SANTA ROSA -- Green Building Studio, formerly GeoPraxis, is gaining a reputation among local architects and building designers for its Web-based energy analysis solutions.
Founded by three building energy efficiency experts, the firm has developed a tool that allows users to assess the carbon footprint of schematic designs in minutes rather than days.
“We have about 6,000 registered users for our Web service,” said John Kennedy, president and CTO of Green Building Studio. “Our goal is to train 50,000 designers and architects to use it by 2010.”
The company holds well-attended Carbon Neutral Building Design seminars several times a year in various locations to teach the program, which uses Autodesk building information management tools and Revit software to analyze multiple aspects of building design.
Those include whole-building energy use and cost, water usage, wind energy and photovoltaic panel potential, natural ventilation potential, rain capture and low flow capacity and carbon emissions.
“Buildings, through their energy usage, account for 40 percent of all greenhouse gases,” said Mr. Kennedy.
The Green Building Studio Web service can be accessed on a pay-as-you-go basis, which includes five free runs on projects, or a recently launched corporate account model, which enables two users to access the program, with additional cost for added users.
The firm’s next local Carbon Neutral training seminar will be held in the late spring or summer, “when the weather is better,” said Mr. Kennedy. “People enjoy a pleasant vineyard setting.”
In addition to teaching the seminars along with Green Building Studio Vice President Patrick Bailey, Mr. Kennedy is one of 1,000 people across the country trained by the Al Gore Climate Project to give his presentation, he said.
The presentation is free to schools, business groups and other interested parties.
For more information on Green Building Studio, visit www.greenbuildingstudio.com. For information on the Climate Project presentation, e-mail jfkennedy1@gmail.com.
