Category: Center Press

CGBC Faculty Startup “Trellis Air” Featured in The Harvard Gazette

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Jonathan Grinham, assistant professor of architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and core faculty member at the Center for Green Buildings and Cities, was recently featured in The Harvard Gazette for his work on Trellis Air: a Harvard startup that aims to reduce the energy demands of air conditioners by using a novel approach to dehumidification. Unlike traditional vapor-compression technologies—which have remained largely unchanged for over a century—Trellis […]

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Scene from Kolkata, India.

The Inequality of Heat

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Holly Samuelson, Harvard Center for Green Buildings and Cities core research faculty and Associate Professor of Architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, was consulted in a recent article evaluating heat dynamics in the city of Kolkata, India. The article describes Kolkata, a city in eastern India, and how differences within the city help predict who will get sick and even die from the heat, and who will be […]

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Wall in HouseZero.

HouseZero: A Zero Energy Retrofit

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Harvard Center for Green Buildings and Cities retrofitted its headquarters in Cambridge into a data-driven living-laboratory that will help us to understand buildings in new ways. The Harvard Office for Technology Development (OTD) discusses the value of projects like HouseZero and how it brings together research teams across Harvard University to develop technologies. Watch the video.

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Cambridge City Councilor Quinton Zondervan.

Cambridge enacts ambitious building emissions reduction standards

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Holly Samuelson, Harvard Center for Green Buildings and Cities core research faculty and Associate Professor of Architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, is quoted in a recent article that responds to building emissions reduction mandates in Cambridge, MA. Cambridge’s City Council set a measure that calls for reductions of greenhouse gas emissions among medium and large nonresidential buildings – a standard that affects around 1,100 buildings. In this […]

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Smoke from Canadian wildfires turns the sky orange.

How Designers Can Help Keep Our Air Breathable

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Smoke from wildfires raging in Canada blanketed the Northeastern United States this month, turning the skies an eerie orange. Responding to record-setting levels of pollution, officials around the region declared health emergencies. Advice to close windows and run air filters helped mitigate the acute effects of the short-term crisis, but the event also drew attention to how climate change is intensifying chronic air pollution around the world. Ensuring the safety […]

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Professor Holly Samuelson stands on Weeks Bridge.

Struggling to design green buildings amid shifting legal, tech landscape

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The push to prepare American cities and towns for greater climate resilience has become more urgent in recent years as scientific evidence of warming mounts and extreme weather events grow more common. Officials in many states, including Massachusetts and New York, are enacting new rules requiring developers and property owners to change or reduce the type or amount of energy used in their buildings, to incorporate certain construction materials and technology […]

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Professor Jonathan Grinham sits inside the window of HouseZero.

Fast Company: Harvard researchers designed a cheaper, more efficient air conditioner

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In August, researchers from Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard and Harvard’s Center for Green Buildings and Cities (CGBC) at the Graduate School of Design, tested a new, exciting proprietary technology, coldSNAP, in HouseZero, the living lab that is also headquarters for the CGBC. The testing of the novel evaporative cooling tecnology was the latest research –  including physical and data-driven control algorithms – to be performed using […]

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Dwell features Ali Malkawi as one of eight climate-conscious design visionaries

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As working from home becomes the new normal for many around the world, Dwell talks to Founding Director of the Harvard Center for Green Buildings and Cities Ali Malkawi about the future of energy-efficient living. Malkawi is featured among eight visionaries and pioneering designers who are pushing the limits in ecologically attuned design and making home more climate-conscious. Read the full profile on Professor Ali Malkawi here. Read the full […]

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L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui talks to Ali Malkawi about HouseZero and the future of simulation software and predictive tools

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International magazine L’Architecture d’Aujourd’hui interviews Founding Director of the Harvard Center for Green Buildings and Cities Professor Ali Malkawi about the future of simulation software and predictive tools both in the design process and in the operation of buildings after construction is complete.   Read the full Q&A here. This Q&A was published in issue 432 – Legacies and Innovations.

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BBC Worklife logo.

BBC Worklife interviews Holly Samuelson on how indoor air quality boosts not only health, but cognitive abilities

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Improving indoor air quality may boost cognitive abilities as well as health. So how should buildings be designed to make us more productive? The question posed to Holly Samuelson, Associated Professor of Architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and an affiliated faculty member at the Center for Green Buildings and Cities. View the full story here.

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