This is a round-up of on-the-spot interviews with job seekers who attended the job fair at the Greenbuild Conference that is taking place this week. Attendees were asked what strategies were they using to land a green building job.

Businesses around the world are feeling the pressures of rising energy, water, and the potential costs of emissions. While business risks and costs are driving many behavior changes, leading businesses are exploring sustainability concepts to identify opportunities. Many companies are addressing these risks by exploring the value aspects of business sustainability.

The Sustainability Science Program at Harvard University’s Center for International Development offers doctoral, post-doctoral, and mid-career fellowships in Sustainability Science. The fellowships are tenable at the Center for International Development during Harvard’s academic year beginning in September 2010. Fellowships are available for 10 months (September 2010-May 2011), 12 months (September 2010-August 2011), the fall semester (September-December 2010), the spring semester (February-May 2011), or for two academic years (post-doctoral fellows only) (September 2010-August 2012).

The green building studies and reports we spotlight cover the following topics: The potential financial benefits of green retrofits; the importance of overcoming the social and psychological barriers to green building; the use of impact fees to encourage green building; the use of mandates and incentives to promote sustainable construction; feedback from the construction industry on the risks that come with green building; global green building trends; green practices reported by facilities management professionals; and reshaping municipal and county laws to foster green building.

A survey of 140 mayors from 40 states also highlights concern over potential financial obstacles for infrastructure projects, according to a study sponsored by Siemens for The U.S. Conference of Mayors. A majority of cities (77%) report their infrastructure budget for 2009 has been adversely affected by the global economic crisis. However, nearly two-thirds of all U.S. mayors surveyed believe that fighting climate change with technological innovation represents a “enormous” economic opportunity. Optimizing the infrastructure of cities is considered a major way to address global warming and environmental protection. Mayors of larger cities, in particular, viewed the expansion of public mass transit as a key way to fight climate change.

The University of Colorado at Boulder’s Initiative for Sustainable Development (ISD) educates, activates and unites stakeholders from across the University, the West, and the nation in pursuit of the best ideas, practices and policies in the growing field of sustainable land use and real estate development. The Director of the Sustainable Development Initiative will develop an interdiscplinary initiative within the Real Estate Center that creates a center for Sustainable Development and Growth Management, including an academic program to teach growth management and sustainable development principles and practices.

The American Real Estate Society, in cooperation with and funding by the CoStar Group, announces a call for papers for a special issue of the real estate monograph series on “green buildings and sustainable real estate” called “Journal of Sustainable Real Estate”. The best research paper published will receive a $15,000 honorarium. All papers accepted for publication will receive $1,000. Authors are encouraged to submit original research that can help investors, developers, appraisers, lenders, asset managers, elected government officials and land use regulators improve their strategies, decision-making and understanding of the impact of sustainable real estate practices.

Justmeans is recruiting a Social Enterprise Fellow to work out of their Pune, India office. The fellow will, among other things: Develop and scale our research team; develop a business strategy for Justmeans expansion into Asia in the first two quarters of 2010; work with one of our partners to launch an annual conference on sustainable development in India; work with our CEO, Martin Smith, to identify and secure founding academic and corporate partners for the launch of
Justmeans Asia; work with Ashoka Fellow and COO Kevin Long to develop an appropriate mobile technology strategy for India and beyond

Last week after finding out that The International Federation of Accountants had developed a a Sustainability Framework for Professional Accountants. I wanted to find out what other resources they had for green accountants. I found out that they published two reports that you can download for free. See what they have…