Another city in the Bay Area and the first in Napa County adopted last Tuesday new green building standards, or as it is now called “High Performance Building Regulations”. Over a year ago, the City of Napa adopted the LEED Silver standard for non-residential construction greater than 30, 000 ft². The recent ordinance now calls for new residential and non-residential construction to comply with the new green building standards. Unlike many other cities in the Bay Area adopting LEED or Build It Green guidelines and standards, Napa will follow the CalGreen Code with additional amendments particular to its city.

Some Napa standards include:

Residential construction will have to achieve a 20 percent water reduction over today’s standards, while commercial projects will have to cut back by 30 percent. [Moreover,] builders whose projects consume 15 percent less energy than the state standard will be get a 25 percent reduction in the cost of their building permit, officials said.

Water conservation is also accelerating in other buildings and cities. Dual-piping for use of recycled water such as the San Rafael Rite-Aid building is one key strategy. While one pipe carries drinking-quality water, the other one uses “highly treated wastewater from the Marin Municipal Water District's Las Gallinas plant”, which is supplied to restroom stalls. An 82-unit condo complex, currently under construction, will use a similar system.

Other cities and water districts soon to follow San Rafael’s example are San Francisco, the town of Winsor in Sonoma County, San Jose and Santa Clara Water Districts. All of these new recycling water projects will decrease the amount of water supplied from the Sacramento - San Joaquin River Delta, Tuolumne River, Hetch-Hetchy Reservoir and others, thus, conserve our clean water sources.

The city of Belmont adopted last Tuesday, May 25th, its new green building ordinance, which requires new or remodeled residential and commercial projects to meet certain building standards before the city approves a building permit.

The ordinance, which will take effect next year, established a minimum point criteria for residential projects based on Build It Green (BIG) standards and Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards for commercial projects. For instance, remodeled residential projects must meet at most 70 BIG points, depending on the size and cost of the project. Moreover, this kind of project requires a city review and inspection. New residences will require 70 BIG points while new commercial projects 10,000 ft2 or greater will require a LEED Silver Certification, plus a review and a 3rd party inspection.

Belmont is among many other Bay Area cities, like San Mateo, Daly City, Redwood City, implementing green building standards in its attempt to conserve energy and water.

Belmont officials cited a Massachusetts Institute of Technology study that found it cost an extra 2.1 percent to build commercial properties under the LEED silver standards, and that those structures ultimately saved 30 percent on energy. It is the first time officials have approved an idea generated by the city's green advisory committee, which was formed in 2007.

BusinessWeek's May 3rd America's Green Innovation Problem feature looks to point up a competitive disadvantage for the US emerging in clean-tech.  The article notes the recent move by Santa Clara-based Applied Materials.

As has been widely reported, U.S. company Applied Materials (AMAT), the world's biggest manufacturer of equipment used to make solar cells, recently decided to construct the world's largest, most advanced nongovernment solar energy research and development facility in Xian, China. Applied Materials also relocated its chief technology officer, Mark Pinto, to China—the first such case of a top U.S. technology executive moving there.

The piece ends stating

As such, the federal government must start the important work of facilitating the development of its own clusters of clean energy innovation in the U.S. To succeed, the U.S. must do two key things. First, it should prioritize major public investments in clean energy innovation, advanced manufacturing, and market creation, something it has been unwilling to do in any of the climate and energy bills currently before Congress. Second, it needs to significantly step up efforts to challenge Chinese mercantilism, whether in green industries or any high value-added industry critical to the country's future.

The federal government is, in fact, doing exactly that through the Department of Energy's Energy Innovation Hub grants - worth $130 million over 5 years.

Each Hub will foster unique, cross-disciplinary collaborations by bringing together leading scientists to focus on a high priority technology. The Hubs will tackle three of the most important energy challenges we face:

1. How can we derive fuels directly from sunlight in an efficient and economical way?
2. How can we design, construct and retrofit commercial and residential buildings that are vastly more energy efficient than today’s buildings?
3. How can we use modeling and simulation technologies to make significant leaps forward in nuclear reactor design and engineering?

More on the Innovation Hub in Science Progress.  Locally, the Lawrence Berkeley National Labs (LBNL) and numerous partners are pursuing the grant for building efficiency.  The Hubs will foster not only R&D but commercialization. The Bay Area Climate Collaborative is supporting the grant application and looking to assist with the "human factors" elements of commercializing innovations which will come out of the hub.  The prospects appear strong for LBNL.  Selection is expected in the fall.

Green building standard are moving forward with a new multi-family housing development in the City of San Mateo. A 52 unit apartment complex known as Magnolia Terrace will include solar panels, rain water collectors for irrigation also recycled and sustainably harvested materials used to construct the two building complex. The irrigation system is a first for the city and exceeds the new green building standards recently adopted by San Mateo, including interesting new features such as use of rain water for the non potable used in the house such as for flushing toilets.

San Mateo’s associate planner, Julia Yeh said "The solar panels and green buildings meet the green checklist the city recently adopted, requiring all new construction meet green standards. But she said the water harvesting system is something new."

Secure bike racks will be available for resident to easily bike commute and take public transit also underground parking will be available. In the fashion for decreased garbage production a duel chute system for waste and recycling will be installed for the both levels of the complex, making recycling accessible and simple.

This is the type of development that will set the bar for future green development in the area, building sustainable living environments and increasing housing density is the way of the future. Positioned next to downtown San Mateo will bring more foot traffic to those business and decrease the need for resident to drive to entertainment.

Read more at the San Francisco Examiner