BuildingGreen’s Top 10 industry-transforming products this year include innovative heat-pump energy storage, electric construction equipment, PFAS-free textiles, healthier lighting, PV circularity, and more.
BuildingGreen is starting the new year by celebrating the positive transformations happening in the building industry—with our annual Top 10 Green Building Products. We have been awarding the Top 10 for more than 20 years, leveraging our deep knowledge of product innovations and trends, as well as our long legacy of systems thinking and our understanding of the biggest problems we need to solve to transform the building industry.
BuildingGreen is an independent company that accepts no advertising or sponsored content, so we are not beholden to manufacturers. The products we choose are the result of research, interviews, and guidance we’ve developed over the years, the same guidance that underlies our editorial Knowledge Base and Product Insights, and drives our consulting work with owners and project teams. We are proud to be part of a larger green building community that is working tirelessly to promote change and make these innovations and progress possible.
This year, we are celebrating this hard work by showcasing innovative all-electric HVAC and construction equipment that reduce carbon emissions, healthier products eliminating chemicals of concern, and resilience products that are helping us manage the consequences of climate change.
2024’s BuildingGreen Top 10 Green Building Products
Why we chose this product: AquaFence’s deployable flood barriers can be quickly installed to protect buildings, resources, and infrastructure.
AquaFence protecting Galveston Trolley Barn.
Photo courtesy AquaFence. Photographer: Marcis Baltskars. Our warming climate is causing sea levels to rise and making storms more intense, increasing the chance of flood events. Even a foot or two of water can cause significant damage to buildings, infrastructure, and equipment, such as HVAC systems—many of which are in basements. The cost of cleanup and remediation can be enormous and is often not covered by insurance, leaving companies, people, and whole communities scrambling to recover. In the aftermath, buildings often have to be gutted, and many of the contents become contaminated and end up in landfills.
According to First Street Foundation, which is used by insurance companies, the U.S. government, and others to assess the potential economic impacts of climate change, more than 3.5 million properties in the U.S. fall under the “Almost Certain Risk” flood category, meaning they have a chance greater than 99% of flooding once in 30 years. That number rises to 14.6 million properties for 100-year flood models used by the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency.
AquaFence makes several products engineered to protect buildings and infrastructure against flooding. According to the company, most require no preinstallation site work and are faster to deploy than sandbags. Their products’ L-shaped design creates higher downward pressure than sideways pressure, stabilizing the system during flood conditions. And its modular construction means that 95% of the barrier can be installed while leaving the building’s doors open as long as is feasible. The final panels can be installed in minutes when flooding is imminent.
The company’s FloodWall can surround buildings or protect longer stretches, such as glass facades or non-structural walls. FloodBarricade protects shorter spans, such as single and double doors. Both FloodBarricade and FloodWall can provide protection 2.5–9 feet high. AquaFence’s smallest product is FlashWall, engineered for flash flooding events and designed to be assembled quickly and to protect against flooding up to 19.5 inches.
AquaFence products are designed to be stored in as little space as possible, with up to 1,000 linear feet able to be stored in a single parking space.
HMTX Industries Mycelium Collection of SRP Rigid Core TPU Flooring
Why we chose this product: HMTX’s TPU-core flooring can be recycled back into new flooring with no loss of performance, providing an attractive and more environmentally responsible alternative to vinyl.
HMTX Mycelium Collection is recyclable and is made from TPU rather than vinyl.
Photo: HMTX Industries Vinyl flooring is ubiquitous because it is cheap, colorful, and durable. But it also has a poor environmental and social legacy. Many vinyl products are imported from China, where environmental and social justice concerns have led to a U.S. import ban on flooring and other vinyl products from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR). Linoleum is a great resilient-flooring alternative, but it does not always meet a design team’s performance or aesthetic requirements. Luxury vinyl tile is usually the default.
