The Green Building Matters Podcast with Charlie Cichetti Titelbild

The Green Building Matters Podcast with Charlie Cichetti

The Green Building Matters Podcast with Charlie Cichetti

Von: Charlie Cichetti
Jetzt kostenlos hören, ohne Abo

Do green buildings matter to you? This podcast fuels your fire with inspiring interviews from industry and nonprofit leaders across the built environment. Not sure if green building matters? Listen to the personal stories of our guests and let Charlie's passion help convince you why green buildings are essential to our shared future. Each episode illustrates a unique journey through sustainability and towards resilience. Charlie explores the challenges and celebrations of the movers and shakers in the green building industry. Hear behind the scene stories from the inner world of green and healthy building design, construction, and management.© 2020 GBES Erfolg im Beruf Kunst Ökonomie
Folgen
  • Special Episode: Building Skema.ai - Why AI-Native Building Design Is About to Change Everything with Charlie Cichetti, Robin Bienfait & Jim Grady

    Special Episode: Building Skema.ai - Why AI-Native Building Design Is About to Change Everything with Charlie Cichetti, Robin Bienfait & Jim Grady
    Jul 1 2026
    🎯 The Green Impact Report Quick Take: What happens when a LEED Fellow entrepreneur, a Fortune 500 technology executive (turn investor), and a startup growth strategist sit down to discuss the future of building design? You get an inside look at how AI is reshaping architecture, construction, ownership, and the economics of the built environment. In this special episode, Charlie Cichetti, Robin Bienfait, and Jim Grady explore why the next generation of buildings won't be designed from scratch — they'll be built from intelligence. 🎓 Meet the Innovators Charlie Cichetti Co-Founder & CEO of Skema.ai, serial entrepreneur, LEED Fellow, and longtime sustainability advocate. Charlie has spent his career helping building owners operate smarter, greener, and more efficiently. Today, he's focused on building a tech startup using AI to dramatically reduce waste, inefficiency, and rework across the building lifecycle. Robin Bienfait Former CIO of BlackBerry, senior executive at AT&T and Samsung, venture capitalist, angel investor, and founder of Atlanta Tech Park. Robin managed thousands of facilities throughout her corporate career and became one of Skema AI's earliest believers (and investors) after seeing the platform's potential to transform how owners design and manage buildings. She serves on the Board at Skema, also. Jim Grady Growth strategist, startup advisor, and investor relations expert. Jim helps founders sharpen positioning, communicate vision, and accelerate growth. Throughout the conversation, he pushes beyond the technology itself to uncover the business case, market timing, and investment thesis behind AI-powered building design. 🌱 Breaking Ground on Better Building ✍️ Key Insight #1: The design & construction industry keeps throwing away its most valuable asset — its own knowledge. The Challenge: Every project generates enormous amounts of design intelligence, yet most of it sits unused on servers after completion.The Solution: Skema AI allows owners and architects to learn from previous projects, creating reusable building intelligence instead of starting over every time.ROI: Faster design schedules, lower project costs, improved consistency, and reduced rework. ✍️ Key Insight #2: AI isn't replacing architects — it is eliminating repetitive work. The Challenge: Design professionals spend too much time recreating work, searching for information, and solving problems that have already been solved before.The Solution: AI accelerates repetitive workflows so architects can focus on creativity, strategy, sustainability, and client outcomes.ROI: Higher productivity, better employee engagement, stronger project teams, and more time spent on high-value work. ✍️ Key Insight #3: Building owners will become the biggest drivers of design & construction AI adoption. The Challenge: Rising costs, schedule delays, contingency budgets, and change orders continue to threaten project viability.The Solution: Owners can use platforms like Skema to create consistency across portfolios while improving collaboration among architects, contractors, and suppliers.ROI: Faster project delivery, reduced risk, improved capital efficiency, and earlier revenue generation from completed facilities. 🧐What is Charlie Up To? Charlie and the Skema AI team are entering an exciting growth phase. Current initiatives include: ✅ Expanding direct relationships with major retailers and building owners ✅ Growing Skema AI's footprint in Data Center Design ✅ Launching broader access for architects through a freemium offering ✅ Expanding AI capabilities for contractors and construction teams ✅ Preparing for a major Series A raise to accelerate growth As Charlie puts it, The Mission is Simple: "Create the 'fast-forward button' for commercial building design and construction" 🌟 Why Robin Is Betting On Skema Robin has spent decades leading technology transformations inside some of the world's largest organizations. What stood out to her wasn't simply the AI, it was that Skema was built AI-native from the beginning. According to Robin, many incumbent software companies now face a difficult challenge: they must bolt AI onto existing products. Skema started with AI as its foundation. That distinction could become one of the company's greatest competitive advantages as adoption accelerates throughout the industry. 🧰 Jim Grady's Perspective Throughout the discussion, Jim repeatedly returns to the question investors care about most: "What creates value?" His takeaway: Owners are increasingly frustrated by inefficiencies, delays, and repeated mistakes across projects. As those pressures grow, solutions that preserve institutional knowledge and accelerate project delivery become increasingly valuable. The opportunity isn't simply saving money, it's unlocking revenue sooner, by getting projects operational faster. 💬 Sustainable Soundbite "We've built the fast-forward button for how you design and build ...
    Mehr anzeigen Weniger anzeigen
    49 Min.
  • AI, Digital Infrastructure, & the Future of Decarbonization: Anya Eydman on Building Trust in the Energy Transition

