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Green Building Report Shows Growth of the Industry

A report from McGraw-Hill Construction (MHC) concludes the green building market will reach $10-$20 billion over the next five years. According to the report, Green building accounted for 2% of nonresidential construction starts in 2004, valued at $3.3 billion, and projects it to grow to 5-10% of this sector by 2010, valued at $10-20 billion. Over 70% of a representative sample of architects, engineers, contractors, and building owners anticipate sales growth from green building. 60% of this group are are specifying green building products now. The report notes that pperating costs of green buildings are expected to be 8-9 lower than in conventional buildings, and have increased value by 7.5%. The report is part of MHC’s effort to take a leadership position in the green building movement. The group is launching a green construction website, “GreenSource” at www.greensource.construction.com, offers custom green building research, and plans to launch a green building publication in 2006. In conjunction with trade association US Green Building Council (USGBC), MHC has organized a pilot workshop at a top university to identify ways to introduce green building into the curriculum. “Green building is a tremendous growth area in design, construction, and building products, and McGraw-Hill Construction is […]

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Shell Solar Achieves New Thin Film Efficiency Record

Shell Solar announced it achieved a record level of efficiency of 13.5% for its thin film PV solar technology. The results were verified by third party auditor, the TUV Rheinland Group in Cologne, Germany. Thin-film is widely believed to be an important solution to bring down costs for solar energy – until now, the trade-off has been in its lower efficiency. Shell’s achievement points to the possibility that thin-film may be able to perform at similar levels of efficiency to today’s crystalline silicon solar products.

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