The U.S. Department of Energy launched a crowdsourcing website designed to aid technology innovators in collecting, sharing, and evaluating input from their customers and other stakeholders about next-generation building technologies.
The website, known as the Buildings Crowdsourcing Community, is administrated by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and can be used by start-ups, designers, buildings scientists, and students to share ideas that can be turned into energy-efficient technolgoeis for buildings and homes.
The website will remain open until 11:59 p.m. EST on May 31. Until then, the Buildings Crowdsourcing Community will accept new idea submissions, comments, and votes on submissions.
Some ideas that have been submitted so far include: modular building facades, improving air tightness in envelopes, and scalable mixed waste to energy conversion technology.
Those who are interested in participating on the site can register through the ORNL Buildings Crowdsoucing Community. The best ideas will be recognized during the DOE's Building Technologies Office Industry Day in September.
Related Stories
| Dec 19, 2014
Zaha Hadid unveils dune-shaped HQ for Emirati environmental management company
Zaha Hadid Architects released designs for the new headquarters of Emirati environmental management company Bee’ah, revealing a structure that references the shape and motion of a sand dune.
| Dec 17, 2014
USGBC announces 2014 Best of Green Schools honorees
Houston's Monarch School was named the K-12 school of the year, and Western Michigan University was honored as the top higher-ed institution, based on environmental programs and education efforts.
| Nov 25, 2014
Behnisch Architekten unveils design for energy-positive building in Boston
The multi-use building for Artists For Humanity that is slated to be the largest energy positive commercial building in New England.
| Nov 20, 2014
Survey: 84% of data center owners want more renewable energy options
The cost of producing wind and solar power has decreased 58% and 40%, respectively, during the past five years, making renewables more cost-competitive with traditional fuel sources in many markets.
| Nov 12, 2014
Chesapeake Bay Foundation completes uber-green Brock Environmental Center, targets Living Building certification
More than a decade after opening its groundbreaking Philip Merrill Environmental Center, the group is back at it with a structure designed to be net-zero water, net-zero energy, and net-zero waste.
| Oct 27, 2014
Report estimates 1.2 million people experience LEED-certified retail centers daily
The "LEED In Motion: Retail" report includes USGBC’s conceptualization of the future of retail, emphasizing the economic and social benefit of green building for retailers of all sizes and types.
| Oct 15, 2014
Harvard launches ‘design-centric’ center for green buildings and cities
The impetus behind Harvard's Center for Green Buildings and Cities is what the design school’s dean, Mohsen Mostafavi, describes as a “rapidly urbanizing global economy,” in which cities are building new structures “on a massive scale.”
| Sep 15, 2014
Sustainability rating systems: Are they doomed?
None of the hundreds of existing green building rating systems is perfect. Some of them are too documentation-heavy. Some increase short-term project cost. Some aren’t rigorous enough or include contentious issues, writes HDR's Michaella Wittmann.
| Sep 7, 2014
Building the cladding palette: panels, rainscreens, and veneers [AIA course]
When it comes to cost, performance, and aesthetics—not to mention maintenance and long-term resilience—the evaluation of cladding materials and façade systems is more complex than ever. This course is worth 1.0 AIA CES HSW learning units.
| Aug 11, 2014
New guide for prevention of thermal bridging in commercial buildings
The guide aims to overcome obstacles with respect to mitigating thermal bridging to reduce energy consumption in buildings.