    AI, Digital Infrastructure, & the Future of Decarbonization: Anya Eydman on Building Trust in the Energy Transition
    Jun 24 2026
    🎯 The Green Impact Report Quick take: AI, data centers, and digital infrastructure are transforming the built environment faster than most of us realize. In this episode, Anya Eydman explains why the future of decarbonization isn't just about technology—it's about trust, education, community engagement, and helping buildings become active participants in a cleaner, more resilient energy ecosystem. 🎓 Meet Your Fellow Sustainability Champion **Anya Eydman is a strategic advisor and community advocate working at the intersection of energy infrastructure, grid assets, and public–private systems. Her work focuses on helping complex projects move from concept to execution in ways communities can understand, trust, and benefit from. She specializes in stakeholder alignment, community partnerships, workforce readiness, and last-mile implementation strategies that connect infrastructure projects with real community impact. Anya has worked across energy optimization, climate initiatives, and civic partnerships, with a focus on building resilient and equitable systems that support long-term economic and environmental outcomes. She holds a Master's degree in Public Administration and, outside of work, writes poetry, meditates, and runs.** 🌱 Breaking Ground on Better Building In this episode, Anya Eydman challenges conventional thinking about energy, AI, and sustainability while helping us understand how digital infrastructure is reshaping the future of the built environment. 🧠 Key Insight #1: Buildings are evolving from energy consumers into grid assets. The Challenge: Most buildings have historically been viewed as passive energy consumers, limiting opportunities to support grid resilience and energy flexibility.The Solution: Reframe buildings as active participants in the energy ecosystem through intelligent infrastructure, electrification, distributed energy resources, and grid-interactive technologies.ROI: Improved resilience, enhanced energy management, future regulatory readiness, and new opportunities to participate in evolving energy markets. 🧠 Key Insight #2: AI's biggest sustainability opportunity is eliminating inefficiency. The Challenge: Organizations remain burdened by fragmented workflows, disconnected systems, and fear surrounding AI adoption.The Solution: Leverage AI to identify hidden inefficiencies, streamline operations, improve decision-making, and enhance productivity while keeping humans at the center of the process.ROI: Reduced waste, improved operational performance, lower carbon impacts, and more effective use of time, talent, and resources. 🧠 Key Insight #3: Community trust is becoming critical infrastructure. The Challenge: As data centers, energy infrastructure, and AI technologies expand, communities often lack visibility into their impacts and benefits.The Solution: Prioritize education, transparency, stakeholder engagement, and honest conversations about both risks and opportunities.ROI: Stronger public support, reduced project friction, faster adoption of innovation, and more sustainable long-term outcomes. Sustainable Soundbites "Every single industry will need to be a green jobs industry." — Anya Eydman 🤗 Your Green Building Action Plan Transform your next project with these steps: This Week: Evaluate how your current spaces support occupant wellness through daylight, air quality, and connection to nature.This Quarter: Explore geothermal or photovoltaic feasibility studies for upcoming projects or facility upgrades.This Year: Build sustainability conversations around measurable human outcomes — wellness, productivity, and operational savings — to improve stakeholder alignment. 🔗 Connect & Learn More 🌿 Access full episode resources: https://www.gbes.com/podcast 📜 Read the transcript 👉 here 👩🏻‍💻 Connect with Anya Eydman : Website: arya.energyLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anyaeydman/ 💚 Join the Green Building Movement: https://www.gbes.com 🤩 Want More Green Building Insights? Get sustainability tips 2x a week. Subscribe to our FREE newsletter here: https://www.greenbuilding.news/subscribe 🤝 Today's Episode Sponsored By: BuildingPlaques.com BuildingPlaques.com helps project teams showcase the story behind their LEED and green building certifications with fully customized architectural plaques. Highlight your scorecard, sustainability strategy, project team, and certifications in one sleek display designed to educate and inspire building occupants. 🔍 Learn more: https://buildingplaques.com Green Building Matters, Inc © 2026 | Good Green Fun.
    Mehr anzeigen Weniger anzeigen
    40 Min.
  • Designing Schools That Heal, Inspire, and Perform Better: Human-Centered Sustainable Design with Bob Morris

