I've spent the last few years at BuildingGreen knee-deep in products research.

I'm a co-editor of GreenSpec—our print directory and web database of hand-picked, environmentally preferable products; and a co-editor of Green Building Products, a BuildingGreen book from New Society Publishers. I'm also an associate editor for our respected monthly professional journal, Environmental Building News.

Not done yet. I'm also the products editor for GreenSource, the member publication for the U.S. Green Building Council. BuildingGreen is a content collaborator that stunning magazine with McGraw-Hill, its publisher. Several personnel here are also on the masthead there.

For a couple years in the late '90s, I was the editor of The Last Straw, the international newsletter about strawbale construction and natural building. Yeah, I'm one of those people... but if you want to talk about something like nonchemical cooling tower water treatment systems, or bisphenol-A as a chemical precursor in the manufacture of epoxies and polycarbonates, I'm up for that too. There are plenty of envelopes to push, and I'm fortunate to be among some of the best envelope-pushers anywhere—you, reader, among them.

Over the years I've spent too much time on the internet, embarrassing myself as often as not. I'm pleased to be able to continue that tradition.

The photo was taken by Bill Steen outside the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian, on the Capitol Mall in Washington D.C., during the creation of the Always Becoming sculpture installation. I didn't know he took it until it showed up in my email. If, when you looked at the picture, you said to yourself, "Hey—that's a psychrometric chart on his shirt," you might be a building science geek.

The low energy use of the first Passivhaus in Bremen, Germany, is surprising, especially since the house has neither solar collectors, nor a PV array, nor a boiler.

Our always enlightening (and often entertaining) sister site, greenbuildingadvisor.com, has a pro/con pair of articles under the banner "Does Passivhaus Make Sense Over Here?"

Gold.

Start with John Straube's "con" article first: "Comparing Passivhaus Standard Homes to Other Low-Energy Homes." It handily describes the Passivhaus standard as it goes along, in case you're not familiar with it.

Then read the "pro" rebut, "In Defense of the Passive House Standard," by Marc Rosenbaum and David White (who I don't know, but am going to keep my eyes open for).

Passivhaus or not? Yes and no.

Twice each month, BuildingGreen publishes an email news bulletin with current news and product information briefs. Sign up here — it's free. We will never share or sell your email address, and you may unsubscribe at any time.

Here's an unformatted, text-only version of the current bulletin:

Free BuildingGreen Email News Bulletin - An overview of new information from BuildingGreen.com, Environmental Building News, GreenSpec, and LEEDuser.

New product listings in the GreenSpec Directory are available online.

Leading the way: Breaking News from EBN
· President Orders Federal Agencies to Save Energy
· Older Buildings May Harbor PCBs, EPA Warns
· Read More News

Get thought leadership from Environmental Building News

Featured New GreenSpec Listing
Curtainwall and 700 Series Board Insulations With Recycled Content. Owens Corning makes several rigid and semi-rigid fiberglass board products for commercial applications. These boards contain 40% recycled content (10% post-consumer) and are made with a urea-extended phenol formaldehyde binder, while being Greenguard certified with formaldehyde levels below 0.05 ppm.

New Green Product listings from the GreenSpec Directory
· Kingspan Insulated Metal Wall Panels With Polyiso or Mineral Wool Cores (membership required)
· Horizon Crawlspace Dehumidifiers Operate At As Low As 33ºF
· Samsung's 40-Pint Per Day Dehumidifiers Significantly Exceed Energy Star
· Electrolux Conveyor-Type Commercial Dishwashers Use as Little as 0.416 Gallons Per Rack (membership required)
· More New Listings (membership required)

Become a member of BuildingGreen Suite.

High Performance Buildings Database - Case Study Highlight
· Boston Children's Museum Expansion and Renovation. A major energy consideration and challenge was the desire to open the western façade to daylight and dramatic views while controlling glare and heat gain.
· Check out more case studies in the High-Performance Buildings Database

BuildingGreen's Blog
· Trane Completes the Switch to Ozone-Safe R-410A
· Why are people drawn to design inspired by nature?
· Double Dipping for LEED Materials Credits
· More blog posts

Visit LEEDuser for help with LEED 2009

Featured Event
· Build Boston; Boston, MA; Nov. 18-20. Visit BuildingGreen's LEEDuser at booth #351 in the Energy Pavilion!
· View All Events

Find us on Facebook

Find us on Twitter

The press release says, "Yosemite black bears select minivan as 'Car of the Year'":

An article in the October 2009 issue of the Journal of Mammalogy examines the number of vehicles, by make and model, that black bears broke into from 2001 to 2007 in California's Yosemite National Park. In all years, minivans had the largest or second largest number of break-ins by bears.

Based on a survey of the types of vehicles visitors to the park drive, it was found that "only minivans were broken into at a rate higher than expected based on their availability."

