Each year, the Delaware Valley Green Building Council hosts its Tri-State Sustainability Symposium to bring together industry, academic and community leaders to share best practices, ask challenging questions, and provide cutting edge information about sustainability in the PA/DE/NJ Tri-State region. This year’s symposium is taking place at Temple University’s Performing Arts Center on March 6. Those who are looking to attend the symposium to gain continuing education credits can receive seven GBCI CEUs and 7.5 AIA LUs.

“The purpose of the symposium is to convene the green building and sustainability community in this region and its a really good chance to hear from a lot of the leaders in the field about what they’re working on right now and what their plans are going forward,” said Alex Dews, executive director of DVGBC. “I think the sustainability movement has grown a lot in the past couple of years, and so the event has grown along with that. Last year we had more than 800 attendees and dozens of companies exhibiting. So it’s grown a little bit every year.”

Dews said that this year’s symposium will feature 4 different keynote speakers as well as over 100 different presenters.

“A lot of those are very local to Philadelphia, but some of them are coming in from quite a distance, so it really is a panel of, I would say, national experts presenting on their work in a lot of different topic areas,” he added.

During the breakfast hour segment, attendees will hear from Anthony E. Malkin, chairman, CEO, and president of Empire State Realty Trust and Judy Wicks, local entrepreneur, activist, and author. Then over lunch, Emily Allen of the award-winning design firm Dekker/Perich/Sabatini will talk about the intersection of sustainability, design and technology, and Michele N. Siekerka, former Assistant Secretary of NJ DEP and current President of the New Jersey Business & Industry Association will discuss the intersection of business and sustainability and how it can be done.

The rest of the presenters throughout the day will present on a variety of topics, from sustainability and art to what’s new in sustainable building materials.

“Its really pretty broad now, the number of topics that are covered in the symposium,” Dews said. “But a lot of it is really focused around some of those core issues for us, which have to do with sustainability and the built environment.”

For more information, including the full symposium schedule, visit http://www.dvgbc.org/TriStateSS.

Image via Steven L. Lubetkin/DVGBC