California Green Building Blog


"Focuses on a wide range of green developments in California, including sureties, building codes, case law and technologies."

Author: Sarah Grilli, Kevin S. Jeong, Doug McManamon and Steve Sacks practice at Bell, Rosenberg & Hughes in Oakland, Calif.

Blawg Related Categories: States • California • Solo / Small Firm • Construction Law

Recent Posts from California Green Building Blog


  • Al Gore Speaks At Greenbuild

    I just returned from the USGBC Greenbuild conference in Phoenix, AZ, and it was great! Roughly 28,000 people attended the three day conference, and there were over 1,000 exhibitors.  I will spend the next few…

  • Congratulations AB 920!

    AB 920 was signed into law last week.  The law requires that utilities pay for energy they receive through net metering.  We have followed AB 920 (previously AB 1920) here at the CGBB since we posted our first articles…

  • Small Wind – The Million Solar Roofs’ Answer To Nighttime

    “Big wind” is just that.  Big.  With big wind comes big power generation.  Thing is, big wind also needs LOTS of STRONG wind.     That level of wind doesn’t blow in most areas, especially residential areas.  Understandably, most people do not want…

  • “West Coast Green” Conference 2009

    West Coast Green is one of the largest green conferences in the United States with roughly 14,000 attendees last year. This year the conference is October 1 – 3 at Fort Mason in San Francisco.  The conference…

  • Inefficient, But Green…Is That Good?

    Some power generation facilities store energy during peak hours to later use during off peak hours (and vice versa).  The best example of this is battery storage of energy from wind and solar generators.  Wind…

  • Big Box Stores For Green Building Supplies

    New Home is a Bay Area-based company opening “Big Box” sized showrooms that will offer green building supplies for consumers and builders.  Rich Rifkin, the founder of New Home, plans to start by opening 10 stores in…

  • California To Get $183 Million to Weatherize Homes

    California will get $183 million in federal funds just to weatherize homes. Now, this is a tremendous improvement from the $6.3 million originally budgeted, but I’m speculating there’s a dark side to this story… The…

  • Residential Solar Leases

    Solar power is on everyone’s mind these days.  We still remember the exorbitant oil prices of the summer of 2008, when oil reached it’s peak of over $150 a barrel.  However, for many, solar energy,…

  • PG&E Inches Closer to Meeting California’s Renewable Energy Mandate

    Today, PG&E announced that it reached a deal with NRG Energy, Inc., a New Jersey energy provider, for the construction of the 90-megawatt Alpine SunTower that will use solar thermal technology. Though not a strictly…

  • Green Hospitals

    A key objective of green building is improving the health of building inhabitants.  The US EPA has reported that Americans spend 90% of their time on average indoors, making healthy indoor environments seem like an obvious choice. And…