Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are persistent, bioaccumulative chemicals that can cause both acute and chronic health problems in humans and may cause cancer; their production was banned in the U.S. in the 1970s. Most studies have focused on how these chemicals enter the human body through the food chain, but a new study published in the... Read more

EBN

Vol. 15,... Read more

Your article “Behind the Logos: Understanding Green Product Certifications” [see EBN Vol. 17, No. 1] does a good job cataloguing the certifications available for green building. However, I would like to clarify a few points related to forest certification and specifically the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI) program.

In addition to... Read more

I was glad that my employer, BuildingGreen, picked up the cost of my... Read more

The braking mechanism on a large wind turbine failed in high winds (the second such occurrence in Denmark last week), leading to the spectacular failure in this video clip. There has been a rash of reported breakdowns in the last two months of turbines manufactured by Vestas, which has a 28% market share and 33,500 units deployed worldwide,... Read more

The title of this post is taken from a question we received about the source of recycled rubber used for a parking-bumper and speed-bump manufacturer. It motivated me to do some digging to get a better understanding of the scrap tire industry. As it turns out, it's actually kind of fascinating. The following is unverified single-pass research,... Read more

Jerelyn Wilson — who has the inadequate title of "Outreach Director" for BuildingGreen — came down the hall and into my office a few minutes ago, bright-eyed and holding the current issue of YES! magazine in front of her, folded open. "Have you seen this?!" she asked, holding it out for me:

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I tagged along with Tristan Korthals Altes, top-notch managing editor of Environmental Building News, on an interview with a global distributor of carbon nanotubes who just happens to be located in our little Vermont town. Tristan's working on a feature story on nano technology for the newsletter, and it's shaping up to be quite something to... Read more

The tech folks here at BuildingGreen just rolled out some great website improvements. A few are invisible ones of the sort that quietly improve the experience... but very visibly and most significantly (in my opinion), the News page — which is available by clicking the "News" button near the upper right of each page on the site — has been... Read more

As a follow-on to the previous post, representatives from BuildingGreen are scheduled to attend the following conferences this year: Better Buildings by Design Burlington, VT

February 13-14, 2008 International Builders Show Orlando

February 13-16, 2008 Building Energy 08 Boston

March 12-13, 2008 Living Future 08 ... Read more

Twice each month, BuildingGreen publishes an email news bulletin with current news and product information briefs. Sign up here — it's free. We will never share or sell your email address, and you may unsubscribe at any time.

The GreenSpec review team has been debating the relative environmental merits of steel cabinets as compared to other alternatives. (GreenSpec is reserved for the very top green products — and within that top few percent, those products that rise above the rest.) Generally speaking, the up-side is that steel cabinets don't support mold; are low... Read more

In November 2007, the Research Committee of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) released A National Green Building Research Agenda, in which it set priorities for green building research and called for funding of this research. (BuildingGreen's Alex Wilson is a member of this committee.) The agenda outlined four major areas of research:... Read more