HMTX Industries’ Mycelium Collection of SRP Rigid Core TPU Flooring—winner of a 2023 Best of NeoCon Sustainability Award—uses a different kind of chemistry not found in other resilient flooring, thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU). Known for its strength and versatility, TPU differs from standard polyurethane materials used in myriad other building products. That’s because standard polyurethane is a thermoset plastic that cannot be melted down and thus is not readily recyclable, whereas TPU can be melted and processed into new material.
HMTX is putting TPU to use in the core of its Mycelium flooring collection. To be clear, the flooring does not contain mycelium: its name is meant to connote a biophilic network of individual parts working together. The flooring is composed of layers that include a PET top layer made from recycled water bottles, a rigid TPU core, and a polyurethane foam back—a conventional thermoset material that HMTX will replace in the product’s next iteration, according to the company.
HMTX says the flooring can be recycled back into new SRP without losing its performance capabilities. They are also putting in place a takeback program that includes QR codes on the back of every tile, leading to instructions on how to return them. And they are building a recycling facility.
Available in 12" x 24" tiles and 8.66" x 49.2" planks, the Mycelium Collection was made for hospitality, retail, corporate, and other applications, and it comes with a 15-year commercial warranty. The 20 SKUs available use digital printing to create realistic biophilic designs, so interior teams now have a flooring that is more environmentally responsible than vinyl flooring without LVT’s cheap plastic look or linoleum’s neutral matte finish.
HMTX’s SRP Rigid Core TPU Flooring will be available in the first quarter of 2024. It will be launched with FloorScore certification denoting low indoor emissions of certain VOCs, along with a Declare Red List Free label and a health product declaration disclosing the product ingredients and their toxicity. The environmental product declaration, disclosing embodied carbon and other environmental impacts, will follow in the second quarter, according to the company.
Why we chose this product:Kaiterra’s indoor air quality monitors use a modular system to simplify and speed up the calibration of its sensors, ensuring accuracy while minimizing system downtime.
The Sensedge IAQ monitor comes with a modular sensor, making it easier and more environmentally friendly to maintain the accuracy of the units.
Photo: Kaiterra We spend the majority of our time indoors, where air quality can be a significant problem. The pandemic years have brought that into stark relief. But we can’t improve our buildings’ air quality without knowing what the problems are.
Indoor air quality (IAQ) monitors have become indispensable for providing this data. Today’s IAQ monitors track CO2, particulates, and other indoor environmental factors that could potentially impact occupant health and wellness. And they can even help identify when HVAC systems are not working properly, leading to corrections that improve overall energy efficiency and performance.
IAQ monitors are only as good as their sensors, however, and those need to be maintained, calibrated, and replaced in order to provide accurate data. The problem is the sensors are built into the unit, so maintaining them may require sending the units back to the manufacturer. And if you want new features in your IAQ monitor, you’ll need to buy a new unit.
Kaiterra’s modular sensor system solves these problems. Available in the Sensedge and Sensedge Mini, these IAQ monitors contain sensor modules that last 12 to 18 months and can be readily replaced, much like a battery, reducing downtime, improving performance, future-proofing the device when updates become available, and reducing waste.
The Sensedge and Sensedge Mini detect fine 2.5-micron particles (PM2.5), which mostly come from burning fuels, as well as large 10-micron (PM10) particulates from dust, pollen, and other sources. They detect total volatile organic compounds (TVOC), temperature, and relative humidity. The Sensedge Mini also detects ozone. The larger Sensedge does contain a seven-inch touchscreen (Sensedge Mini does not, but the company does offer a dashboard) and more memory.
Both units connect to the Cloud and can be integrated into a wide variety of building automation systems, including Modbus and BACnet, as well as systems from Johnson, Controls, Siemens, Schneider Electric, and others. They are also certified to RESET and to the BTL (BACnet Testing Laboratories) Certification for BACnet Smart Sensor.
Why we chose this product:Lightly’s Butterfly luminaire uses natural materials in place of aluminum, steel, and plastic, and is the first commercial LED product to achieve a Declare Red List Free label for eliminating chemicals of concern.
Lightly’s luminaires have all the performance of high-end lighting and are also Red List Free.
