Lenny Antonelli is deputy editor of Passive House Plus. He also writes regularly for the Irish Times, and has contributed to a variety of other publications including the Sunday Times, the CS Monitor, Village, the Sunday Tribune amd the Dubliner. He is currently working on a radio documentary on Ireland's oceans.
Patrick Blanc's green walls in London
Patrick Blanc's living wall at the Musée du quai Branly in Paris
The Guardian talks to French botanist Patrick Blanc about the vertical green walls he's designed in London.
Green Party's cycling plan for Dublin
The Green Party has published its ten point cycling plan for Dublin. Among the key points are:
The greenest city in the world?
Writing on the BBC Website, Mark Mardell profiles Freiburg, perhaps the world's greenest city. Mardell writes:
What is missing is the constant low thrum of traffic in the background. It's not that cars are completely banned from the city, but most of the centre, rather than the odd street, is a pedestrian zone. You pedal or walk to trams or trains. Freiburg can lay claim to being the greenest city in the world, and it's all rather pleasant.
Insulation from agricultural waste
A group of students from the University of Michigan has won the $200,000 MIT Clean Energy grand prize for developing insulation panels from agricultural waste.
Green roofs feature in National Geographic
The May issue of National Geographic magazine features an in-depth article on green roofs. The full article can be read online here.
Solvent green
The market for new residential build may have bottomed out, but compared to the rest of the construction industry the sustainable building sector appears buoyant. Changing market conditions, various government incentives and updated building regulations are all helping greener building companies - but with few houses likely to be built this year and capital restricted, challenges still lie ahead. Lenny Antonelli reports
End result
In light of the current economic conditions, an increasing number of Irish people are turning away from buying new homes, instead deciding to make the most of what they’ve got by extending and refurbishing. Lenny Antonelli visited one such house nearing completion in Glasnevin that uses a combination of materials and techniques to aim for highly sustainable results.
Walking on water
Designing a low-energy public building with passive ventilation and lighting in mind is one thing – making it fit seamlessly into a rural wetland environment is quite another. Lenny Antonelli visited the award-winning Ballybay Wetlands Centre in County Monaghan - a closed-panel timber frame structure designed to sit softly on the surrounding landscape.
Examining the Spirit of Ireland proposals
Spirit of Ireland have been getting a lot of publicity over the last month - check out the group's news page for a list of recent media articles. If you haven't heard, the group's proposals essentially involve storing wind energy in the form of pumped storage reservoirs along the coast.