Viridiant Winter 2017 Newsletter

Without your support what would the greater Virginia, Washington, DC and Maryland look like? Where would we be without Viridiant?

• Almost 20,000 families would be paying nearly 140% in housing costs from utilities. Did you know that in Virginia alone, approximately 973,757 or 31.6% of Virginia families are housing cost burdened i.e. paying more than 30% of income for their housing costs (Housing Virginia’s Sourcebook)? By lowering families’ utilities, we lower their housing costs; our work makes a difference.
• 450 Habitat for Humanity families would not be living in healthy, sustainable, energy-efficient housing.
• Thousands of industry professionals would not have had access to building science educationand advice on cutting edge building approaches and technologies. Think builders, developers, HVAC professionals – did we mention real estate professionals, appraisers and lenders too?
• Our industry would not be receptive towards these high-performance advancements. Think energy code, benchmarking, conditioned crawl spaces, continuous insulation, whole building dehumidification
• Non-profit partners would not be able to leverage resources to build high-performance housing that better serves their community.
• Manufacturers would not be afforded the insight into gaps in the high-performance housing market to determine how to best serve market needs.
• The region would have an additional 682 million lbs of CO2 in the atmosphere.  Removing this CO2 is equivalent to 32,000 homes’ energy use for one year, 78 wind turbines installed, or 10 million incandescent light bulbs switched to LEDs.

These are just a few of the roles that Viridant plays in advancing high-performance housing in our area. We work tirelessly to promote the science of sustainability: economic sustainability, environmental sustainability and structural sustainability, and there’s still so much to do.

​Now more than ever, we need your support. Help us continue to support our building partners and the industry; make a contribution to this organization. In return, we will continue to deliver these effective programs and work towards goals outlined in our 2017 – 2019 strategic plan.

​Goals include:

1. Research, Engage & Educate
2. Fund the Mission
3. Grow Multifamily Reach
4. Increase Single Family Impact
5. Support the Industry

​​If you have participated in this effort, we thank you. If you believe in this work, I encourage you to invest in our future through the gift of a charitable donation.

All the best,

• Single Family: 2,696 single family homes
• Multifamily: 248 projects housing 17,074 dwelling units

1. Shelter Alternatives – HERS 2, EarthCraft and ENERGY STAR certified
2. Bain-Waring – HERS 46, EarthCraft certified
3. EnviroHomeDesign, LLC – HERS 50, EarthCraft Renovation and LEED for Homes certified

Thursday, February 16th
​3 – 4:30 PM (with special networking reception to follow at Capital Ale House until 6:30 PM)
Speakers:

• Rob Howard, Mitsubishi Electric Cooling & Heating
• Jim Jenkins, Huber Zip System
• Nikki Krueger, Ultra-Aire Ventilating Dehumidifier

Mark your calendars and be sure to join us at our Annual Sustainable Leadership Awards! Our awards reception and ceremony will be held Thursday, April 20th at the Virginia Historical Society in downtown Richmond. ​Registration is coming soon.

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In an effort to increase the reach and longevity of our lectures series, Viridiant now develops and shares a bulletin recapping what was discussed at each lecture. Lectures that have been published so far cover: Water in Buildings, Energy Efficient Retrofits, and Resiliency and Sustainable Buildings. We hope you’ll check them out and find them useful.