The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has launched the EnergySmart Hospitals program, with the goal of reducing the energy use of hospitals by 20% in existing buildings and 30% in new buildings, relative to current standards. The program has similar goals to the Energy Star for Healthcare program administered by the U.S. Environmental Protection... Read more

One of a handful of laws in the U.S. requiring private buildings to meet LEED standards, legislation passed in 2006 in Washington, D.C., may be unenforceable as currently written. According to the Washington Business Journal, the D.C. Department of Environment is working to address a complaint from the surety industry, which issues bonds that... Read more

In last week's column I examined a fairly unusual local power source: the Northfield Mountain pumped hydropower system, which is used for "storing" electricity--by pumping water uphill. This week we'll take a look at a very different power-generation system that's even closer to home: the landfill gas power plant at the Windham Solid... Read more

whir... whir... whir.. whir... CLUNK! It finally worked... after decades of catching nothing but birds and bats, while making a small amount of electricity as a byproduct, the international effort to catch a UFO netted its first victim. A wind turbine in England lost one of its rotors last week in a nighttime incident with no clear cause, on... Read more

Last weekend, looking for someplace new to explore, my wife and I drove down to Northfield, Massachusetts, to check out the cross-country ski center. The skiing was great, and it occurred to me that readers of this column might be interested in learning about the pumped-hydro power plant on the mountain--the ski center was created as... Read more

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Light-emitting diodes, better known as LEDs, are all around us--those little red or green indicator lights that blink at us from our stereo equipment, most new traffic signals, and virtually all new exit signs in commercial buildings. And if you've been to Times Square recently, you've seen way too many LEDs... Read more

One of several builders in the development, Vanguard chose to go above and beyond the... Read more

TimberSIL, the sodium-silicate-based “glass-wood fusion” alternative to preservative-treated lumber, has overcome some hurdles since we reviewed it in 2004 (see

EBN

Vol. 13, No. 10).

As part of its management of the Clean Water Act, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has proposed national stormwater guidelines for construction sites. Under the proposed regulations, all construction sites would be required to implement erosion and sediment-control best practices. In addition, construction projects disturbing over... Read more

A recent survey of 30,000 facility managers, designed and analyzed by Peter Kimmel, AIA, and funded by the online publication FMLink, found that an increasing number are engaged in energy auditing and re-commissioning. Their efforts resulted in an average 5%–10% energy savings from 2006 to 2008, with the most effective changes being inexpensive... Read more

The dramatic energy savings reported for compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) over conventional incandescents typically do not take into account the impact on space heating and cooling energy.

The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has announced that Rebecca Flora will replace Peter Templeton as its senior vice president of education and research.

Flora leaves her post as the executive director of the Green Building Alliance in Pittsburgh and ends her tenure as chair of the USGBC Board of Directors; she begins her new... Read more

Extending its mission of product safety from people to the environment, Underwriters Laboratories (UL) will offer manufacturers two new programs to test and certify environmental product claims. Set to launch in January 2009, the Environmental Claims Validation (ECV) program will test and assess environmental product claims, and a second... Read more

A number of utilities across the country are moving to peak power pricing that gives lower rates to consumers using electricity during off-peak hours. General Electric (GE) is developing appliances that can automatically take advantage of those policies.