    Designing Schools That Heal, Inspire, and Perform Better: Human-Centered Sustainable Design with Bob Morris
    Jun 17 2026
    🎯 The Green Impact Report Quick take: What happens when sustainability stops being about buzzwords — and starts being about healthier kids, stronger schools, and lower operational costs? Architect Bob Morris breaks down how net-zero schools, biophilic design, and human-centered architecture are reshaping the future of education. 🙋 Meet Your Fellow Sustainability Champion **Bob is an architect who specializes in the planning and design of K12 schools for EUA, a multi-disciplinary design firm with five office locations in Wisconsin, Colorado, and Georgia. Architecture, for Bob, is a means to an end. Great design is measured by how it improves the lives of those who experience it. This necessitates a user-driven approach, emphasizing the voices of teachers, parents, and students in the design process. The results are learning environments that embrace equity, promote student agency, and encourage experiential learning opportunities. It also leads to designs that are rooted in the places and stories of the communities they serve, emphasizing connections to nature, long-term sustainability, and responsible use of resources. As a senior design architect and principal at EUA, Bob's personal design approach mirrors the values of his firm. EUA's design philosophy is anchored by the belief that design has the power to unleash true human potential and to enrich communities. This includes a firm-wide aspiration to net-zero emissions in the built environment as evidenced in the AIA 2030 Commitment.** 🌱 Breaking Ground on Better Building In this episode, Bob Morris revolutionizes traditional construction approaches: 🧠 Key Insight #1: Sustainable schools perform better when they prioritize human wellness — not just energy savings. The Challenge: Traditional school buildings often focused on efficiency and standardization while overlooking how physical environments impact student health, engagement, and learning outcomes.The Solution: Bob and his team design schools with biophilic principles, natural daylight, improved indoor air quality, flexible learning environments, and stronger connections to nature.ROI: Healthier students, increased engagement, improved learning environments, and long-term building performance that supports both wellness and sustainability goals. 🧠 Key Insight #2: Net-zero schools are becoming financially realistic for public education. The Challenge: Renewable technologies like geothermal and solar were historically viewed as too expensive or impractical for publicly funded school districts.The Solution: Advances in geothermal systems, photovoltaic arrays, and available funding opportunities are helping schools achieve ambitious energy goals without sacrificing budgets.ROI: Lower operational costs, reduced energy consumption, and the ability for school districts to reinvest savings directly into student programs and educational resources. 🧠 Key Insight #3: The future of sustainability depends on reframing the conversation around people, not politics. The Challenge: Sustainability and "green building" conversations can become politically divisive, especially in public-sector projects.The Solution: Bob emphasizes focusing conversations around health, student outcomes, operational efficiency, and creating environments that genuinely improve human experience.ROI: Greater community buy-in, stronger stakeholder alignment, and more meaningful progress toward resilient, high-performance buildings. ❝ Sustainable Soundbite "The buildings we design today become the world the next generation is stuck with." — Bob Morris 🤗 Your Green Building Action Plan Transform your next project with these steps: This Week: Evaluate how your current spaces support occupant wellness through daylight, air quality, and connection to nature.This Quarter: Explore geothermal or photovoltaic feasibility studies for upcoming projects or facility upgrades.This Year: Build sustainability conversations around measurable human outcomes — wellness, productivity, and operational savings — to improve stakeholder alignment. 🔗 Connect & Learn More 🌿 Access full episode resources: https://www.gbes.com/podcast 📜 Read the transcript 👉 here 👩🏻‍💻 Connect with Bob Morris: Website: https://eua.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bob-morris/, https://www.linkedin.com/company/eppstein-uhen-architects/ 💚 Join the Green Building Movement: https://www.gbes.com 🤩 Want More Green Building Insights? Get sustainability tips 2x a week. Subscribe to our FREE newsletter here: https://www.greenbuilding.news/subscribe 🤝 Today's Episode Sponsored By: BuildingPlaques.com BuildingPlaques.com helps project teams showcase the story behind their LEED and green building certifications with fully customized architectural plaques. Highlight your scorecard, sustainability strategy, project team, and certifications in one sleek display designed to educate and inspire ...
    Mehr anzeigen Weniger anzeigen
    29 Min.
adbl_web_anon_alc_button_suppression_t1
Noch keine Rezensionen vorhanden