Photo: Luxtech, LLC Lighting products have a long history of using PVC wiring along with two of the highest-embodied-carbon materials on Earth—aluminum and steel. This made sense when more structural materials were needed for incandescent and fluorescent lighting, but the evolution to LEDs opens up other material options.
Lightly has made a more sustainable commercial luminaire by replacing aluminum, steel, and plastic with local poplar, wool, and other biobased materials. The company says it has also eliminated heavy metals and uses PVC-free wiring and bio-based, zero-VOC finishes. In doing so, Lightly became the first company to earn a Declare Red List Free label for commercial lighting. And it just happens to have 50% less embodied carbon than standard products, based on the company’s environmental product declaration compared with industry baselines. To top it off, Lightly won a 2023 U.S. Department of Energy L-Prize for its sustainability and performance.
And all of this has apparently come with no performance or financial compromises. The Butterfly is low-glare and provides both direct and indirect light in color temperatures from 3000K to 4000K, with tunable white light from a warm 2700K to a cool 6500K. And it does so without sacrificing energy performance—the company claims efficacy of up to 140 lumens per watt—or light quality, with a color rendering index (CRI) of 90. The Butterfly is available in 2–8 feet individual lengths, as well as in longer continuous runs, and due to its light distribution, these luminaires can be spaced up to 16 feet apart.
As for cost, by using local materials, reducing components, and doing the finishing in-house, Lightly claims to have lower costs than standard luminaires and a nimbler manufacturing process that can reduce lead times.
Why we chose this:Maharam was the first textile manufacturer to eliminate “forever chemicals,” used as stain-resistant treatments, from its products.
Maharam was the first company to remove PFAS compounds from its textiles.
Image: courtesy Maharam Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a class of more than 10,000 “forever chemical” compounds that do not readily break down in the environment. Over the years, many of these have been used as stain-resistant treatments in countless consumer goods and building products. Along with carpet, upholstery textiles have historically been one of the biggest users of PFAS in the building industry. The early treatments contained compounds that are now considered persistent, bioaccumulative, toxic chemicals and are suspected carcinogens, endocrine disruptors, and more. Newer PFAS replacements still carry long-term, unknown health and environmental risks. The damning health data and the ubiquity of PFAS are leading to bans on the compounds in many states, but it will take years to get them out of our products entirely.
California is banning PFAS in textiles in 2025, but Maharam is ahead of the curve. In 2017, the company began lab-testing the performance of textiles treated with PFAS compounds versus those without, and over the years, found that the compounds do not work as advertised and can even make staining worse. The company found that “composition and weave structure were larger contributors to a textile’s performance.”
Maharam stopped using PFAS in January 2023, and though there could still be legacy PFAS stock, new products are PFAS-free. For this Top 10 Product award, BuildingGreen is not highlighting just one of Maharam’s products. Instead, we are honoring the company’s leadership, as shown by testing for and eliminating PFAS from all its products.
Solarcycle Advanced Solar Panel Recycling Solutions
Why we chose this product:Solarcycle recovers valuable materials from aging solar panels, providing a cost-effective, scalable solution for reducing the environmental impacts of PV manufacturing.
Solarcycle’s PV panel recycling process can recapture valuable metals and materials that can be used for the manufacture of U.S. panels.
Photo: Matthew Gough/SOLARCYCLE We are going to need renewable energy, and lots of it, to reduce our carbon emissions and the worst impacts of climate change. That means using more solar panels, most of which are made with mono- or polycrystalline PV cells that have very energy- and carbon-intensive manufacturing processes. Many of these cells are also made in the Uyghur region of China, raising environmental and social justice concerns.
PV panels have a long lifespan, but what happens to them at the end of their service life? What happens to that embodied carbon? The valuable metals? The crystalline cells? As is, there are few viable alternatives for PV disposal—a significant downside to an important technology.
