HPDC is very pleased to announce the appointment of two new members to the HPDC Technical Committee: Sara Cederberg, Healthy Materials Program Manager at Google/REWS; John Ullman, Sustainability Manager in the Harvard University Office for Sustainability. Sara and John were appointed by the HPDC Board of Directors, following an open call for applicants, to fill two seats that had become open on the Technical Committee.
The HPDC Technical Committee, composed of seventeen representatives of the HPDC membership, is appointed by the HPDC Board of Directors to oversee the evolution of the HPD Open Standard. The Technical Committee focuses on driving forward the Standard to reflect the learning that is occurring as more and more HPD reports – now over 5,000 have been published by over 500 manufacturers – are being used to support product and ingredient selection by both the design community and manufacturers. Continual improvement to make transparency and material health information easier to create and use is critical for scaling adoption to a much broader community of practice.
Sara and John are both highly experienced practitioners of sustainability, and represent organizations – Google and Harvard, respectively – that are global leaders in transparency and material health.
- Sara Cederberg recently joined Google’s Real Estate and Workplace Services Sustainability Team as the Healthy Materials Program Manager. Google’s Healthy Materials Program aims to ensure all of the products and materials used within Google’s buildings are one day safe and circular – that is, products made from safer ingredients with clean supply chains and can be reused at the end of life. Prior to joining Google, Sara worked for the U.S. Green Building Council for seven years primarily on the content development for the LEED Rating System. She led the effort to include transparency requirements for products and materials in LEED. She has collaborated closely with HPDC, HBN, C2C, and others in the Ecosystem for many years. She has served on several related committees, including the Governance Committee for the EPA Draft Guidelines for Product Environmental Performance Standards and Ecolabels for Voluntary Use in Federal Procurement, the Steering committee for the BizNGO Chemical Footprint Project and the AIA Materials Knowledge Working Group. Sara is a licensed architect.
- John Ullman has been a Sustainability Manager in Harvard University’s Office for Sustainability since 2016, serving a critical role in the development and implementation of the University’s innovative program, the Healthier Building Materials Academy. In just the last few years, John has been involved in over 30 major capital projects, representing more than 3 million square feet on campus, and worked with over a hundred manufacturers to increase ingredient transparency in their products and move them further to optimize for health. Prior to joining Harvard University, John was the Sr. Strategic Initiatives Coordinator in Johns Hopkins University’s Office of Sustainability and worked as a cancer researcher at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. John earned Master of Business Administration and Master of Environmental Management degrees from Duke University, and graduated from Johns Hopkins University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Molecular and Cellular Biology.
“HPD Collaborative is delighted to have Sara and John as members of our Technical Committee, where they join an equally remarkable group of HPDC members who are committed to the advancement of transparency and material health practice,” commented Amanda Kaminsky, HPDC Board Chair. “The tremendous progress of the open HPD initiative – and, indeed, our entire community of practice – has been made possible by the largely voluntary contributions of many dedicated practitioners. Congratulations to Sara and John on their new Technical Committee roles.”
HPDC Technical Committee Chair Mike Manzi says, “Over the past four years, HPDC has focused on strengthening our governance of the HPD Open Standard, through the creation of a revamped Technical Committee and Technical Sub-Groups, and establishing an annual revision process. These moves have enabled us to respond to new ideas rapidly, while maintaining rigorous review. We have a strong focus on working across the entire ecosystem to learn from diverse experience, and to maintain harmonization of the Standard within a growing community of practice.”