News Analysis
At its August 19, 2001 meeting the Board of the U.S. Green Building Council voted unanimously to set a new course for updates to the LEED™ Rating System. “What we realized is that we’re overwhelmed by LEED’s popularity,” said LEED co-chair Rob Watson of the Natural Resources Defense Council. “We wanted to ensure that LEED has a really solid... Read more
Op-Ed
mourns the loss of friend and green building champion David Kibbey, of Berkeley, California, who died on August 9, 2001 after a long battle with cancer. A native of Vermont, Kibbey was an artist, craftsman, scientist, and counselor. He designed and built beautiful spaces, edited the
Architectural Resource Guide product directory,... Read more
News Brief
CD-ROM of 46 technical papers, 2001. Send a check (made out to “Tides Center/Ecological Building Network”) to: Bruce King, Ecological Building Network, 209 Caledonia Street, Sausalito, CA 94965. Price: $70 + $10 shipping
The First International Conference on Ecological Building Structure, held July 5-9, 2001 in San Rafael, California,... Read moreProduct Review
News Analysis
When we reported in
EBN
Vol. 10, No. 4 that annual energy use in the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection’s recently constructed Cambria office building was coming in at 62,300 kWh, or $0.18/ft2 ($1.94/m2), we noted that this seemed too good to be true. Alas, this suspicion has been borne out. The incorrect energy... Read more
Product Review
Arsenic has taken a big hit recently—from studies showing elevated levels in school playgrounds in Florida to public outcry about President Bush’s decision to relax drinking water standards for the element. Not surprisingly, product manufacturers are getting the message. In the July/August issue of
EBN (
Vol. 10, No. 7/8) we... Read more
News Brief
Edited by Lynne Elizabeth and Cassandra
Adams, 2000. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
New York. Hardcover, 392 pages, $70.
Alternative Construction provides aterrific overview of various methods
for building with earth, straw, and
bamboo. With writings from over 30
authors—many of them experts or
... Read more
News Analysis
guaranteed that every one of his homes would have annual heating costs less than $100. “My competitors just tore us up over this, claiming it must be bogus because it just could not... Read more
News Brief
A $150,000 grant from the U.S. EPA is funding research by the New Buildings Institute (NBI) of White Salmon, Washington, to
assess actual energy use of newly constructed buildings. NBI will work with subcontractors Eley Associates of San Francisco and Architectural Energy Corporation of Boulder, Colorado on the project. Using the Energy... Read more
Feature
Walk-off mats are a critical line of defense for indoor air.
The indoor air quality mantra “ Eliminate, Isolate, Ventilate” describes a sound framework for ensuring safe indoor environments. In the first of these strategies, we tend to focus on the materials and products used in construction—specifying low-VOC paints, choosing formaldehyde-free wood products, perhaps avoiding mineral fiber insulation... Read more
Product Review
To the best of our knowledge, this product is no longer available.
Just when we thought emergency exit sign illumination had reached an unbeatable low-energy plateau with LED (light-emitting diode) technology, we learn of a quite different technology offering even greater energy savings and some performance... Read moreNews Brief
a 113 kW photovoltaic carport that will shade 152 parking spaces at Riverside, California’s Public Utilities Operations Center. A total of 2,016 modules, each generating 75 W, will be mounted in two rows on the structure, which is slated for completion by November.
Product Review
News Brief
The Home Builders Association of Metro Denver and the Colorado Association of Home Builders have developed a
Built Green Communities rating program. Designed to work with their newly upgraded Built Green checklist for homes, the green communities program was developed by a diverse working group including local planning experts,... Read more
Op-Ed
EBN has often touched on building regulation, but we’ve never done a feature article on building codes. Given the influence of building codes on the environmental performance of building, the topic is overdue. For this month’s feature, we team up with long-time
EBN friend and supporter, David Eisenberg, who recently... Read more
News Brief
Everyone has a great way for taxpayers to spend their tax rebate checks, including the Lowe’s and Home Depot home improvement centers. Both now describe
energy-efficient home improvement projects for under $300 and under $600 starting right on the home pages of their Web sites. But Home Depot goes a step further: “There’s no need to go... Read more
Op-Ed
Version 5.0 of our acclaimed
EBN Archives is now shipping! This single CD-ROM includes all issues of
Environmental Building News—from 1992 through 2000. A total of 67 issues (1,200 pages) are available in easy-to-use Adobe Acrobat PDF format. The
Archives are fully searchable and provide instant access to all articles... Read more
Product Review
News Brief
A recent study by the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources investigated the feasibility of
deconstructing mobile homes for salvage. The study was prompted by an unexpected waste disposal crisis—a group of condemned, flash-flooded, mobile homes. A surprising underground market for mobile home windows, fixtures, and chassis was discovered... Read more
News Brief
Green-Think. Fedrizzi will continue to work as a consultant for Carrier’s parent company, United Technologies Corporation, on a variety of product... Read more





