Today we have the pleasure to air the  “Greenroofs: Wind & Fire”  Panel Presentation with  Kelly Luckett, Mike Ennis, and Jim Kirby  from our inaugural  2011 Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Virtual Summit on greenroofs.tv and our GreenroofsTV channel on YouTube.

As most of you know, Kelly Luckett has been a long standing editorial contributor to Greenroofs.com as The Green Roof Guy (2008-2012) and prior to that as The Roving Exhibitor (2005-2008).  And after all these years, Aramis and I count Kelly and his lovely wife, Trish, as extremely good friends, too – you just can’t ask for better people!

We have known affable Jim for several years now after many greenroof conferences, and have always enjoyed his candor and wit.  Although well known by many, we had not yet met Mike, but were very happy to have him on board as an expert in this discussion.  This panel presentation came out of the three years of work that numerous people from many professional organizations put into developing the much needed and long awaited RP-14 Wind Design Guideline.

So we thought it would be a very good topic for all of us!    All three men invested many, many hours to the topic of the  ANSI/SPRI VF-1 and RP-14 standards, and we as an industry are grateful to all for their hard work.

In fact, Green Roofs for Healthy Cities honored Kelly’s dedication and volunteerism with their  Civic Award of Excellence in 2010 (I wrote about it and much more at my post “Final Reflections of Fall 2010 Greenroof Conferences: Vancouver, B.C., Part 3“). Make sure to read Kelly’s own reflections at his December 9, 2010 “Green Roofs, a Civic Award of Excellence, and a Lifetime of Memories.”

And as a backgrounder for this highly technical subject matter and for your reference, make sure you read Kelly’s March 9, 2010 “RP-14 Wind Design Guideline”  article for complete details.

Kelly Luckett is a GRP and LEED AP.  Nearly a decade in the green roof industry followed Kelly’s thirty years in the roofing industry.  His work includes: developing the Green Roof Blocks product line with products in service on over 125 green roof projects; providing the initial funding to establish the G.R.E.E.N. Green Roof Research Program at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville; co-authoring minimum design standards for green roofs within the International Building Code; authoring Green Roof Construction and Maintenance, 2009; serving on committees to develop and beta test the Green Roofs for Healthy Cities Green Roof Professional accreditation testing program; and working as an instructor with the NRCA University educating designers and contractors about green roof design and construction.

Recently, Kelly designed, patented, and introduced the Green Wall Blocks vegetated retaining wall system.  Kelly is also a contributing editor on Greenroofs.com (2005); he is the Green Roof Guy who shares his travels attending ASTM, GRHC and other roofing and greenroof related organization meetings.  In 2010, Kelly received the Green Roofs for Healthy Cities Civic Award of Excellence.

Kelly was the Moderator for “Greenroofs: Wind & Fire.”

Mike Ennis has been Technical Director for SPRI, the Association representing Single-Ply Roofing Manufacturers and Component Suppliers, for the last five years.  Prior to this he worked for The Dow Chemical Company for thirty years and was the North American Application Technology Leader for commercial products in Dow’s Building Solutions business where he led the development of new products ands applications.  Mike has 35 years of building and construction experience to his credit.

Mike is a Registered Roof Consultant with RCI, Inc. and is Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Roofing Industry Committee on Weather Issues and the Cool Roof Rating Council.  He is a member of ASHRAE and ASTM Committees D8 Roofing and Waterproofing, E5 Fire Standards, and E60 Sustainability.

James R. Kirby, AIA, is the associate executive director of technical communications for NRCA.  He holds a Master’s of Architecture from University of Illinois and is a licensed architect in Illinois.  Having joined the NRCA in 1996, Kirby is responsible for NRCA’s sustainability activities and communicating technical information through presentation and articles.

Jim is a professional member of ASTM, AIA, GRHC, ICC and USGBC.  He is an accredited Green Roofing Professional (GRP) and is pursuing a Graduate Certificate in Sustainable Design and Construction from Boston Architectural College.  Jim provided NRCA commentary on RP-14.

In the trio’s panel presentation, they proclaim “No longer can the green roof be deleted from a project due to failure to comply with the fire code.  After three years in the making from members of Single Ply Roofing Industry in cooperation with Green Roofs for Healthy Cities (GRHC), we now have a green roof design guide for minimizing the risk of fire on green roofs.

“The securing of a place in mainstream construction through the International Code Council (ICC) has resulted in a milestone for the North American green roof movement. Fire concerns are only half of the code story as the wind design guide is still progressing through the ANSI process – we must overcome both the wind and the fire obstacle. Kelly Luckett, President of Green Roof Blocks, moderates and shares his experiences representing GRHC with the consensus based ANSI/SPRI VF-1 and RP-14 standards. Jim Kirby, NRCA’s AED, Technical Communications, provides NRCA commentary about building codes, vegetative roofs and RP-14. Mike Ennis, Technical Director for SPRI, speaks to SPRI’s leadership leadership in the development of fire and wind standards and experience in the building code arena.”

A concurrent live Q & A accompanied the panel session during the actual  2011 Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Virtual Summit presentation with Kelly Luckett, Mike Ennis, and Jim Kirby.  The commentary is no longer available for you to see – one reason to attend the second  Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Virtual Summit – so you can participate and let your voice be heard!

Note: Due to technical and other difficulties from the second party vendor who filmed our illustrious panel of three, this video does not have our standard  2011 Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Virtual Summit branding, including the shots from Google Earth.  We are, however, planning on adding it to the four affected presentations so that they may be effectively identified for posterity.

Enjoy!  Visit greenroofs.tv to see   Greenroofs: Wind & Fire”  Panel Presentation  or click below:

Watch earlier videos on our exclusive Virtual Summit greenroofs.tv play list, or see the following Virtual Summit videos now available on our GreenroofsTV channel on YouTube:

If you’re looking for an overview, make sure to see our 2011 Virtual Summit Highlights video (6:18) and our 2011 Virtual Summit Trailer (2:59).

Check back next week on GreenroofsTV for our 25th installment from the Greenroofs & Walls of the World™ Virtual Summit 2011!

~ Linda V.