While U.S. factory shipments were lower in 2007 than 2006 for nearly all residential appliances, according to the March 2008 issue of

Appliance magazine, factory shipments of unvented gas room heaters increased 43% during this period—from about 197,000 to 281,000 units. Dehumidifier shipments also increased significantly (38%), while... Read more

EBN

Vol. 15, No. 7). EPA now plans to extend the label to whole houses using specifications that will be finalized by the end of 2008. Draft... Read more

Forests in the U.S. are currently certified using one... Read more

In 2005, the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) accredited the Green Building Initiative (GBI) as a standards developer, and GBI began working to turn its green building rating system, Green Globes, into an ANSI-accredited standard (see

EBN

Vol. 14, No. 11). A draft of that standard, known as the GBI Proposed American... Read more

Recognizing the durability benefits of green buildings, insurance company Fireman’s Fund began offering green rebuilding policies for commercial properties in 2006. These policies cover the cost premium for adding green features when a building is repaired or replaced. Covered upgrades include efficient lighting and plumbing, vegetated roofs,... Read more

If you wanted to know about all the environmental impacts of a product, common sense suggests that you would have to trace that product from the origins of its raw materials, through its manufacture and use, and finally to its fate at the end of its useful life. That’s the premise behind environmental life-cycle assessment (LCA)—a science that... Read more

On May 19, 2008, the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) opened a public comment period for the most sweeping changes to its LEED Rating System since its original launch in 2000. The changes, which apply to all nonresidential LEED rating systems that have been formally released, are largely in line with the plan that USGBC laid out at the 2007... Read more

Air leaks may not be as dramatic as water leaks, but they cause plenty of problems. When a new LEED-certified building in New York formed icicles and ice dams, the owners brought in building-science consultant Terry Brennan of Camroden Associates to investigate. “The detailing of the air barrier was actually pretty good,” he says. The rafters... Read more

While the LEED for Homes rating system from the U.S. Green Building Council has garnered a lot of attention since its 2007 launch (see

EBN Vol. 16, No. 12), a less complex and comprehensive rating system, the HERS Index, has quietly been applied to hundreds of thousands of homes and is referenced by a growing number of programs.

Does wind power increase carbon emissions? That was the question I asked in a recent post after seeing a analysis by Stanley Rhodes of Scientific Certification Systems, a major testing and certification agency for green building products, among other things. Stanley, who is a respected expert on life-cycle assessment, looked beyond the carbon... Read more

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I have a huge amount of appreciation and respect for (and some jealousy of) people plying artisan trades, and had a couple good conversations with AIA'08 exhibitors offering that sort of thing. John Canning & Company goes beyond artisan; check out the featured projects on their website. In my capacity as poster boy for the A Little... Read more