The mission of the Green Building Initiative is to accelerate the adoption of building practices that result in energy-efficient, healthier and environmentally sustainable buildings by promoting credible and practical green building approaches for residential and commercial construction.
There’s lots of useful information and links on the site, check it out. Green homes and office buildings ought to and should become the mainstream. They use less energy both in construction and in daily operation, which means a smaller carbon footprint, as well as saving the owners money in the long-term.
Hi Bob,
You are right. Green homes and office buildings should become the mainstream but there is still a lot of do in working towards that reality. Good news is that there are more cities that are starting to adopt requirements to develop constructions of green buildings and more companies are also following this trend. Cities and private companies are starting to realize that earth friendly designs also brings energy efficiency and other cost savings in the long run.
Here is an article from inhabitat that shows how a company has built an earth friendly building and managed to save up to 42% savings in electricity costs.
http://inhabitat.com/2007/02/06/genzyme-center/