BCCI Delivers State-of-the-Art, Ultramodern Yoga Studio

Samyama, the Sanskrit word for “bind” or “hold together,” is a name well suited for a yoga center that goes beyond the typical studio and focuses on healing and community. Located in a new two-story, building in Palo Alto’s Midtown neighborhood, BCCI’s client envisioned an inviting modern facility rooted in traditional yoga principles that would provide a sensory retreat for the mind, body, and soul.

Samyama exterior at sunrise

Samyama retail boutique with double height hard lid ceilings, soffit lighting and curved millwork

Samyama zen lounge featuring Italian wind chime chandeliers and ‘pods’ encircled with sheer drapes

Samyama banquet seating outside the second floor yoga studio

Samyama main yoga studio, ‘Ascension’ with modular art wall systems

Samyama Savant app-controlled, customized lighting system

To assist with project planning, BCCI was brought on early to provide constructability

CALGreen Changes Promise to Have Widespread Impact

If the new CALGreen requirements that went into effect on July 1, 2012 were not on your radar, there’s probably a good reason for that. Until recently, CALGreen – the first Statewide green building code – only applied to less than 10% of commercial construction projects. When CALGreen went into effect in 2010, it was primarily focused on new nonresidential construction projects, not commercial interior renovations, thus limiting the reach of the new code.

PODCAST: Recent Updates to CALGreen | The Commercial Construction Forum

Green Building Moving Forward: New Products and Industry News from Greenbuild

We continue our look back at this year’s Greenbuild with some intriguing new products unveiled at the expo and some industry news to boot.

New Product: Enova

One of the more unique products showcased at Greenbuild was the additive Enova, a silica aerogel made by Cabot Corp. which improves energy efficiency for a variety of applications.

What We Saw at Greenbuild

As we expected, Greenbuild 2012 did not disappoint. Whether or not you followed our recommendations on making the most of the conference, we hope that you found great value in the forums, expo hall, green building tours and networking. Here’s a bit of what we saw at this year’s Greenbuild.

The U.S. Green Building Council’s annual Greenbuild, a gathering of over 30,000 green building industry professionals, kicked off with several pre-conference activities, including the Codes Summit and the Living Building Challenge Materials Forum. At the Codes Summit, the comparison between LEED and CALGreen, California’s statewide green building code, was a hot topic.

We’re Growing!

We’re thrilled to share the news that our continued growth within the marketplace has led to the expansion of our team.

As part of our commitment to excellence in the areas of sustainability and design, we are pleased to welcome Aron Bosworth, LEED AP, who joins our dynamic sustainability team, and architect Lisa Szmurlo, who brings seventeen years of experience as a project architect.

How to make the most of Greenbuild

Alex Spilger,
LEED AP
Director of Sustainability, BCCI

Greenbuild, the world’s largest conference and expo focused on green building and sustainability related to the built environment is coming to San Francisco in just a few weeks (November 14-16). It’s important for anyone involved in the green building industry to consider the options for participation in this once-a-year opportunity, whether by attending the full conference or many of the other events happening in conjunction with the Greenbuild conference.

2 Billion and Counting…

The announcement last week by the USGBC that 2 billion square feet of commercial space has been LEED certified is not only awe-inspiring but also confirms that the green building movement has more than just taken root, it is flourishing. The USGBC also reported that it certifies 2 million square feet of commercial space a day and more than 50,000 commercial projects are registered for LEED certification which equals 9 billion square feet of space.

It is the recognition of these milestones that allow us as an industry to reflect on our achievements towards piloting LEED projects and supporting sustainable design and construction practices.

California AB 1103 Will Reveal Buildings’ True (Energy) Colors

California Assembly Bill 1103, which will require non-residential building owners to disclose their energy consumption information via the Energy Star Portfolio Manager, has been postponed for implementation until January 1, 2013, at the earliest.

What is Energy Star Portfolio Manager?
The Energy Star Portfolio Manager allows building owners to track and assess energy consumption and compare their own building’s performance against a national database of buildings with similar operating characteristics. The result is a rating on a scale of 0 to 100, with 100 being the most energy efficient building in its category.

A verified score of 75 or higher qualifies the building for Energy Star certification, which indicates that the building performs better than 75% of all similar buildings nationwide. A higher Energy Star score

LEED 2012: Introduction to the New Rating System Including the Integrative Process Credit

In recognition of Earth Day, we are taking this opportunity to kick off our series which highlights forthcoming changes with the most recognized green building program – LEED.

For more than a decade, the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards have set the bar for high performance buildings. One of the reasons that LEED has been able to drive such market transformation is because it is always evolving to improve and adapt to changing market conditions, user feedback, and new technologies. During previous modifications, the fundamental structure of the LEED Rating System remained largely intact; the changes that took place from one version to the next were relatively few and focused primarily on redistributing points across the various credits to better align with environmental impacts and human benefits.

In March of 2012, the USGBC completed the third public comment period for the latest draft of the Rating Systems, LEED 2012, which is anticipated to be released in November of this year. Unlike previous revisions, LEED 2012 will bring major changes across each of the credit categories, revised point distributions and technical content that aims to increase the rigor of LEED.

Unveiling LEED 2012

Planning is underway for the latest version of the USGBC LEED Rating System, which is slated for release in November 2012. This third version of the system has LEED consultants and users eager for a more robust and technically intuitive system than the current version, which was last updated in 2009.

While the system will continue to rely on a 110-point scale (100 base points and 10 bonus points), there will be added credit categories and compliance paths for 2012. LEED 2012 will include a new credit category called Location and Transportation (LT) in addition to Sustainable Sites that presently focus on surrounding density and connection to community.