IWA World Congress on Water, Climate & Energy, Dublin - Ireland, May 13-18, 2012

Submitted by petrareulen@iis... on Mon, 07/18/2011 - 10:39

The IWA World Congress on Water, Climate and Energy, taking place in Dublin, Ireland 13-18 May 2012.

Climate change is forcing us to reassess our energy usage and will have real substantial impacts on the water cycle as well as energy production. Solving the interlinked challenges of water, climate and
energy in a sustainable manner is one of the fundamental goals of this
generation.

The Congress will explore topics of resilient and sustainable cities with a focus on climate change adaptation and mitigation, energy
including:

* CLIMATE CHANGE
* COMMUNICATIONS AND INFORMATION
* ECONOMICS AND POLICY
* ENVIRONMENT AND ECOLOGY
* WATER, WASTEWATER &
ENERGY INFRASTRUCTURES / UTILITIES
* WATER, AGRICULTURE AND FOOD
* SPECIAL PROGRAMMES

For a full detailed listing of Topics and Sub-Topics visit:
www.iwa-wcedublin.org

The Congress will attract over 2000 like-minded water, climate and
energy professionals from across the globe to exchange ideas, explore
the state of the art and debate the key issues underlying the science
and practice of these inectricably linked natural, utility and
infrastructural issues of our time.

Detailed proposals received for SB13 & SB14 Conferences

Submitted by petrareulen@iis... on Fri, 07/08/2011 - 16:47

Rotterdam and Penne du Tarn, 4 July

The period for receiving detailed proposals to hold SB13 and SB14 conferences has now ended, and representatives of CIB, iiSBE, UNEP-SBCI and FIDIC, led by Dr. Bill Porteous, will now begin to review the proposals.

The SB Conference series was established a decade ago, and is now recognized as the pre-eminent conference series related to sustainable building and construction. The founding international sponsor organizations were CIB and iiSBE. UNEP-SBCI joined in 2005 and FIDIC earlier this year.

The conference series has evolved into a three-year cycle, with Year 1 focused on preparation and planning, Year 2 consisting of a series of several national events, and Year 3 culminating in a world conference. The total number of delegates for the last two cycles
was approximately 6000 delegates. It should be noted that the uniqueness of the series lies partly in the peer review of papers and its non-commercial aspect, and partly in that delegates tend to be researchers, policy makers and practitioners who are all specialized in sustainable building.

The last event of the current conference cycle will be the World SB Conference in Helsinki, during 18-21 October of this year.
See for details.

Requests for expressions of interest for the 2013-2014 cycle were issued in January and 8 detailed proposals have been received for
2013 national events, and 3 bids for the single global conference in 2014. The global partners reserve the right to include a small number of additional SB13 national events in order to provide geographic and thematic balance.

It is expected that an announcement will be made at SB11 Helsinki of the names and locations of the selected 2013 national events and of the winning global 2014 event.

Nils Larsson
Executive Director, iiSBE

International trends in the development of rating systems

Submitted by Giulia Barbano on Wed, 03/09/2011 - 15:18

As part of a larger conference for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) organization, a two-day seminar on green buildings was held on 3-4 March 2011, in Washington DC. The seminar, Green Buildings and Green Growth: the Enabling Role of Standards and Trade, brought together some 100 people from 10 countries from the fields of trade, business, standards and building technology. Delegates known to most iiSBE members included Niclas Svenningsen of UNEP and Kazuo Iwamura from Japan.

Beyond welcomes and introductions, some 40 substantive presentations were made. Issues covered included the role of standards, EPDs (environmental product declarations) and rating systems in promoting or hindering global trade. Nils Larsson represented iiSBE and delivered a presentation titled International trends in the development of rating systems., which is attached.

IEA Task 23 documents

Submitted by Giulia Barbano on Mon, 02/28/2011 - 13:34

IEA Task 23 explored the role of the integrated design process (IDP) in enabling buildings to reach very high levels of performance. The three files attached provide an overview of the project, which ended in 2003.

The Integrated Design Process; History and Analysis

Submitted by Giulia Barbano on Tue, 02/15/2011 - 11:52

Nils Larsson, Executive Director
International Initiative for a Sustainable Built Environment (iiSBE)
larsson@iisbe.org, 21 August, 2009

Abstract: The Integrated Design Process (IDP) is a method of intervention in early stages of the design process that supports the development and design team to avoid sub-optimal design solutions. IDP is not a new concept, and may in fact have been applied in the past by some design teams on an ad-hoc basis; but the formal implementation of the process is a development that has taken place over the past 15 years. This paper provides a partial history and some analysis of the characteristics of IDP.