The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has announced former Vice President Al Gore as the opening keynote speaker for its annual Greenbuild International Conference & Expo, to be held Nov. 11-13, 2009, in Phoenix, AZ. 

Gore’s keynote address will kick off Greenbuild at the Opening Keynote & Celebration, taking place Nov. 11 at Chase Field, home of the Arizona Diamondbacks.  The evening celebration will feature a musical performance by nine-time Grammy winner Sheryl Crow and an address from renowned green building speaker and USGBC President Rick Fedrizzi. 

Al Gore has championed awareness and action to confront global climate change since his earliest days in the U.S. Congress 30 years ago, and is regarded for his pioneering role in helping put one of the most important challenges of our time on the map with his best-selling book and Academy Award-winning documentary,An Inconvenient Truth. In 2007, Gore was jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for his environmental activism. In 1992, Gore publishedEarth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spiritand instituted environmental policy and initiatives in the Clinton-Gore Administration to help safeguard the environment.

Gore is cofounder and chairman of Generation Investment Management and multiplatform media company Current TV. He is a member of the Board of Directors of Apple Computer Inc. and a senior advisor to Google Inc. Gore is also Visiting Professor at Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro, TN.

Greenbuild is the largest gathering of representatives from all sectors of the green building movement. Three days of extensive educational programming, workshops, a vast exhibition floor and ample networking events provide unrivaled opportunities to learn about the latest technological innovations, explore new products, and exchange ideas with other professionals. Greenbuild is the three-time recipient of the IMEX Green Meetings Award. Previous Greenbuild keynote speakers have included former President Bill Clinton in 2007 and Archbishop Desmond Tutu in 2008.

For more information, visitwww.greenbuildexpo.org.