According to the article, titled "Selective Foraging for Anthropogenic Resources by Black Bears: Minivans in Yosemite National Park":

Black bears forage selectively to balance energetic and nutritional gains with foraging costs. Selection of minivans by bears in Yosemite National Park was the likely consequence of efforts to maximize caloric gain and minimize costs by targeting vehicles with higher probabilities of payoff. Potential costs to bears came in the form of energy spent breaking into vehicles and considerable risk because park rangers were deployed nightly for surveillance and bears detected in or around campgrounds and parking lots received aggressive negative conditioning. The trade-off between food acquisition and penal actions by humans likely pressured bears to target vehicles with the highest probability of attaining food.

Cost-benefit analysis. Bears aren't so different from us.

I received an email from a Design student at Kingston University (London) writing a dissertation on "why people are drawn to design inspired by nature." Three questions were sent; I went overboard answering the first one, and basically wussed out on the second two. I'd be interested in your takes on this highly subjective stuff, and will be sure to let our dissertation author in on the discussion.

1. Why in your opinion are people so drawn to design inspired by nature?

2. What in your opinion is the finest example of design inspired by nature in the field of product and furniture design (my course)?

3. Do you think there are psychological benefits to design inspired by nature, and what do you think they are?

1. Why in your opinion are people so drawn to design inspired by nature?

I don't think everyone is drawn to design inspired by nature. Some like Le Corbusier's buildings at their boxiest, and contemporary glass and aluminum offices and homes, and Danish Modern furniture, while others like nature-inspired design... simply because they do. There's no accounting for taste. I know that speaks to the shallowest part of peoples' immediate and visceral reactions to aesthetics, but I think that most of the time — especially in this day and age — that's all there is to it. It's certainly not true of everyone, but most people in these harried times never have any need or desire to consider why some fashion appeals to them while some other fashion doesn't. It is what it is, and there are ten thousand other urgent things to attend to. If pressed, they'll tend to latch onto any available notions that support their position without actually considering them. Look to politics as an independent example of that. Trying to detangle rationalizations from pure impulse is a tricky business. (But it would probably be a much better world if more people tried.)

Read more...

Twice each month, BuildingGreen publishes an email news bulletin with current news and product information briefs. Sign up here — it's free. We will never share or sell your email address, and you may unsubscribe at any time.

Here's an unformatted, text-only version of the current bulletin:

Free BuildingGreen Email News Bulletin — An overview of some of the fresh information in BuildingGreen Suite, including Environmental Building News, GreenSpec, the High Performance Buildings Database, our bibliography, calendar, blog, and more....

The mission of BuildingGreen, LLC is to facilitate transformation of the North American building industry. Join us in that mission by becoming a member of BuildingGreen Suite to access information critical to your green design and construction work.

The October 2009 issue of Environmental Building News (EBN) is now available online!

Quote of the Month
"Incorporating social equity means that architects are living up to the responsibility they already have." — John Knott, The Noisette Company
(membership required... Get EBN in print!... Get EBN online in BuildingGreen Suite!)

This Month's Feature Story
Building for People: Integrating Social Justice into Green Design. Social justice is already a part of green building. Making it a conscious part of the decision-making process, however, requires a new focus. (membership required)

This Month's Primer
Upgrade to LEED 2009? Projects currently registered under LEED-NC 2.2 can transfer to LEED 2009 before certifying. Should your project switch?

News in This Issue
AstroTurf Ordered to Curtail Lead Use

Product Reviews
Mineral Wool Residential and Commercial Insulation. Following up on EBN's August story (membership required), mineral wool insulation offers a good alternative to foam-based insulation, with fewer hazardous chemicals. (membership required)

Heat-Pump Water Heaters Ready for Prime Time (membership required)

Letters
August's feature story — "Polystyrene Insulation: Does it Belong in a Green Building?" (membership required) — brought in a lot of mail from readers:
Polystyrene's Track Record
Watch for Other Toxics
HBCD Isn't the Only Problem
Polystyrene Chemicals Widespread
Changing Practices

Case Study Highlight
Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation, Evanston, IL. JRC's commitment to the principle of tikkun olam — Hebrew for "repairing the world" — is manifest in the building's architecture. On a modest budget, the synagogue achieved a LEED Platinum certification.
Check out more case studies in the High Performance Buildings Database...

BuildingGreen.com Blog
Stimulus-Funded Green Jobs = Left-Wing Conspiracy
Buildings For the People
BuildingGreen on Campus
See all Blog Posts...

Featured Events
National Sustainable Building Advisor Program; October 2; Southern Oregon University
WaterSmart '09 Convention; October 5-9; Las Vegas, NV
Greenbuild; November 11-13; Phoenix, AZ. Visit BuildingGreen at booth #1652 to see LEEDuser Live!
BuildingGreen.com Calendar...

