China’s Coal Plants Getting Less Dirty, How To Rebuild The Built Environment, Who To Follow on Twitter

Smokestacks (image by shoothead, CC 2.0 licensed)

Some good news from China this week, and a blueprint for addressing the huge amount of energy used, and GHG's generated, by the built environment:

China has become the world leader in building clean coal power plants, although they have a ways to go still, according to this New York Times article.

China’s improvements are starting to have an effect on climate models. In its latest annual report last November, the I.E.A. cut its forecast of the annual increase in Chinese emissions of global warming gases, to 3 percent from 3.2 percent, in response to technological gains, particularly in the coal sector, even as the agency raised slightly its forecast for Chinese economic growth.
The World Business Council for Sustainable Development just published a report on the changes needed in the building sector - which uses 40% of our end-use energy, and contributes 40% of the greenhouse gases - to chieve the energy usage rduction goals prescribed by the IPCC. I'll be blogging more about this report later this week, but for now, here's the link to the report:

“Energy efficiency is fast becoming one of the defining issues of our times, and buildings are that issue's ‘elephant in the room'. Buildings use more energy than any other sector and as such are a major contributor to climate change,” said Björn Stigson, president of the WBCSD.
From Treehugger, a list of twitterers to follow on green building and green architecture:

There are some great people twittering about the latest in eco-friendly architecture and building design. Check out a few of the people we think you should follow to stay updated.

Tags: built environment, clean coal, climate change, green building

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