BuildingGreen Report

News Brief

November 1, 2001
Architects Chetwood Associates recently received the

Design Sense 2001 award of £40,000 for their work on Sainsbury’s supermarket on the Greenwich Peninsula. The Studio eg Ecowork furniture line (see

EBN

Vol. 9, No. 9) was recognized in the same September 26, 2001 program with the

Corporate Prize for Sustainable Design.... Read more

News Analysis

November 1, 2001
Effective October 8, 2001, businesses in Oregon can get a tax credit for buildings that achieve a Silver rating or higher under the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED™ Rating System. These substantial tax credits, amounting to as much as $142,900 for a 10,000 ft2 (930 m2) Platinum-rated project (see table), “should be enough to pay extra initial... Read more

Op-Ed

November 1, 2001

Our recent spurt in production at BuildingGreen—new editions of

GreenSpec,

EBN Archives and

Green Building Advisor—has brought home a message that we often convey to others: being environmentally responsible can be a challenge.

Tackling any project, whether designing and building a structure or publishing a 368-page... Read more

News Brief

November 1, 2001

Entries are due by December 1 for the

National Green Building Awards to be given at the 2002 National Green Building Conference, March 24–26 in Seattle. Award categories include: Green Advocate; Green Project of the Year—New Home; Green Marketing; Green Building Program of the Year; and Outstanding Green Product. For details, contact... Read more

News Brief

November 1, 2001

by David Pearson. Gaia Books Ltd. and Chelsea Green Publishing Company, 2001. Hardcover, 95 pages, $16.95.

At once playful and elegant,

Treehouses features arboreal residences from all over the world in a wide range of styles, scales, and levels. Some of these homes shelter activists who have taken up permanent residence in a tree in the... Read more

News Brief

November 1, 2001

Following 10 years of often-rancorous debate, California Governor Gray Davis on October 9 signed into law a bill that requires builders of large subdivisions to demonstrate that there will be

adequate water supplies for the development. The new law prohibits cities and counties from issuing permits to projects with 500 or more homes... Read more

Product Review

November 1, 2001
Whirlpool Corporation, which manufactures half of all residential clothes washers sold in the U.S. and is the world’s largest manufacturer of major home appliances, was slow to join other manufacturers with water- and energy-saving clothes washers. But during 2001 the company introduced two entire lines of efficient washers. In February, the... Read more

Product Review

November 1, 2001
In the classic

Gypsum Construction Handbook (see page 145 in the 90th anniversary edition), there is a completely impractical detail for depressing and subsequently hiding wallboard butt joints. But in the head and hands of a craftsman, this detail has been transformed into the ButtHanger, an elegant (despite the name) materials and labor-... Read more

News Analysis

November 1, 2001
Several companies that emerged over the past five years to produce particleboard and medium-density fiberboard from straw have had a rough go of it. One of the largest—Elie, Manitoba-based Isobord Enterprises—was in receivership when the assets were bought by Dow Chemical Canada in the Spring of this year. As supplier of the MDI resin to Isobord,... Read more

News Brief

November 1, 2001

The New York State Energy Research and Development Authority released two

Program Opportunity Notices announcing nearly $2 million in funding for high efficiency lighting products and demonstrations (PON 629-01, $1.2 million) and heating and cooling (PON 649-01, $750,000). Proposals for both are due in late November. Details are... Read more

Feature

These roofs are not just green, they're alive.

November 1, 2001

 

Mayor Richard Daley saw his first planted roofs several years ago while visiting Chicago’s sister city of Hamburg, Germany. At the same time, he was learning about urban heat islands (in which our urban areas maintain temperatures considerably higher than surrounding suburban and rural areas). He was particularly attuned to the urban... Read more

News Analysis

October 1, 2001
The benefits of gypsum (CaSO4 · 2H2O) as a soil amendment are well established: gypsum improves soil tilth, particularly in clayey soils, and effectively displaces the sodium in soils that have high salt content. Research has shown that applying ground-up scrap gypsum board gives the same benefits as agricultural-grade gypsum at rates of up to 22... Read more

News Analysis

October 1, 2001
The most common gas fill in high-performance windows is argon. One problem with this odorless, colorless, chemically inert gas is the difficulty of detecting it. The folks that make—and for that matter, evaluate—high-performance windows have long sought a nondestructive method for determining the gas fill content of sealed insulated glazing units... Read more

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

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

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

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

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 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

The tragedies of September 11th are almost too horrible to comprehend. We were fortunate at

EBN that no close friends or family members were killed or injured at the World Trade Center or the Pentagon. Our staff joins the millions around this country and the world in mourning the loss of life that occurred that day. We hope and pray... Read more