On November 8, 2005, Scientific Certification Systems, Inc., of Emeryville, California launched its Indoor Advantage program, which appears aimed to compete directly with Greenguard® (see EBN

Vol. 12, No. 10) in certifying products and materials for their low indoor air emissions. The program includes two levels: Indoor Advantage™ and... Read more

Designing a Sustainable and Secure World Awards, presented by Global Green USA, the U.S. arm of Green Cross International. The

Hearst Corporation was recognized in the “green building design” category for commissioning the... Read more

In an announcement that sent shockwaves through the green building industry, the Dow Chemical Company announced on November 15, 2005, that Dow BioProducts, a division of Dow Canada, is shutting down. The Dow BioProducts plant in Elie, Manitoba, will stop producing its Woodstalk™ brand of products on December 8, according to Myra Dunn, the... Read more

Winners of the second Excellence in Sustainable Design and Development Awards were announced in October 2005 during the Integrated Design/Integrated Development (IDID) Conference, held in Crawford Notch, New Hampshire. The winners were the

NRG Systems Offices and Manufacturing Facility in Hinesburg, Vermont, designed by William Maclay... Read more

Hurricane Katrina and a long list of other natural disasters over the years—from the Northeast’s Blizzard of 1978 that killed 17 people and left tens of thousands of people without heat and water, to the Chicago heat wave that killed more than 700 people during a one-week period in 1995, to the January 1998 ice storm in Eastern Canada that... Read more

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) codified new efficiency standards for residential appliances and commercial equipment that were established by the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (see

EBN

Vol. 14, No. 9). New requirements for small products, such as exit signs, take effect in 2006; requirements for larger appliances, such as... Read more

The Public Utility Commission of Nevada recently approved Solargenix Energy’s amendments to power purchase agreements with Nevada Power Company and Sierra Pacific Power Company, clearing the way for Solargenix to complete the development of Nevada Solar One, the third-largest solar power plant in the world and the largest solar-electric power... Read more

Sustainable Hotel Siting, Design, and Construction

, published by Conservation International and the International Business Leaders Forum, is intended to help the travel and leisure industry build more environmentally friendly hotels. The book was produced with the support of nine of the world’s leading hotel chains, including Hilton,... Read more

BuildingGreen, Inc., publisher of the GreenSpec®Directory and Environmental Building News™, announced the fourth annual Top-10 Green Building Products during the U.S. Green Building Council’s Greenbuild Conference and Expo in November. The Top-10 represent the most exciting products added to GreenSpec in the past year. A press release about... Read more

EBN

Vol. 13, No. 8 for winners of the first competition). All prototypes had to meet... Read more

The International Code Council (ICC), an organization focused on building safety and fire prevention, disappointed the green building community when it voted in late September 2005 not to adopt member-ratified changes to the 2004 International Energy Conservation Code (IECC) that would have strengthened standards for wall insulation. The... Read more

A September 2005 report from New Ecology, Inc., and Tellus Institute demonstrates that green affordable housing is more cost-effective than conventional affordable housing. The report,

Costs and Benefits of Green Affordable Housing, features case studies of 16 green affordable housing projects around the country and lays out the long-... Read more

DuPont and Tate & Lyle have begun construction on a $100 million plant in Loudon, Tennessee, that will convert corn into 1,3 propanediol (PDO). The product, also known as Bio-PDO™, will replace petroleum-based PDO in the production of Sonora®, DuPont’s newest polymer, used in clothing, carpeting, plastics, and other products. The production... Read more

The National Association of Industrial and Office Properties (NAIOP), the world’s leading organization representing commercial real estate executives, has awarded its first Green Development Award to Corporate Office Properties Trust (COPT) for a 125,000 ft2 (11,600 m2) office building in Annapolis Junction, Maryland. The award was developed in... Read more

The Fusiotherm® and Faser® lines of polypropylene pipe and pipe fittings made by Aquatherm Piping Systems, LLC, were awarded ESR 1613 listing by the International Code Council (ICC) in September 2005. This listing, according to Aquatherm’s Jim Brock, certifies that Aquatherm pipe and fittings meet all of the relevant plumbing codes. The... Read more

In what it describes as the most ambitious energy conservation campaign in U.S. history, the California Public Utilities Commission in September 2005 authorized $2 billion in funding over the next three years for energy efficiency and conservation. The program’s provisions include financing strategies, online energy audits, and consumer rebates... Read more