ASHRAE, others starting to draft new biomass requirements for green buildings

After deciding to create a definition for what biomass is in the Green Building Standards, HPAC Engineering reported that ASHRAE, U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) and the Illuminating Engineering Society (IES) will draft new standards soon.

ASHRAE/IES/USGBC Standard 189.1, Standard for the Design of High Performance Green Buildings, contains minimum requirements for the siting, design and construction of high-performance green buildings in support of reducing building energy, resource consumption and other environmental impacts. To that end, the standard contains requirements for the use of renewable energy systems such as solar, wind and geothermal.

The Standard 189.1 Committee recently considered a proposal to add biomass to the definition of renewable energy systems, which was submitted by an interested individual from outside the committee. In this context, biomass includes organic material, such as wood and crop waste, that can be burned to generate thermal energy.

Read more about the update to the Green Building Standards on HPAC Engineering’s website.