International News from Sustainable Buildings 2000

Held from October 22 to 25, 2000 in Maastricht, The Netherlands, the Sustainable Buildings 2000 conference had a capacity crowd of 750 attendees, including many from Western Europe, North America, Japan, and Australia. Conference venues included concurrent presentations on various technical and policy-related topics, an exhibit consisting primarily of national pavilions, and poster presentations.

The global scope of the event was highlighted by an opening session with a panel of speakers, each representing a different continent. Comments by Chrisna du Plessis of South Africa and others about the disconnect between the needs of developing countries and sustainability efforts in wealthy nations helped set a broad tone for the event. One track of presentations featured the recent work of the Green Building Challenge (GBC) initiative, which had been introduced in November 1998 in Vancouver, Canada.