The International Green Construction Code was developed in response to a consensus need for a “green code” that addresses safe and sustainable design and construction practices. The IgCC applies to all new and renovated commercial and residential buildings over three stories high.
The historic code sets mandatory baseline standards for all aspects of building design and construction, including energy and water efficiency, site impacts, building waste, and materials.
The new code creates a mandatory 'floor" - enforceable minimum standards on every aspect of building design and construction that now must be reached.
Across most of the U.S., about 40% to 60% of all buildings were built before 1980, when building codes generally specified much less wall insulation than required today.
Buildings consume approximately half (49%) of all energy used in the United States and three quarters of all electricity, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). Building energy retrofits, or the application of energy efficient or clean energy generation measures to existing building stock, represent a significant opportunity to save money, reduce climate impacts and create jobs. However, the U.S. building stock is diverse, and the building retrofit market is actually comprised of a number of underlying market segments and sub-segments. The three main categories of segments include residential, commercial, and institutional.
Commercial retrofit market segments comprise a smaller overall proportion of the total U.S. building stock than segments in the Residential category but present a viable opportunity for development due to the relatively concentrated nature of energy savings, strong value proposition to owners and, therefore, potential demand.
A recent study published by the doe’s LBNL found that adopting cool wall technology presents the opportunity of significant energy savings. The study featured an analysis of more than 100,000 building simulations and concluded that 40% energy savings in pre 1980 buildings is attainable.
What is a cool wall?
Reflective walls have long been used to cool buildings in hot, sunny climates and first appeared in the international green construction code in 2018. A “cool” wall is an exterior wall surface that stays cool in the sun by strongly reflecting sunlight and by efficiently emitting thermal infrared radiation. Just like a cool roof, a cool wall should exhibit both high solar reflectance (also known as “albedo”) and high thermal emittance.
Making a wall cool is much like making a roof cool. Commercially available light color paints and darker “cool color” paints can be field applied to walls or factory- applied to wall products. While most wall surfaces reflect diffusely and send about half of their reflected light into city, special retroreflective wall products that return light toward the sun could help bounce sunlight out of the city.
ATPG’s NRG coating’s documented performance characteristics are unequalled by any other product in the marketplace.
ATPG has the Solutions for your Structures.
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