Building Standards & Code

United States of America - In the United States, buildings are constructed to withstand the usual occurrence of rain, wind, snow, and earthquakes. The abnormal events of gas explosions, vehicle impacts, and uncontrolled building fires are not usually considered by architectures and engineers. Now, a new building standard may aid engineers in…

Plymouth, United Kingdom - New research from the University of Plymouth in England has revealed that plants can actually help keep buildings warm in the winter and cool in the summer. The only thing you have to do is install or retrofit. Retrofitting cavity wall assemblies (i.e. double walls with an air gap in between) with a facade of plants…

Göttingen, Germany - Popcorn Insulation? With construction insulation as a major topic, the goal of lowering heating costs and CO2 emissions has led forest scientists to turn to environmentally friendly and sustainable insulation methods: popcorn. Researchers have developed a method for transforming granulated popcorn into insulation boards.…

New York, New York - Mass Timber Advances, Basement apartments get overhaul. The New York City Council approved changes to the city's building code on Thursday, October 7, allowing for the construction of cross-laminated timber (CLT) structures throughout the five boroughs (up to 85 feet). This may not seem like a significant change in a city…

Carpinteria, California - (NYSE: PCOR) Like everyone else you are probably asking yourself: why would Procore pay $500M for LevelSet? Don't worry you are not alone and most likely it's not why you would think. LevelSet is a platform for managing lien notice of intents, placements and payment collection for the United States. The construction…

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA - WASHINGTON, D.C. -The American Institute of Architects (AIA) is urging Congress to reintroduce legislation prohibiting future administrations and the federal government from mandating preferred design styles for federal buildings. A new bipartisan bill would prohibit political influence on the design of federal…

Sacramento, California - Governor Gavin Newsom has signed bipartisan legislation (background story) to accelerate housing construction in California, streamline the permitting process, and enhance density in order to promote more inclusive and vibrant neighborhoods around the state. Potentially adding an additional 700,000 homes the package of…

Tallahassee, Florida - Governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, has appointed seven individuals to the Construction Industry Licensing Board. Ted Feaster, Brian Wilson, Frank Cawthon, Ashley Ross, Donald Cesarone, Rachelle Wood, and Edward McCullers were all chosen to the board. Ted Feaster from Ocala, Florida, is a general contractor and owner of…

Milford, Connecticut - As construction budgets have blown up the past year and half we are releasing details on a new cost modeling and value-engineering investigatory report performed by AGGRECOST™ . The modeled construction project was a affordable multi-family housing project commissioned by CHFA (Connecticut Housing Finance Authority)…

Surfside, Florida - On Thursday June 24th in the early morning, a 12 story residential condo building partially collapsed in Florida’s Miami-Dade county. The Champlain Towers South condominium laid established in Surfside, Florida approximately 6 miles from Miami Beach. …

  HB-6572 states that any town, city, or borough may require all buildings over 40,000 square feet that qualify as new construction or substantial renovation, to have an energy usage of at least ten percent per square foot less than the energy use allowed by the State Building Code.

Connecticut has some of the highest electricity prices in the US, which creates a market opportunity for solar and wind power. The average national tariff is 12.69 cents/kWh, according to the latest data from the Energy Information Administration, while an average tariff of 21.29 cents/kWh was reported for Connecticut (68% higher). Several major…

LEED has become one of the most popular green building certifications around the world, used in 181 countries as of early 2021. The first version was launched by the US Green Building Council (USGBC) in 1998, and the rating system has been used in over 2 million residential projects and 106,000 commercial projects globally. The USGBC has been…

Henrico County is en route to dazzle the state of Virginia with the construction of a new up-and-coming sports and concert stadium composed of 17,000 seats. Dubbed GreenCity and with a $245 million dollar budget privately funded by GreenCity LLC, the state of the art arena will redefine Interstate 95 and East Parham Road.             In order…