Solarcycle is partnering with large solar companies to recycle old or broken PV panels. According to the company, the panels are inspected, and if they cannot be reused, they go through an automated process that removes the frame and junction box and later recovers the glass. Any remaining laminate materials are crushed, ground, and/or shredded. Solarcycle’s process recovers silica, silver, copper, and other valuable metals, and the company received a U.S. Department of Energy grant in 2023 to refine the materials for use in domestic clean-energy production. The company claims it can extract 95% of the value in a panel and return it to the domestic supply chain.
Solarcycle has only been in operation for a couple of years but it already boasts a number of large PV companies as clients. It provides these companies with data documenting the benefits of their PV recycling, which they can publish in environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reports.
Why we chose this product:Solid Carbon’s admixture reduces the embodied carbon of concrete while destroying PFAS and microplastics that would otherwise end up in our drinking water and food supplies.
Solid Carbon’s admixture lowers a concrete’s embodied carbon without impacting performance.
Photo: Solid Carbon The standard binder in concrete, portland cement, is responsible for approximately 5%–8% of the world’s anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. There are a number of ways to reduce concrete’s overall global warming potential (GWP), including the use of supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs), such as fly ash or ground granulated blast furnace slag, to replace a percentage of the cement and reduce concrete’s overall GWP. These are widespread and proven solutions, but the most common SCMs are byproducts of carbon-intensive coal power plants and blast-furnace steel production. As the power and industrial sectors have begun to decarbonize, these materials have become rarer and more expensive.
BioLock is different than other admixtures in that it is a biochar made from a waste product. Traditional biochar is typically made by burning wood or other organic matter at high temperatures in the absence of oxygen. Using the wrong biochar process can waste energy, create potentially hazardous emissions, and more.
In contrast, Solid Carbon’s process uses organic waste (biosolids) from municipal wastewater treatment. These biosolids are usually either landfilled or spread on fields as fertilizer. But when sent to a landfill, biosolids take up valuable landfill space, and as they decay, they also produce a significant amount of methane. And when used as fertilizer, many contaminants concentrated in the biosolids—such as PFAS and microplastics from our food, packaging, and consumer and building products—can find their way into the soil and our food supply.
But the process of making biosolids into biochar breaks down PFAS compounds and microplastics. And Solid Carbon’s energy-efficient, self-sustaining process meets strict San Francisco Bay Area air quality standards, according to the company.
According to BioLock’s environmental product declaration (EPD), 1,000 kg of the admixture is equivalent to –1,000 kg CO2e, a “storage” of CO2 equal to the weight of the material. The method used to create the EPD (called a product category rule, or PCR) does not allow the company to discount “avoided emissions”—the greenhouse gases that would have been emitted during decomposition if the biosolids had been taken to a landfill. Solid Carbon claims its process avoids significant emissions and therefore has a much greater climate benefit than shown in the EPD.
BioLock is available in 25-pound buckets or 1-cubic-yard supersacks that weigh 1,400 pounds.
Trane Thermal Battery Storage-Source Heat Pump System
Why we chose this product: Trane uses water-source heat pumps and ice-based thermal storage to provide all-electric heating and cooling that is effective even in cold climates.
This rendering shows a possible installation of Trane’S SSHP system, where the system’s use of thermal energy storage tanks increases the usefulness of TES as well as the air-to-water heat pumps.
Rendering: Trane
Heat pumps and batteries have become synonymous with our move away from burning fossil fuels and toward all-electric buildings. But heat pumps are not as effective in cold climates and can be too large for dense urban areas. And lithium-ion batteries are expensive, have safety concerns, and are not readily compatible with commercial HVAC systems.
Another way to store energy in buildings is in the form of ice. When ice is made during off-peak hours, its cooling capacity can be used when needed during the day. This is the basis of Calmac’s thermal energy storage (TES) system. Trane is now using TES to optimize the performance of its heat pump systems so the stored energy can be used efficiently for heating and cooling in the most extreme climates. The system can do so because it isn’t really the ice itself providing the energy: it’s the phase change from water to a solid and back.
