Patricia Kirk's Climate Chronicles

Concerned about the impact of climate change, some state and local governments are aggressively pursuing carbon neutral status and adopting policies and strategies aimed at reducing their carbon footprint. Over the next few months, we will be discussing what it takes to attain this goal and highlighting cities and states that are leading the way.

Six cities always are among the top 10 green U.S. cities no matter who compiles the list: San Francisco, Berkeley, Austin, Seattle, Chicago and Boston.

Our Going Carbon Neutral series starts with Austin, the only city so far with the political will to formally commit to this goal and start the journey.

Economists predict the real estate market will begin to rebound sometime in 2010 as the economy turns. However, real estate experts say the next round will look markedly different from the last one, with the industry adopting practices aimed at creating a sustainable marketplace.

Unlike the last housing cycle when developers aimed higher and higher, ultimately pricing out middle-income workers, home products in a sustainable market would target a mix of incomes, suggests Henry Cisneros, the former secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and chairman of CityView, a national real estate investment and pension fund manager based in Los Angeles.

Cisneros notes that the majority of housing would be priced to attract the largest group of consumers, those earning about 150% of area median income.

Project success would be measured by the “triple bottom line,” its impact on society and the environment, as well as profitability.

Sustainable development is moving to a new level where buildings are integral to nature, supporting nature’s work rather than interfering with life-sustaining ecosystems. HOK, the world’s largest architecture-engineering firm, has teamed up with the Biomimicry Guild to bring about this innovative shift with the introduction of biomimicry to the build environment.

Biomimicry enables architects and engineers to design buildings and other structures that perform like nature, notes Mary Ann Lazarus, director of Sustainable Design for HOK.

“A building designed with biomimicry principles might or might not look like a tree, but different aspects will function like a tree,” explains Janine Benyus, a biologist, cofounder of the Biomimicry Guild and author of Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature.

In fact, under this new order of sustainability, buildings, outdoor art and other manmade structures would function like trees, meadows, flora and fauna, capturing, cleaning and storing rainwater; converting sunlight to energy and carbon dioxide to oxygen; protecting soil from erosion; disseminating seedlings; and eliminating waste.

Climate laws alone cannot shift the global energy paradigm to clean, renewable sources by 2050, but with the help of nanoscience they just might.

U.S. scientists are on the leading edge of nanoscience work that has the potential to facilitate a quantum leap in technology innovation.

This relatively new area of scientific work involves control of materials at the atomic, or molecular, level causing it to undergo a quantum change that makes it lighter and better by increasing the surface size and strength of products, explains Wade Adams, director of the Richard B. Smalley Institute for Nanoscale Science and Technology at Rice University.

Nanoclay, for example, has been used for a decade to make light, flexible car bumpers and side panels. Scientists studied the nanostructure of lotus leaves to create water repellant surfaces used on clothing to repel moisture and stains.

Nate Lewis, professor of chemistry at California Institute of Technology, believes nanoscience is also key to making clean energy affordable by providing inexpensive replacements for expensive components in clean energy technologies.

To avoid catastrophic climate change, experts say developed nations must reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by at least 80 percent by mid-century. Getting there will take major improvements in energy efficiency, particularly in energy-intensive buildings.

While 80 percent might sound like a tall order, good design principles and conservation techniques can already get a building close enough to carbon neutral for technology to finish the job, says architect Lawrence Maxwell, president of Spacecoast Architects of Indialantic, Fla.

Step one in sustainability, he says, is to reduce energy load.

The Odyssey Charter School, Maxwell’s prototype for a sustainable school design, comes close to meeting that 80 percent cut. It needs less than 30 percent of the energy required by a typical school.

A few years ago modular, or prefabricated, housing was the stepchild of the homebuilding industry, just a cut above mobile homes or manufactured housing.

Now, with the offering of higher quality, green modular housing in the marketplace, consumers are beginning to view it in a fresh light.

The reason? Hurricane Katrina.

Organizations concerned with rebuilding New Orleans green aligned architects with modular housing. This, in turn, accelerated the acceptance of modular housing in the new home market, suggests New York architect Frederic Schwartz, who designed several New Orleans projects.

There are many good reasons to build green, but for homeowners and small businesses, the high upfront costs can be prohibitive.

The key to advancing renewable energy use nationwide may be government involvement.

Federal, state and local incentives can help offset the big capital outlay that solar, wind and other renewable energy technologies require. Tax credit and rebates already go a long away. Now, innovative local funding programs are taking these projects even farther, making renewable energy installations as affordable as the monthly electric bill.

Covering the green build environment over the last eight years has been a journey filled with surprises, not the least of which was the quick integration of green building principles to the mainstream build environment.

When the U.S. Green Building Council launched the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system in 2000, it was hard to imagine that green building principles would become integral to popular culture and a driving force in the real estate market within a decade. Back then, just the mention of “green” caused developers to shudder.

Today, green homes sell quicker and at higher prices than conventional homes. Green office space commands above-market rents, because it consumes up to 50% less energy and provides a healthier work environment that improves worker productivity.

Now, all major corporations—even Wal-Mart—have adopted sustainable building standards, considered “best practices” by industry professionals. Even in a dismal real estate market, demand for green buildings continues to grow.