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ECOLOGICAL BUILDING UPHILL VA
By Diego Cevallos *
Buildings North American release abundant greenhouse gas, sewage and waste, while hovering just green building in Mexico, with five thousand houses erected popular .
MEXICO CITY, Apr 2 (IPS) The kind of building where you live or work and use that gives generate much of the climate changes that concern scientists. The energy consumed there translates into polluting emissions, waste water and waste building materials.
In North America, between 11 and 30 percent of the emission of greenhouse gases responsible for global warming, from the buildings, which spend much of the available electricity, water and raw materials, including precious lumber often illegally, and plastic compounds such as polyvinyl chloride or PVC, harmful to health.
In the U.S. alone, generating nearly a third of global greenhouse gases, buildings consume about 65 percent of all electricity, 40 percent of raw materials and 12 percent of the water supply.
In Mexico, responsible for two percent of these gases, buildings use 20 percent of electricity, 80 percent of which is produced by burning fossil fuels.
These two countries, with Canada represented on the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC), seeking to reduce the impact of this sector in climate change, according to most scientists is produced by the atmospheric buildup of gases from mainly from burning fossil fuels.
Experts from the three countries discussed the matter since the beginning of the year and in September a comprehensive report including recommendations to governments.
The goal is to limit polluting construction practices and give a to sustainable building, which integrates the environment in a friendly way, consume less electricity and, ideally, process water and garbage, as well as providing comfort to its inhabitants.
But it is an uphill battle. "The development of green building is emerging and there is a core policy of governments in the area," said David Morillon, expert from the National Autonomous University of Mexico and one of those who drafted the final report of the CEC.
However, some plans are already underway, and dozens of architects, engineers and researchers from North America and South exchange information through virtual networks through regular seminars on "green building."
the past six years, Canada and the United States developed new environmental standards for buildings, private firms have set up certification for green building construction and emerged a mortgage business "green", which lends money under environmental considerations.
Even so, the percentage of green buildings in these countries does not exceed 10 percent of the total.
In Mexico, the government is sponsoring a green building plan for low-income managed by the private sector. This was erected about five thousand homes, most between 40 and 70 square meters and almost completed.
For a country where housing demand exceeds one million units per year - although in the last six years only rose 500 000 per year - the project is just one small step.
The housing in Mexico aims especially to reduce consumption of electricity and water, but does not include solar energy or wastewater treatment, which are ideal for this type of construction.
"This is an experimental step" and aimed at generating information and verifiable to be the market "that finally imposes the need to move towards sustainable construction," said Evangelina Hirata, director of the state National Commission to Promote Housing.
But we can not promise that in six years Mexico will build all homes with sustainable features, "which does not happen anywhere in the world," he continued.
March 29 came into force in Spain's building code, requiring the inclusion of renewable energy for hot water and electricity in all buildings that begin construction or renovation since then.
Under the new rule, there will be limits on energy consumption of buildings depending on their characteristics, we foster the best performance of heat and lighting systems and be a required percentage of clean energy sources: direct solar energy and solar panels .
While in Mexico is planting a seed. "Hopefully in a year the Mexican financial system begins to offer green mortgages", after finding that "in the long term any sustainable construction will be cheaper and more beneficial for users and community, he added. According
Morillón, building sustainable housing can cost between three and 20 percent more than conventional. But hopes that the market will see prices fall when mainstream.
That could take years, and time is short, he said.
in Mexico traditional buildings have a lifespan of 30 to 40 years, but in 10 or 12 years, the country could run out of oil, making it difficult to supply electricity to those buildings.
The clock is also ticking on the side of climate change. If consumption of fossil fuels and environmental deterioration continue as before, at the end of the century the average global temperature could increase between 1.8 and 6.4 degrees and sea level between 18 and 59 centimeters, according to various forecasts .
* This article is part of a series on sustainable development by IPS (Inter Press Service) and IFEJ (acronym in English the International Federation of Environmental Journalists.)
architectures exist that land managers trained in ancient times and survivors over time. The recovery of this traditional knowledge and its inclusion in the field of contemporary knowledge is carried out with enthusiasm in many research centers in Europe and America and is projected as examples made in various places. 