We're on Facebook
We're on Twitter

Over at The Last Straw blog, Jeff Ruppert has posted a review of Making Lime Mortars, the first of a four-disc tutorial offered by St. Astier Natural Limes. Perhaps the thing I like best about the review is that it doesn't get into the whole "Why use lime" conversation... it respectfully assumes that you already know.

But in case you don't know, here's most of the product description for St. Astier's natural hydraulic lime from GreenSpec:

St. Astier Natural Hydraulic Lime, or NHL, is a 100% natural product that has been in production since 1851. St. Astier NHL Mortar is widely used in the restoration of old buildings. This natural hydraulic lime mortar imported from France allows stone to "breathe" naturally. Used in construction as plaster, stucco, mortar, and paint, its high level of vapor exchange and mineral composition can help reduce the risk of mold development and dry rot. NHL products are highly permeable, elastic, low shrinking, zero VOC, self-healing, and recyclable.

Over at GreenBuildingAdvisor, veteran journalist Richard Defendorf combined his abiding interests in green building and politics by taking a look at a Fox News Forum opinion piece from the policy director the conservative advocacy group (natch) Americans for Prosperity. It contained gems like this one:

"Most green jobs consist of hiring low-wage workers with caulking guns to weatherize buildings. We are trading away high-wage, high-value manufacturing jobs for these green caulking jobs. Any time you spend billions of dollars you will create some jobs, but the key question is, what the cost is when you divert resources from higher-value activities?"

Defendorf had the audacity to respond with thoughtfulness and logic. Take a couple minutes to read it: Stick 'Em Up, I've Got a Caulk Gun!

Architectural testing concern HTL will be at GlassBuild America shooting missiles at windows again. The demonstration/demolition follows the Miami-Dade large missile protocol by shooting 2x4s at impact-resistant and non-impact-resistant windows. A press release from HTL quotes NGA Industry Events Director Susan Jacob: "There is nothing quite like the drama of a 2x4 missile shot from an air cannon at glass windows." Wish I was going!

I checked HTL's website for some footage, but was left wanting. There's a link for client videos (and there's some top name clients in there), but they all seem to be password-protected. So it was off to YouTube to find this:

Another interesting short video — less than two minutes — was shot at last year's Glassbuild conference; a reporter from e-Glass Weekly played word-association with a few exhibitors. If this small sampling is any indication, the fenestration industry does not like the NFRC at all; was optimistic (as of last year) about commercial construction; and thinks green building and LEED are the future.

Twice each month, BuildingGreen publishes an email news bulletin with current news and product information briefs. Sign up here — it's free. We will never share or sell your email address, and you may unsubscribe at any time.

Here's an unformatted, text-only version of the current bulletin:

Free BuildingGreen Email News Bulletin - Become a member of BuildingGreen Suite and get access to more tools and information critical to your green design and construction work.

New product listings in the GreenSpec Directory are available online.

Breaking News
· People Get Sicker in Overcooled and Overheated Buildings (membership required)
· USGBC Revising Forest Certification Benchmark for LEED
· Read More News...

Featured New GreenSpec Listing
Evergreen Aftermarket Blower Motor for Residential HVAC. Evergreen is an electronically commutated motor (ECM) aftermarket replacement for permanent-split-capacitor (PSC) blower motors in residential HVAC systems (except furnaces). According to the company, Evergreen can add up to 1 SEER point to an existing system and uses 25% less electricity than a PSC motor and 74% less in constant-fan applications. (membership required)

Select New GreenSpec Listings
· IceStor Ice-On-Coil Thermal Energy Storage System for Commercial Use (membership required)
· Silva Cell Supports Tree Growth and Stormwater Management Even with Paved Surfaces (membership required)
· Separett Villa is a Swedish-Made, Waterless Urine-Separating Composting Toilet
· Children's Furniture from Solid FSC-Certified Maple Harvested in Northeast U.S.
· More New Listings... (membership required)

Case Study Highlight
Half-Moon Outfitters Distribution Center, North Charleston, SC. Expected to use 46% less energy than a comparable conventional building, energy-reduction strategies include efficient fluorescent lighting, dimming ballasts, daylight and occupancy sensors for lighting, SEER-19 split-system heat pumps, and demand-controlled ventilation. Check out more case studies in the High-Performance Buildings Database...

BuildingGreen's Blog
· Living With Climate Change: How to Design Buildings and Communities for Adaptation
· LEED 2009: Should You Upgrade Your Project?
· More blog posts...

Featured Event
West Coast Green, San Francisco CA, Oct. 1-3. Visit BuildingGreen in Booth #137 with a nifty offer for thrifty residential designers and builders. Stump Peter Yost and other our Green Building Advisors at their Q&A session, and see Alex Wilson's picks and pans for green products. Registration discount of 20% with this link. View All Events...

Find us on Facebook
Find us on Twitter