February 18th, 2011 
Tushar Mathur Green construction is a movement toward sustainable, energy-efficient and nontoxic building of all kinds. Construction companies, architects, suppliers and homeowners all have the opportunity to participate in the green building revolution regardless of project size. However since new environmentally friendly building ideas and products emerge each year, keeping abreast of these ongoing and exciting trends can be challenging. Luckily, you don’t need to be well versed in construction management to stay informed on the most recent developments in the industry. Read on to learn about everything from the new low-VOC caulking products to high tech designing tools.
One emerging trend is that green construction is becoming the new standard within the whole building industry. In fact, it is expected to contribute half a trillion dollars to the U.S. economy over the next few years and provide millions of jobs. The reason for this trend is primarily financial: green building design, construction practices and materials continue to become more cost effective, and thus attractive, for mainstream clientele.
This trend is supported by the increasing presence of green hardware stores and vendor Web sites. Chains such as Green Depot (which has just acquired the west coast retailer Ecohaus) and online retailers such as Green Building Supply are causing the industry to take notice, pressuring big box building suppliers to increase their green product range. Available products from green building vendors include low-VOC cabinets, paints and flooring, HVAC and plumbing, efficiently designed prefab building systems and just about any other item you can think of within the building industry.
Another significant trend in green construction could aptly be called extreme efficiency. This approach utilizes design principles, design software, hardwired smart systems and smart appliances to lower the cost and carbon footprint of construction projects. For example, Building Integration Modeling (BIM) is a design trend with emerging software applications that integrate detailed building design, construction and operation data to model greater efficiencies and adhere to the design intent of the building over its life cycle. Green Building XML is a data structure format created specifically to represent green-focused information for BIM purposes. More and more, this data representation system is being integrated into emerging Computer-aided design (CAD) and engineering software tools to enable modeling of green construction priorities such as heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC), water and electricity efficiency.
Such tools enable better compliance with the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) new voluntary WaterSense, so we can expect to see more builders earn the WaterSense label for their projects. Integrated modeling also means hard-wired smart buildings (with two-way interface between smart systems and appliances and the electrical distribution system) will continue to be a focus of companies like CISCO and General Electric (GE) as they look to the future revamping of the electric grid and its impact on how buildings are constructed and operated.
Thanks in part to these new trends in energy efficiency and smart systems, green construction, in addition to being the right thing to do for the planet, is increasingly becoming the cost-effective thing to do. Not only does the construction industry continue to blossom, but each year brings new and important developments worthy of attention.
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