In other words, these heat pumps cleverly exploit the laws of physics. It takes 1 Btu to raise a pound of water 1°F, but it takes 144 Btu/lb. to change ice from a solid to a liquid at 32°F. At the moment when ice is changing into liquid water, it is effectively storing all that “latent” energy—so that one 1,655-gallon Calmac Ice Bank tank can store almost two million Btu (8.34 pounds to the gallon x 1,655 gallons = 13,812 pounds x 144 Btu = 1,987,589 Btu).
Tracer Controls that optimize the performance of the system
The engineering of the system is complex (see a detailed explanation in our product review), but the gist is that Trane’s SSHP is a reliable design that can optimize the performance of the heat pumps used to move energy into and through the building. And this is true even when outdoor temperatures drop well below 0°F and standard heat pumps struggle.
Why we chose this product:Volvo’s electric construction machines greatly improve conditions for jobsite workers and nearby communities while also reducing carbon emissions.
Volvo’s fleet of electric construction equipment can lower a job’s carbon footprint while exposing workers to less noise and pollution.
Photo: Volvo Construction Equipment The carbon impact from construction is significant. Much of this comes from the construction equipment used on the jobsite. These machines can burn 2.5 to 10 gallons of diesel fuel an hour when active and 1 gallon per hour when idling—and the latter can account for up to 40% of the operating time in jurisdictions with no anti-idling laws or enforcement.
Even putting fuel waste and greenhouse gas emissions aside, the diesel fumes emitted from these machines can contain particulates, benzene, formaldehyde, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), nitrogen oxides, and more. And the machines are noisy, which also negatively impacts workers, as well as the areas surrounding construction sites—especially hospitals, schools, and residential areas. In some places, noise ordinances limit the hours the equipment can operate, extending construction schedules.
Volvo CE is now offering six electric construction machines that operate on lithium-ion batteries. These include compact excavators (models ECR18, EC18, and ECR25), compact wheel loaders (models L20 and L25), and a double-drum asphalt compactor (model DD25). According to the company, these machines offer comparable performance to their fossil-fuel-powered brethren and can, in some cases, even offer better performance in the form of instant torque.
Charging is often a challenge with electric equipment. These machines can run between four and eight hours, depending on how hard the use is. They can be charged with a standard 120V system, a 240-volt, 32-amp, Level 2 AC-charging setup, and an SAE J1772 charging adapter or J plug. With a DC fast charger, recharging can be cut to 45 to 90 minutes, depending on the machine.
Because of charging downtime, electric equipment might not be the best fit for a 24-hour construction site, but for the right jobs or where charging can be managed, they offer benefits beyond zero onsite carbon emissions.
Electric equipment is very quiet and vibration-free, which, according to the company, is less fatiguing for workers and improves their working conditions. The quiet operation also allows the equipment to be used in densely populated areas, at night, and where there are other noise restrictions.
In addition, although they are more expensive than diesel versions, Volvo’s electric machines require less maintenance and do not idle, saving wear on the equipment and money over time.
Why we chose this product: Products from Washbox Global are used to clean construction tools on the jobsite, recycling the water and minimizing watershed pollution.
The Washbox tool washing station is portable, saves water, and reduces pollution. And it does not require a plumbing hookup.
Photo: Washbox Global Masons, bricklayers, tile setters, painters, and other jobsite employees who have to clean their tools are at the mercy of whatever water source is available at the construction site. In some cases, sinks are in fixed locations, so tradespeople have to take time to schlep their tools across the site to clean off paint, grout, and other materials in potable water. The waste then drains into sewer systems (or, in some cases, stormwater systems) and ends up in the watershed. With heavy use, the plumbing on these cleaning systems can clog, causing more delays and inconvenience.
Washbox is a mobile tool-washing station that does not require a water hookup—though it does need power from a standard wall outlet to drive the pump. The Washbox is filled with water and then operates as a closed loop, filtering and recycling that water, and collecting the waste solids rinsed off by the various tradespeople. These solids are then collected so they can be disposed of responsibly.
