As part of a company-wide commitment to fight climate change, Apple announced on Monday that all of its facilities, including retail stores, offices, data centers, and co-located facilities, across 43 nations are now powered by 100 percent renewable energy. “We’re committed to leaving the world better than we found it. After years of hard work we’re proud to have reached this significant milestone,” said CEO Tim Cook in a press release. “We’re going to keep pushing the boundaries of what is possible with the materials in our products, the way we recycle them, our facilities, and our work with suppliers to establish new creative and forward-looking sources of renewable energy because we know the future depends on it.” Additionally, nine more manufacturing partners have committed to producing Apple products with clean energy, bringing its total clean-energy manufacturing partners to 23. [Apple]
Facebook signed WeWork's largest-ever lease agreement, committing to approximately 225,000 square feet of space in the shared workspace company's Mountain View, Calif., location. The facilities will reportedly be ready for a September move-in. [New York Business Journal]
What happens when you ask students to select a common material and pair it with an unlikely manufacturing technology, without specifying an end goal? Our resident materials guru Blaine Brownell, AIA, writes that the results will surprise you. [ARCHITECT]
Researchers from the University of California, Santa Cruz; the Nature Conservancy; and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology at ETH Zurich have published a study finding that nature-based solutions for flooding caused by climate change can reduce the risk of future flooding by 45 percent over a 20-year period, and prevent than $50 billion in damages. While most funding now goes to "gray" infrastructure such as seawalls, the researchers found that interventions such as oyster reefs, coastal wetlands, barrier islands, and beach dunes can lower wave energy, trap sediment, and reduce storm surges. [Phys.org]
Hampshire College's R.W. Kern Center designed by Cambridge, Mass., firm Bruner/Cott & Associates has become the largest higher education project to become certified as a Living Building by the International Living Future Institute. [ARCHITECT]
3DPrint.com writer Sarah Anderson Goehrke toured Redwood City, Calif.–based 3D printing company Carbon and calls it, "One of the most undeniably forward-thinking companies in the 3D printing industry." [3DPrint.com]
In Prague, the DOX Centre for Contemporary Art features Gulliver, a 130-foot-long, 30-foot-diameter zeppelin-like structure designed by Huť Architektury Martin Rajniš. The pedestrian walkway and event space cantilevers more than 50 feet beyond the roof of one of the cultural center’s warehouse-like buildings. [ARCHITECT]
Call for Entries: ARCHITECT invites design firms, manufacturers, researchers, students, startups, and innovators in all building-related disciplines to enter our 12th annual R+D Awards by next Friday—but, if you want to save some money on your entries, register by tonight at midnight Eastern Time. New this year: Autodesk is offering winners of the program the opportunity to participate in its BUILD Space resident program in Boston. Winners will be featured in ARCHITECT's July issue and online. [ARCHITECT]
