Suggest an article
Send us your articles! Please email any articles or topics that you think we should feature to Editor@Sustainable-Chicago.com.
Ed Begley Jr. is Optimistic About the Environment (And He Thinks You Should Be Too)
March 15, 2012 by Matt Baker · Leave a Comment
By Matt Baker
"There were no energy saving thermostats then, there were no compact fluorescent bulbs, there wasn’t a fraction of the things that we have today. We’ve come a long way."
“You don’t run up Mt. Everest,” Ed Begley Jr. likes to say when encouraging people to live as sustainably as they are able, not as they feel that they must. “You get to base camp and you get acclimated. Then you climb only has high as you can.”
Read More…
Tax Rebates May Be Gone, But Utility Rebates Remain
March 15, 2012 by Matt Baker · Leave a Comment
By Jon Sedey
Read More…
Lollapalooza to Feature Energy Playground
August 3, 2011 by Matt Baker · Leave a Comment
If you are one of the quarter-million people expected to attend Lollapalooza this weekend, the three-day festival will feature more than just music acts. This year, fans will have a chance to engage with the Prius Playground, an energy-generating activity center on the concert grounds.
Read More…
Clean Coal Project Makes Another Push for Chicago
June 9, 2011 by Matt Baker · Leave a Comment
By Matt Baker
For the second time this year, the Illinois General Assembly has approved legislation for a $3 billion energy facility. Chicago Clean Energy would be a gasification plant designed to produce substitute natural gas from coal and industrial byproducts. Chicago Clean Energy is an initiative of Leucadia National Corporation, the proponents of the first bill. The gas plant site at 115th and Burley Avenue on the city’s south side is a 140-acre brownfield, the former site of a coke manufacturing plant that went bankrupt in 2001.
Read More…
2011 Building Green Chicago Conference & Expo
June 9, 2011 by Matt Baker · Leave a Comment
By Jon Sedey
On April 19th 2011, Index Publishing held the fifth annual Building Green Chicago Conference and Expo at the Swissôtel Chicago. After the keynote address, the educational sections consisted of topics ranging from deconstruction, energy consumption and non-potable water sources.
Read More…
Chicago Now Home to Nation’s Largest LEED Gold Apartment Complex
February 22, 2011 by Matt Baker · 1 Comment
The two-towered Alta at K Station, the product of a collaboration between Chicago-based Fifield Companies and its joint-venture partner, Pacific Life Insurance Co. of Newport Beach, CA, recently attained LEED Gold from the USGBC. The complex of 848 luxury residences is the largest apartment building in the country to have earned that level of sustainability.
Read More…
Geothermal Energy: Operating 24 Hours a Day
November 10, 2010 by Matt Baker · Leave a Comment
Drugstore giant Walgreens announced yesterday the opening of the nation’s first pharmacy chain location to make use of geothermal energy for facility heating and cooling. The store in suburban Oak Park is expected to reduce its energy usage by about 46 percent as a result of the geothermal system.
Read More…
DOE Announces $20 Million for Geothermal Advancement
September 16, 2010 by Matt Baker · Leave a Comment
U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu yesterday announced $20 million for seven projects aimed at researching and developing cutting-edge geothermal technologies. These seven projects will demonstrate the technical and economic feasibility of non-conventional geothermal energy technologies in three research areas: low temperature fluids, highly pressurized geothermal fluids and geothermal fluids recovered from oil and gas wells. This funding will help demonstrate and commercialize innovative technologies to lower the high initial costs of geothermal development and help make the operational deployment of low temperature geothermal units more economical.
Read More…
ComEd Increases Financial Aid to High Performance Buildings
June 2, 2010 by Matt Baker · 1 Comment
Commonwealth Edison has announced that it will increase the maximum funding amount of financial incentives for new construction or major renovation projects in its service territory to $150,000—a $50,000 increase since the program’s inception in June of 2009.
Read More…
Smart Grid 101
March 12, 2010 by Matt Baker · Leave a Comment
By Michael Munson, Metropolitan Energy and
Michael Cornicelli, BOMA/Chicago
What is Smart Grid? Smart grid is a term with varied meanings to different audiences. The multitude of perspectives makes it difficult for consumers and businesses to identify what it is, understand how it applies or grasp the potential benefits and costs associated. An interesting parallel may have occurred in the 1980′s as people attempted to define the “internet” or “cyberspace.” At that time, it was a tool used by the government and university researchers with rooms full of mainframe computers. Today, it’s something that we carry with us by way of the iPhone and Blackberry. Caveats aside, the term “smart grid” represents a technology vision to optimize efficient electricity information, transfer and use.
Read More…
