of as much as 70%
· Re-skinning can be smart — solar, thermal, media, vegetation etc.

More information, and tonnes of inspiration, can be found at the new Zerofootprint resource area for a limited time in the library.

You can also find more books about designing like you give a damn now on display in the library.

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