Awesome sweetgreen Ballston Grand Opening

November 29, 2010 by 2 Comments


sweetgreen is hosting the grand opening party for their SEVENTH location this Wednesday night in Ballston! Unfortunately, I won’t be able to make it as I am still on this side of the Atlantic till Dec 13th.

Ladies, even if you are not into greens, I strongly suggest you attend the opening just to meet one of the co-founder who happens to be one of the most good looking Persian Washingtonian dude I know of, Jonathan Newman – besides me of course :-)

Make sure to RSVP

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Brace Yourself for a Greener Washington DC: Launch of the largest Bikeshare program

September 23, 2010 by 1 Comment

Not that there wasn’t enough incentive to enjoy living and working in Washington, D.C. area, here is another one – we are the first American city launching the largest Bikeshare program.

Marking the start of the Capital Bikeshare program the cycles are part of a new program in the Nation’s capital that hopes to encourage bike transport. The fleet is currently at 400 bikes but is expected to grow to 1,100 bikes by the end of October, making it the largest bikeshare in the country. Read more of this post

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Can someone Build this Rotating Solar House in Washington, D.C. area?

August 23, 2010 by Leave a Comment


Just read about a great solar powered house during my visit in London. The rotating solar panels house produces five times the energy the house uses. The builder – of course a German architect. I’ll do to all my power to raise the fund for whoever is serious enough to build something similar for the Awesome Washington DC area.

Rolf Disch built the home, called Heliotrope, to follow the sun throughout the day. The structure features triple panes of thermally insulated glass to strike a balance between letting light in and keeping the house cooler inside.

A giant 6.6-kilowatt-capacity rooftop solar panel called the Sun Sail slurps up the rays of energy, pumping them into the home and grid. Solar thermal collectors on balcony railings act as water heaters and radiators. On cloudy days, the house can be heated with wood chips and solar thermal heating. Read more of this post

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Marriott Hotel Going Green

July 26, 2010 by Leave a Comment

Marriott International unveiled a prototype last week that will help it build more green, LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design)-certified hotels.

Charleston/Summerville is the first of Marriott hotels set to open in early 2012, will be a LEED hotel, created in partnership with the US Green Building Council.

According to their press, using the prototype will save the hotel giant six months of design time on each hotel. That’s about what the company says it would usually take to design a LEED-certificate worth new property. Marriott plans to roll out similar prototypes for its other brands in the future, including Residence Inn by Marriott and Towne Place Suites. Read more of this post

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Bill Gates New Passion for Clean Car Technology

July 18, 2010 by 2 Comments


Whether you think President Obama is doing a great Job in handling our nation, whether or not you voted for him, one thing for sure he deserves a major credit for – Greenizing the country. I have been living, studying, and working in Washington, D.C.  since 1985.  I have never seen so much buzz and initiatives on green since Obama has taken over the Washington, D.C.  His passion for going Green has even got Bill Gates to invest in green.

Prior Obama if you asked any republican to spell out “green”, they would spell it  B-L-A-C-K. I assume you all know what I mean; OIL. Read more of this post

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Builders Question Efficacy of Green Certification (Washington, D.C.)

May 23, 2010 by Leave a Comment


According to a  story I just read on Washington Business Journal,  the U.S. Green Building Council’s (USGBC) certification affiliate is making plans to bring the process for reviewing green building applications back in house after some in the builder community raised doubts about its effectiveness. The plan was previously attempted about a year ago.

The Green Building Certification Institute, which began contracting out the review process for its Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification last April,  plans to resume management over a bulk of LEED application reviews in the next two years. For the past year, in an effort to cut down a growing backlog of applications and slash months-long delays in review times, the institute had been contracting out the review and quality-control processes to 10 outside organizations that specialize in general certification consulting, as opposed to the green building niche. Read more of this post

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Finnish Embassy and their Love for Green

May 15, 2010 by Leave a Comment


by Elias Shams
On my way back from the annual Greek Food Festival in Massachusetts Avenue noticed the  Finnish Embassy off  the Rock Creek Parkway with a big banner about  them gone green :

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Washington DC Took The Second Place In Green Building

March 25, 2010 by Leave a Comment


by Elias Shams
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released its second annual ranking of U.S. metropolitan areas with the largest number of buildings receiving the Energy Star label in 2009.  Washington DC took the second place with 204 Energy Star buildings while Los Angeles became first with 293  buildings, and San Francisco, which has about 20 percent of the population of Los Angeles, came in third with 173 buildings. read more…

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