Blog

All around the globe, the pandemic has created something of a "gap" between what came before and what will come after. Let's use this gap as an opportunity to change paradigms while traditional practices are somewhat less solid. Paying attention to paradigms is what matters most during this time between the old normal and the new normal.

Ours is the indoor generation. We spent the vast majority of our lives in indoor environments of our own making. What if these environments were viewed as highly functional systems to provide for human health, comfort and well-being? This was where the societal conversation existed when it ran into a head-on collision with the Novel Coronavirus pandemic. At this point, we find ourselves at a profound inflection point, ruminating on what will change in our society as we move forward.

A compilation of resources for management of the indoor environment during the COVID-19 epidemic from the state of Maine’s Indoor Air Quality Council. We thought these would be useful to our readers. Let us know if you find any additional resources that would be good additions.

We’re writing you today to express our sentiment of solidarity in these strange and uncertain times. Now is the time to stay informed and also to stay calm. We are confident that working together, as people who care deeply about the world, we’ll make it through this.

Now, more than ever, there is a tremendous amount of attention on how interconnected we are to our immediate environmental conditions (and to each other) as the spread of the Novel Coronavirus has reached a pandemic level. We were inspired by the recent NYT Opinion piece, titled “Your Building Can Make You Sick Or Keep You Well” by Dr. Joseph G. Allen, director of the Healthy Buildings program at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and wanted to take a few moments to clue you into the way Positive Energy thinks about buildings, their mechanical designs, and the impacts of our design/engineering decisions on indoor air quality.

The AIA should absolutely follow the example that our UK counterparts have laid out and move our own awards programs toward one that measures multiple dimensions of quality and beauty. After all, if we’re not designing projects focused on sustainable outcomes, we’re not upholding our ethical duties as the design professionals who are responsible for managing many resources and their associated carbon profiles.

A fantastic article by Stephanie Carlisle of KieranTimberlake on the role of architects in curbing the AEC industry’s impact on climate change.

Heat pumps are so common in our lives that we ordinarily fail to notice them. That said, if you live indoors chances are that you interact with a heat pump every day. This is because that refrigerator in your kitchen is a heat pump. Do you trust it to do its job reliably? Generally speaking, refrigerators are not all that exciting. They just do their jobs day after day. Like all machines, they can and do fail over time but overall your refrigerator is solid. In my own home I’ve replaced the dishwasher twice but still have the same fridge keeping my food fresh and ice frozen after 20 years. This reliability is due to the fact that at the core of your refrigerator are simple, reliable, inexorable laws of physics.

Join us for a conversation about the AIA’s shift in focus toward combatting climate change. The session will be co-led by Betsy Del Monte, the resolution's sponsor and a member of the AIA Strategic Council and Corey Squire, the lead author the COTE Toolkit. They both currently sit on the AIA National Committee on the Environment Advisory Group.

The American Institute of Architects has released a five-point action plan for climate change after announcing it a "critical issue" for the architecture profession. AIA unveiled the Where We Stand: Climate Action plan on Monday 16 September following the announcement of its initiative to drive climate action on 5 September.

We recently took a detour from the esteemed Westford Building Science Symposium, aka “Building Science Summer Camp,” to visit our friends at Bensonwood in New Hampshire.

We had the opportunity to sit in on a talk by Vishaan Chakrabarti on the nature of cities, transit-oriented urban density, and the impact of cities on our quality of life and the planet’s ecological health.

Join the 2030 Challenge

New 2030 Commitment report findings emphasize need for climate action. Profession must double down on efforts to meet 2030 targets.

AIA Board of Directors approves member-led resolution to rally architects in mitigating and adapting the built environment, adopts COTE design measures as deflation of “design excellence.”

Thanks for celebrating our 10th anniversary with us. Here’s to another decade of great work and great relationship building.

Positive Energy has reached a milestone in its history. This week we are celebrating our 10th anniversary, while simultaneously celebrating a new office space, new staff, new services, and a rebranding moment with a new website. Please take a look around at the new site. Read about our new services. Get to know our new folks. Share in this wonderful moment with us.