For those of you in San Francisco interested in learning about energy efficient buildings go to the PGE headquarters on 5th and Howard. It is really one of the best resources to learning about all items related to green building. They have great demonstrations on lighting, windows, HVACs and many more. It really is a true hidden gem for our industry that is totally underutilized.

An example of a demonstration they have is two panels of glass one is LOW-E and the other is spectrally selective LOW-E glass. Behind the glass are about a 100 incandescent bulbs. When you turn on the switch you can feel the difference of the heat transmitted through the glass. It becomes very clear that for a commercial building it is crucial to have spectrally selective glass because commercial buildings are cooling dominated. Residential it is more important to have passive heating, so heat transmission is helpful, meaning that regular LOW-E glass is the right choice.

Just a cool little bit of information for all you green building enthusiasts.
— The EBS Team