Awesome Albert, with the Zero Net Carbon Buildings Alliance now official, and one of our top priorities going to be "Road Map to a Net Zero Building Code" you'll have your work cut out for you! But you'll also have an emerging powerhouse of advocates ready to advise and back you up with any proposals that come before the council! Here's what I wrote to Gov. Inslee:
Dear
Governor Inslee,
I would like to recommend the appointment of Albert Rooks of
Small Planet Supply to the Washington State Building Codes Council. Mr.
Rooks, through his role on the Board of Passive House NW and the NW EcoBuilding
Guild (past), represents the green building community in Washington with
in-depth knowledge of the products, materials and technology required to
design, permit and implement high-performance, energy efficient and healthy
buildings. As we face the spectre of climate change, and strive to develop
strategies, standards and codes that will help "Decarbonize
Washington", we need strong knowledgeable leaders like Rooks to guide
policy and code.
Rooks has also been a contributor and financial supporter of
the Code Innovations Database, an online resource I manage that is helping code
officials and builders share information about successfully permitted
high-performance green building innovations that don't fit the normal
prescriptive path to approval; and instead require alternative compliance
processes and code / policy alternates to become part of our built
environment. Innovators like Mr. Rooks are pushing the envelope with
cutting edge solutions that are already standard in Europe and other leading
nations. Yet several of Rooks' clients projects have been slowed or even
stopped by the lack of flexibility in current codes and standards. In
other cases, projects did win approval using alternative compliance paths, but
only through diligent collaboration with code officials. Rooks
intimate knowledge of innovations and the compliance methods used (and needed)
to accelerate adoption of advanced building methods makes him an ideal
candidate for a seat on the Building Codes Council.
Governor Inslee, I urge you most emphatically to approve
Albert Rooks application to serve on the Washington State Building Codes
Council. And while you're at it, let's see if we can get more funding for
the Council next year so they can tackle the monumental challenge of adapting the
codes to a climate-uncertain future!
Sincerely,
Chris van Daalen, Executive Director
Code Innovations Database, Principal Investigator
The Northwest EcoBuilding Guild
