Big news out of Madrid: Team Rhône-Alpes’ Canopea House has won the 2012 Solar Decathlon Europe! At the forefront of the competition since winning the Architecture and Operations prizes, this compact home is topped with a 10,7 kW array of photovoltaic panels that produce enough energy for both floors and a mini EV. — Inhabitat

So far, Broad has built 16 structures in China, plus another in Cancun....The company is in the process of franchising this technology to partners in India, Brazil, and Russia. What it’s selling is the world’s first standardized skyscraper, and with it, Zhang aims to turn Broad into the McDonald’s of the sustainable building industry. — Wired

The long-awaited final section of the High Line broke ground this morning. Mayor Bloomberg and Friends of the High Line kicked off Section 3, a.k.a. "The High Line at the Rail Yards," which will follow the rails from 30th to 34th streets to the north and south and from 10th to 12th Avenues east and west. When completed, the newest section will flow in seamlessly with the rest of the elevated park's design and will feature new benches, tables, and a children's play area. — Inhabitat

Architect Deborah Berke, founder of New York City-based firm Deborah Berke Partners, has been selected as the first recipient of UC Berkeley’s College of Environmental Design (CED) inaugural 2012 Berkeley-Rupp Architecture Professorship and Prize. — bustler.net

For the latest Student Works feature Elif Erdine a PhD in Architectural Design Candidate at the AA, researching on ‘Generative Processes in Tower Design: Algorithms for the Integration of Tower Subsystems’, profiled Fallen Star an installation set between biomimetics, interaction, and perception.The project led drewjmcnamara to think "I am always amazed at the resources available to students at some schools. And then to see those resources actually being put to good use".

Ned Dodington, founder of AnimalArchitecture.org, today announced the winners of the 2012 Animal Architecture Awards. This year's competition, titled "URBAN ANIMAL", called for designs that reshape, expand and redefine the context of urban thought and space while keeping in mind the needs (and possible benefits) of synanthropic species — wild animals that “live near, and benefit from, an association with humans and the somewhat artificial habitats that humans create around them”. — bustler.net

The report, entitled The Greenest Building: Quantifying the Environmental Value of Building Reuse, has been said to provide the most comprehensive analysis of the potential environmental benefit of building reuse to date. Most notably, it concludes that, when comparing buildings of equivalent size and function, building reuse almost always offers environmental savings over demolition and new construction. — earthtechling.com

Drawings showing a futuristic raised glass open-top tunnel, that have drawn comparisons with New York's High Line, could become a reality as soon as 2015.

Sam Martin, 43, the landscape architect who came up with the idea with a colleague two years ago, said discussions between the Mayor and Network Rail were 'going well' since an initial meeting in May and that feasibility studies over potential sites were already underway. — dailymail.co.uk

A coalition of environmental activists and community advocates has mounted the first major legal challenge to a planned downtown [Gensler-designed] Los Angeles NFL stadium, filing a suit Thursday that says a state law intended to assist the project is unconstitutional. — latimesblogs.latimes.com

Dawson City spent more than $600,000 last year dealing with damage to roads and pipes caused by melting permafrost.

A recently-published report says the shifting ground, a result of climate change, can do a lot of damage to infrastructure such as water and sewer systems. — cbc.ca

When Mr. Archer, 62, finds something intriguing (and it’s usually a very large something), he often builds a new wing around it.

His house, which he bought 30 years ago for $135,000, was once a 3,000-square-foot, two-story box. Now it is somewhere between 11,000 and 13,000 square feet, with wings flying every which way, a pterodactyl of architectural detritus. — nytimes.com

As growth slows, China's huge investment in infrastructure is looking ever harder to sustain, leaving a string of ambitious projects - towns, shopping malls and even a theme park - empty and forlorn. — bbc.co.uk