BuildingGreen Report

Product Review

October 1, 2001
The importance of a good track-off entryway system cannot be overemphasized (see feature article, page 1). Even better, from a green building standpoint, is when the entryway products are themselves green by virtue of their composition. In the commercial entryway track-off area, Arden Architectural Specialties, Inc. offers just such a product:... Read more

News Analysis

October 1, 2001

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

Op-Ed

October 1, 2001
EBN

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

Product Review

October 1, 2001

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

October 1, 2001

Edited by Lynne Elizabeth and Cassandra

Adams, 2000. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

New York. Hardcover, 392 pages, $70.

Alternative Construction provides a

terrific 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

October 1, 2001
Just about 20 years ago, a young, innovative Chicago-area home builder named Perry Bigelow came up with the idea of really putting his money where his mouth was: he

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

October 1, 2001

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

News Analysis

October 1, 2001

At the August 2001 National Hardware Show in Chicago the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) introduced the latest Energy Star®-labeled product: residential ceiling fans. Working closely with the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Ecos Consulting, and the residential fan industry, EPA developed airflow efficiency, controls, and... Read more

Feature

Walk-off mats are a critical line of defense for indoor air. 

October 1, 2001

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

September 1, 2001
DuPont Tyvek® Weatherization Systems has introduced a new component called FlexWrap®. FlexWrap is an 8”-wide (200 mm), door and window flashing product made up of a highly adhesive, self-sealing butyl layer and a surface layer of the polyolefin Tyvek material. The main advantage of FlexWrap is its malleability—it can be easily formed to cover all... Read more

News Brief

September 1, 2001

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

September 1, 2001
Over the years,

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

September 1, 2001

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

Product Review

September 1, 2001
Wausau Tile has just begun producing a new line of terrazzo tile products using recycled glass instead of stone chips. Terrazzo is usually made from a mix of cement and stone. Prior efforts to substitute recycled glass for some of the stone have not been successful because a chemical reaction (the alkali-silica reaction or ASR) weakens the... Read more

Op-Ed

September 1, 2001

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

News Brief

September 1, 2001

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

September 1, 2001
Rick Fedrizzi, founding chairman of the U.S. Green Building Council, has left his position as Director of Communications and Environmental Affairs for Carrier Corporation to form a consulting firm,

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

News Analysis

September 1, 2001
Table 1. Measured Standby Loads

Source: “Whole-House Measurements of Standby Power Consumption” by J. P. Ross and Alan Meier, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Report LBNL-45967, 2000.

On July 31, President George W. Bush signed an Executive Order requiring Federal agencies to purchase electronic equipment with very low standby... Read more

News Brief

September 1, 2001

A new report from the nongovernmental organization

Fern identifies the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) as the only independent and credible forest certification program. Three other major programs—the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI), the Canadian Standards Association’s Sustainable Forest Management Standard (CSA), and the Pan-... Read more

Product Review

September 1, 2001
Update: (July 28, 2006)

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 more