March 2020 Newsletter

Image
Image

An ICAST Employee Gets a Great Life Experience.


Monti Griffin, an ICAST construction laborer from Missouri, recently flew to New Mexico to help with  green rehab projects there. This is notable for Monti because it was the first time he has left Missouri, as well as the first time he has flown on a plane.  Monti has been with ICAST since 2019 after being hired out of the YouthBuild program that ICAST partners with in St. Louis.  The YouthBuild organization assists low-income youth learn construction skills to help build affordable housing, which aligns with the ICAST mission.  Our Green Construction Careers (GC2) program partners with organizations like YouthBuild to provide workforce training for marginalized groups.  Monti had been with YouthBuild off and on since he joined in 2014 at age 18. He has been a great addition to our team, and has recently expressed that “Signing up with Youthbuild and ICAST were the best decisions of my life.”


Building Sustainable Castles in the Sky.


Nearly 40% of UK greenhouse gas emissions, to use a figure architects love to bandy, are caused by the built environment. It’s an arresting figure. It suggests that the design of buildings and the planning of cities can do much to counter climate crisis.

Architecture tends to attract people who want to change the world for the better. And what could matter more than the prevention of environmental and societal collapse? So what would architecture look like if all involved put climate at the centre of their concerns? Would there be no more concrete, given the material has been fingered as particularly destructive? Or an end to towers clad in panels that have to be replaced every 30 years? Or much less building altogether?

To read more, please click here

Image
Image

This is What Energy Resilience Could Look Like.


Right now, four homes in the rural town of Basalt, Colorado, offer a glimpse into what the future of energy resilience may look like: a network of distributed energy resources (DERs) that work together across buildings. Each house is tricked out with energy resources (solar panels, batteries, smart devices, electric vehicle chargers) that automatically optimize loads and share electricity with one another using an algorithm. The result: homeowners can keep the lights on when the grid is down, and the utility has a new, flexible resource to better run its operation and reduce its reliance on dirty energy..  For more information, please click Here
Image

ICAST new employees


ICAST is pleased to announce it has hired Greg Elsea as our new Finance Manager. Greg had been working as a contractor with ICAST since December but was recently made a full-time employee. He has a 40-year-long career leading accounting departments in the construction industry. Greg is an alumnus of the University of Northern Colorado, graduating with a Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting. He feels strongly about being proactive in making a better place for tomorrow, which is a major reason why he chose to work at ICAST. Welcome to the team, Greg!

Sign Up for the ICAST Newsletter

Gain access to job and internship postings, innovative industry news, and
information about ICAST events.

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.