According to the company, Washbox almost “eliminates the use of water for the task and completely eliminates the generation and discharge of liquid waste.”
Here’s how it works:
A bottom tank is filled with clean water.
A hose connects this tank to a sprayer at the top of the machine, which is used to wash the equipment.
The dirty water drains into a top tank where the water and solids are collected.
This feeds into a recycling system that separates out the solids and sends the water through filtration.
The clean water then flows back into the tank.
A green light turns on, letting users know the system is ready for the next person.
There are two models. The 200T Series is on a trolley and is small enough to be pushed through standard doorways by one person. According to the company, these are best used for smaller jobs such as office fit-outs or refurbishments, or on construction sites where “tight-access equipment is required.” The 500P Series is mounted on a pallet and moved by a forklift or pallet jack. It can be used by around 40 tradespeople, according to the company.
Ehrlich, B. (2024, January 9). BuildingGreen Announces Top 10 Products for 2024. Retrieved from https://www.buildinggreen.com/product-review/buildinggreen-announces-top-10-products-2024
I especially love the Trane thermal batteries. I've always thought of the heat pump as the niftiest trick of physics.
Sadly, Solarcycle doesn't appear to be recycling the silicon wafers themselves; this is a start, but more is needed.
I'd like to add one to your list: TimberHP. While wood fiber insulation isn't a new concept (um, Gutex?), it's nice to see it being done finally in the US, and in a recycled paper mill as well. And in board, batt and fill forms.
Things I'm longing to see: lithium ion battery recycling; US manufacturers making Passive House quality windows (we only have 2 companies making PH windows, and none of the big players (Andersen, Pella, Marvin, etc.) has stepped up. Shame on them.)
TimberHP was so last year! Haha. I believe several years ago there was also a battery company we gave a Top 10 for reusing (not recycling) EV batteries. I'll check in with Brent on that one. If you're open to non-Li tech, check out Salient, also from last year's bunch.
Brent wrote full product reviews on TimberHP and Salient as well.
Thanks for the feedback and insights, Caleb. For sure, solar cells and batteries are tricky to recycle (unless you are using lead, of course, but that's another issue!). SolarCycle is a good start in terms of PV, but it is just a start. Hopefully they can scale up and refine their processes. The end of life mineral extraction/recycling is going to take some time to figure out, especially with all the new technologies and composite materials that need to be separated. Geesh, we can barely manage single-use PET bottles.
As for high-performance windows and doors, those have always been tricky product categories, especailly for more "mainstream" manufacturers. We gave Marvin a Top 10 back in 2015 when they launched a PH window, but that product did not survive. Cost and demand seem to be the big problems, per usual. More affordable high-performance windows are almost always vinyl, and that is a non-starter for many. And PH exterior doors to go with those windows? For those, you need robust structures, multi-pt lock mechanisms, bank-vault thickness, and specialized installation to keep them from warping and losing their seal in cold temps. That combo drives up costs beyond the capabilities of most standard U.S. homebuilders. Maybe we need to change what "standard" means and figure out a way to pay for it! If there was more demand for PH in the US, someone would fill that niche and maybe prices would drop accordingly.
Over the years we've watched the launch of many great green building products, including LEDs, formaldehyde-free insulation, CO2-based heat pumps, and more. As you noted, this year Trane took the older concept of thermal energy storage and brought it squarely into the age of electrification. And TimberHP? We followed them for years behind the scenes as they worked to get their plant up and running. Great success stories.
But many great products and ideas have not seen this success, and that brings me to the rant-ish portion of this response (not directed at Caleb, of course!). The green building community is great at asking for products but less good at actually buying them and getting them installed. VE, owners, inertia, unfamiliarity, long-term performance questions, apathy, genuinely outrageous niche pricing...there are a lot of possible reasons. But if we want change, we need to work with the manufacturers trying to make it happen, and we are going to have to choose not to buy dirt cheap LVT and other similar race-to-the-bottom products. It's a tough challenge as many are tightening their purse strings.
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