7 Eco Events

Our politicians and radio shock jocks might be arguing over the need for action on green issues, but, for the most part, practitioners in the built environment industry are embracing the need for change. Warren McLaren presents a selection of events, conferences and competitions that – in addition to BPN’s own Sustainability Awards – are aimed at improving the sustainability knowledge and skills of design professions

LEADERSHIP REWIRED
Although not exclusively an architecture event we felt this online training program would be of interest to BPN’s Environ readers. Australia’s Centre for Sustainability Leadership has taken their Fellowship Program and formed it into an “e-learning” package that participants can engage with at their own pace from home or office. The modules, such as Design and Selling Change, highlight separate principles and tools via video interviews, and case studies, garnered not only from Australia, but as wide afield as India, France, Denmark, the USA and UK. As well as a networking community of likeminded sustainability collaborators, the course program also offers a Matching Service, whereby participants can be connected with others who may be able to help them get their project off the ground.
www.rewired.org

2012 BRAUNPRIZE
Partial to 'design projects with a particularly strong focus on sustainable solutions for everyday life'? Then consider submitting an entry for consideration in the 2012 BraunPrize. The overall theme of the prize is “Genius design for a better everyday,” with the total prize pool across all categories being US$100,000. Whilst Braun has a heritage in industrial design, we’re particularly pleased that they are looking forward to seeing product concepts submitted that address issues such as sustainability, health and well-being, the ageing population, and mobility, all key issues of responsible design. Indeed every entry will be assessed on three core criteria of which Sustainability is one. Design students, professionals and enthusiasts can upload their entries to the 2012 BraunPrize website between October this year and March 2012. Winners will be announced in September 2012. Submissions are only open to product concepts and projects not yet in production.
www.braun.com/global/world-ofbraun/ braun-prize.html

GREENING CITIES CONFERENCE
If our feature article on Vertical Farming piques some interest, then the Greening Cities Conference might build on that intrigue. GreenRoofs Australasia (GRA), with support from the City of Sydney, present this four day event as their 5th annual national conference at Sydney’s Darling Harbour during 9-12 November 2011. GRA present 20 authorities speaking on green roof and green walls. Amongst this coterie is Patrick Blanc (France) and keynote speakers from Canada, Britain, United States and Australia. The conference will discuss the latest technology being employed in the design, installation and maintenance and research for green walls and roofs. It will also cover the various benefits ascribed to these architecture features, such as reduction in urban heat island effect, enhanced stormwater management, noise mitigation and carbon sequestration. Additionally, there will be an accredited GreenRoof Training Workshop, and a site tour of projects around Sydney.
www.greenroofsaustralasia.com.au

ECOBUILD
Billed as the “world’s biggest event for sustainable design, construction and the built environment” EcoBuild does sport some impressive statistics. For starters there are 1,300 exhibitors or sustainable construction products, more than 600 speakers presenting at the Official Ecobuild conference and the 100 free seminars. The downside is that to take in all this information you’ll need to get to the ExCel exhibition and conference centre in London’s Docklands, (a venue that will host more 2012 Olympic sports than any other.) ExCel is a facility that revels in big, it has the United Kingdom’s largest commercial wormery recycling attendee’s food waste. The upside is that you have until 20 March 2012 to work on the justifications for why you should attend. Although themes for 2012 have yet to be announced, it is likely they’ll reflect those of this year, which included ‘Making Sustainable Construction Happen’ and ‘Design, Architecture & Sustainability’.
www.ecobuild.co.uk

INTERIOR DESIGN EXCELLENCE AWARDS
Winners of the Interior Design Excellence Awards for 2011 will be announced in Melbourne on 25 November 2011. This has been the biggest year for (inside) magazine’s awards, also known as IDEA, with more than 400 submissions over 14 categories, including Sustainable Product and Sustainable Project. 13 products made the cut for the shortlist in the Product group, amongst which is Spore Furniture’s Flat Pack Bed, a portable futon-style bed made of sliced plywood, which ingeniously harnesses the curving flex of the ply to give the bed its strength. Very clever design. In IDEA’s project category 15 entries were successfully shortlisted, one of which was BVN Architecture’s work on the AECOM Workplace in Brisbane, where individual workstations users control their individual energy consumption, with the ventilation system providing 50 per cent more fresh air than the average commercial building.
www.idea-awards.com.au

GREEN CITIES
Green Cities holds the moniker of 'largest green building conference in the Asia-Pacific'. Sponsored for the past five years by the Green Building Council of Australia and the Property Council of Australia, the next Green Cities conference is on at Sydney’s Convention and Exhibition Centre on 4-7 March 2012. Part of the conference will be Extreme Green. Up-and-coming inventors or designers with a product that has the potential to revolutionise the green building industry are challenged to submit their product by 30 November 2011. The three best environmentally sustainable products and materials will then be critiqued in a manner likened to the ABC’s New Inventors television program, with the winner receiving a $1000 cash prize.
www.greencities.org.au

THRIVING NEIGHBOURHOODS
This Melbourne-based conference sets out to address some of the issues raised by the advocates of Vertical Farming noted elsewhere in this issue. For example, presentations entitled ‘Land use planning: aligning environmental aspirations with economic returns’ and 'Feeding the city: shortening the food supply chain amid threats to peri-urban farming'. But the conference also looks at the pre-release testing of The Green Building Council’s new Green Star Communities rating, as well as hearing from internationally acclaimed author (Ecology of Commerce; Natural Capitalism; Blessed Unrest) Paul Hawken’s thoughts on environmental and community activism, which he sees as an unstoppable force redefining our view of the world. Martin Brenman, CEO of ICLEI believes the conference will “build our capacity to create sustainable communities.”
http://thrivingneighbourhoods2011.org