A spokesperson for San Francisco’s Department of Environment confirmed that chances were very good that legislation would be enacted to formalize recommendations put forth in a June 2007 report by the Mayor’s Task Force on Green Building. Following the proposed recommendations, large commercial and high-rise residential buildings, both new and... Read more

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is currently drafting a new specification for home plans called Designed to Earn Energy Star. EPA expects to complete the specification by the end of 2007, after two rounds of comments from stakeholders. The current version of the specification requires home plans to be accompanied by information... Read more

In July 2007 the New Buildings Institute (NBI) released its Advanced Buildings

Core Performance Guide. The guide describes a series of energy-efficiency measures, selected by NBI using a comprehensive energy-modeling exercise, as the most cost-effective ways to achieve 20%–30% energy savings in buildings throughout the U.S. This guide... Read more

In a July 16, 2007 ruling for the LEED for Commercial Interiors Rating System, the U.S. Green Building Council endorsed the use of carbon-neutral products to achieve an innovation point. Both the original query, which was submitted in June of 2006, and the eventual ruling contain extensive qualifications and restrictions on this path to an... Read more

McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry (MDBC) has released a draft of the version two criteria for its Cradle to Cradle (C2C) product certification program. The most significant changes to C2C, which certifies an array of consumer and building products based on MBDC’s environmental philosophy, are a new “Basic” level of certification and... Read more

In Alex Wilson’s editorial in the June 2007 issue [

EBN Vol. 16, No. 6], he was careful to point out that “the

heat source in nuclear power plants does not emit greenhouse gases” (my emphasis). This simplification distorts the true emissions picture, as shown in an analysis performed by Jan Willem Storm van Leeuwen and Philip... Read more

A report released in June 2007 details plans to move the U.S. House of Representatives to carbon-neutral operation by the end of 2008, to reduce energy consumption in House facilities by 50% from 2006 levels by 2017, and to “make House operations a model of sustainability.” The initiative, headed by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D–CA) and Majority... Read more

The Royal Institute of British Architects USA (RIBA–USA) has announced the winners of its international design competition “Building a Sustainable World: Life in the Balance.” The competition asked entrants to conceive self-sustaining communities that respond to the challenges of global climate change (see

EBN

Vol. 15, No. 9).... Read more

Fear of infection is hardly a new phenomenon, but it seems to have risen to a fever pitch in recent years. Modern medicine appeared to have all but conquered infectious disease decades ago—but in the last three decades our society’s confidence in that victory has unraveled. Diseases like AIDS, anthrax, “mad cow disease,” severe acute... Read more

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The Partnership for Advancing Technology in Housing (PATH), a program administered by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, has... Read more

At its annual convention in Baltimore, Maryland, in June 2007, the Construction Specifications Institute (CSI) announced its forthcoming GreenFormat product data-reporting tool. GreenFormat is a Web-based questionnaire and product listing service that manufacturers can use to report on environmental aspects of their products. BuildingGreen, Inc... Read more

For the second time, the Holcim Awards, sponsored by the Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction, are open to entries (see

EBN

Vol. 15, No. 8). The awards recognize projects that meet housing and infrastructure needs without harming future generations. Projects are eligible for the competition if construction had not... Read more

The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) announced in June 2007 its intention to commit $1 million to green building research, including areas such as human health and productivity, climate change mitigation, the business case for green building, and passive survivability. The structure and schedule for funding by USGBC have not been determined... Read more

Just as President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal led America out of the Great Depression in our grandparent’s day, a dramatic set of initiatives will be required if we are to prevent the Great Warming. Many have argued for something akin to the Apollo Project to carry out the research and development needed to advance low-cost renewable energy... Read more

The Western Regional Climate Action Initiative, started in February 2007, continues to grow. Created by five states—Arizona, California, New Mexico, Oregon, and Washington—the alliance grew to include Utah and, recently, the Canadian provinces of British Columbia and Manitoba. The initiative requires the signatory states to work together to... Read more

The Clinton Climate Initiative (CCI) will undertake a global project to encourage retrofitting buildings with energy-efficient technologies, former President Bill Clinton announced in May 2007. The program brings together several energy service companies and banks to help initiate and finance retrofit programs in 15 cities around the world,... Read more

ASTM International has published a new standard for investigations of indoor air quality problems in residential buildings. Standard D-7297 contains guidelines for an initial assessment of possible indoor air quality problems and a subsequent three-phase process for finding the sources of any problems. A first-phase walk through the house is... Read more

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Underfloor air distribution (UFAD) is an approach to ventilation in commercial and institutional buildings in which conditioned air is distributed... Read more

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Those who remember the 1970s houses with two parallel exterior walls and an airspace between them circulating solar heat around the house may be doing... Read more

Members of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) approved a measure that effectively increases the minimum energy performance of LEED-certified projects by 14% for new buildings and 7% for major renovations. Introduced in November 2006, the measure requires all projects to obtain a minimum two out of ten points in the energy optimization... Read more