by Brianna Crandall — February 24, 2014—Ensuring sustainability of ecosystems through protection of plants, soil and water and increased habitat for native birds and insects is the goal of proposed requirements to the green building standard from ASHRAE (formerly the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers), the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), and the Illuminating Engineering Society (IES).
“The intent of the proposal is to maintain or restore a minimum level of biodiversity including bio-diverse plantings, native plants and limited turfgrass,” Anthony Floyd, a member of the Standard 189.1 committee, said. “Sustainable development recognizes and attempts to account for the interdependencies of ecosystems in the human built environment. Hence, Standard 189.1 addresses biodiversity at the building site level in recognition of these interdependencies.”
ANSI/ASHRAE/USGBC/IES Standard 189.1-2011, Standard for the Design of High-Performance, Green Buildings Except Low-Rise Residential Buildings, covers key topical areas of site sustainability, water-use efficiency, energy efficiency, indoor environmental quality (IEQ) and the building’s impact on the atmosphere, materials and resources.
Proposed addendum bg revises the Native Plant definition, clarifies the Plants section by renaming it Landscape Design, and requires a minimum area of the landscape to be native plants. Overall, addendum bg is a cleanup to the existing section, according to Floyd.
Addendum bg is open for public comment, along with four other addenda, until March 9, 2014. The other addenda open for review are:
- Addendum al, which will match requirements for opaque wall assemblies in Climate Zones 1 through 3 to ANSI/ASHRAE/IES 90.1-2013, Energy Standard for Buildings Except Low-Rise Residential Buildings
- Addendum w, which provides bicycle parking design requirements
- Addendum bk, which adds a fan-efficiency requirement that is slightly more stringent than the fan-efficiency section in ANSI/ASHRAE/IES 90.1-2013
- Addendum bm, which adds more building components and clarifies salvaged material requirements in Section 9.4.1.1 “Recycled Content”
To comment or learn more, visit ASHRAE’s Public Review Draft Standards / Online Comment Databases Web page.
