U.S. gives Olympic Village gold for going green

BEIJING, CHINA - The United States awarded the Beijing Olympic Village with its own gold medal, lauding its environmentally friendly design and holding it up as a model for energy efficiency in China.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson presented the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold Award to Chen Zhili, Mayor of the Olympic Village and Vice-Chairwoman of China's National People's Congress.

Paulson called the Village an example of U.S.-China cooperation on energy and environmental issues, urging more work along those lines. The U.S. Department of Energy provided technical assistance for the project.

"China's leaders know that the development of green buildings is a critical need, and the Olympic Village can serve as a model for this development," Paulson said.

"China, given its current economic growth and prosperity, can be a leader in deploying and using advanced energy and environmental technology."

Organizers have made "Green Olympics" one of the official slogans of the Games, and many of the venues have incorporated innovations such as systems to collect rainwater.

The Olympic Village itself includes a near-zero energy building that generates most of its power, heating and cooling through renewable sources such as solar cells and geothermal heat pumps.

This is one discipline, though, in which gold does not mean top spot. The U.S. Green Building Council, which issues the LEED certifications, has an even more elite category: platinum.

Related News

clean grid laboratories

From smart meters to big batteries, co-ops emerge as clean grid laboratories

WASHINGTON - Minnesota electric cooperatives have quietly emerged as laboratories for clean grid innovation, outpacing investor-owned utilities on smart meter installations, time-based pricing pilots, and experimental storage solutions.

“Co-ops have innovation in their DNA,” said David Ranallo, a spokesperson for Great River Energy, a generation and distribution cooperative that supplies power to 28 member utilities — making it one of the state’s largest co-op players.

Minnesota farmers helped pioneer the electric co-op model more than a century ago, pooling resources to build power lines, transformers and other equipment to deliver power to rural parts of the state. Today, 44 member-owned electric co-ops…

READ MORE
UK in a Changing Europe

Opinion: UK Natural Gas, Rising Prices and Electricity

READ MORE

ehrc logo

Government of Canada Invests in the Future of Work in Today's Rapidly Changing Electricity Sector

READ MORE

Transmission constraints impede incremental Quebec-to-US power deliveries

READ MORE

justin trudeau

Ottawa hands N.L. $5.2 billion for troubled Muskrat Falls hydro project

READ MORE