News

For seven years the Earth Advantage Green Builder of the Year Awards has been celebrating the extraordinary efforts of builders and developers who certify to our standards. All of the builders who work with Earth Advantage are interested in building quality, low-energy, high-performing single family and multifamily residences.

Home Efficiency Forum brings together Northwest building experts of all kinds to talk shop and advance energy-efficient building practices in residential new construction. This two-day event will feature trainings, networking opportunities and the chance to share ideas with your peers around this year’s theme: Building for the Future.

With energy costs showing no signs of abating, architects and builders everywhere are factoring energy efficiency into every aspect of their projects. Indeed, minimizing energy use is a key component of building standards gaining in popularity among policy makers, home building professionals, and homeowners alike.

Every year we’re fortunate to have a rotating group of outside judges, representing a cross-section of sustainable housing industry experts, who review the applications and select the winners. This year, the expert judges are Heidi McCullough, Emily Mikhaiel and Dan Wildenhaus.

Given that so many of the standard upgrades Earth Advantage builders have incorporated into their homes have now become code, it becomes really apparent that the lowest hanging fruit of energy efficiency is tied to the efficiency of the water heater.

Now, eleven years after completing our first build in Portland, Ethan Beck Homes is undergoing an exciting period of growth.

High performance homes require better HVAC design strategies than code level homes.

The Passive House Institute US has a new blower door measurement metric, should it be adopted by the industry for all homes?

Moving from a site to source definition for zero energy homes.

Peter Brown, Director of Certifications at Earth Advantage recently interview Gary Phillips of Gary's VacuFlo, the leading installer of central vacuum systems in the greater Portland metropolitan area.