Carrier Corporation is the only building products manufacturer to receive a 1994 Stratospheric Ozone Protection Award from the U.S. EPA. Carrier won the award for developing the first residential central air-conditioner to run on a chlorine-free refrigerant, HFC-134a (a hydrofluorocarbon). The company was simultaneously cited for its new... Read more

Strikes Back

To the best of our knowledge, this product is no longer available.

A new efficiency record has been set for the commercial-scale conversion of sunlight into electricity. Efficiency over 20% was achieved in a 2 kW installation near Atlanta, Georgia using a system called Integrated High-Concen- tration Photovoltaics (IHCPV). Built by AMONIX, Inc. of Torrance, California, the system uses low-cost... Read more

The National Association of Home Builders released in November the results of an environmental survey filled out by about 400 members. Among 17 environmental issues impacting builders, stormwater discharge topped the list with 47% affected, followed in order by building codes (46%), wetlands (46%),... Read more

Glidden’s Spred 2000 and Lifemaster 2000 lines, introduced in 1993, were the first such paints from a mainstream paint company (see EBN... Read more

According to the E Source newsletter

E News, replacing vertical-axis, coin-operated washers with horizontal-axis models reduced energy use by 73 percent in a multifamily property in Seattle, Washington. The metered test, performed by Seattle City Light and Seattle Water, confirms expectations of the energy-saving potential of horizontal... Read more

Decisions about insulation are among the most important you will make relative to the environmental impact of buildings. Because insulation reduces the energy consumption, it provides ongoing environmental benefits throughout a building’s life. However, not all insulation materials are equal environmentally.

In assessing the... Read more

by Peter Katz. McGraw-Hill, Inc., New York, 1994. Hardcover, 288 pages, $49.95.

The New Urbanism is one of the most important books to have appeared on what is emerging as a new paradigm in land-use planning and community design. Sometimes referred to as “neotraditional town planning,” this school of... Read more

Fortunately, I can tell them we are not as pessimistic in... Read more

The National Audubon Society headquarters building in New York City was received the Governor’s Award for Energy Excellence this past October. The building was originally constructed in the 1890s, and an extensive renovation by Audubon was completed in 1992. Today, the building is a showcase of environmentally responsible commercial building... Read more

The aptly named privy works exactly like the company’s well-known composting toilets that convert human wastes into a nutritive... Read more

for the Sky

Bioclimatic Skyscrapers by Ken Yeang, 1994. Artemis London Limited, England (North American distribution by Scovill Petterson Inc., 141 Fifth Ave. New York, NY 10010; 212/673-6090, 212/673-6603–fax). 150 pages, $39.95.

An ecological skyscraper may seem like an oxymoron, but Ken Yeang hasn’t... Read more

Whether we should import raw logs from Siberian forests has sparked a hot debate among environmentalists and the wood products industry. Russia is hoping to boost its weak economy by exporting raw logs from Siberia’s vast forests. Some U.S. wood products companies see this as a way to make up for the loss in... Read more

The State of California has banned the use of “regrind” or recycled plastic resin for use in ABS drain-waste-vent pipe. The new law stemmed from major problems with pipe failure of recycled-content ABS pipe made by several companies during the 1980s. For some homeowners, repairs cost tens of thousands of dollars since all D-W-V pipe had to be... Read more

Tree Talk has lowered the price of the

Woods of the World computer database to $149. The CD-ROM-based database was reviewed in EBN (

Vol. 3, No. 4) and is continually being improved, according to Berne Broudy of Tree Talk.

Gridcore Systems International dedicated the world’s first full-scale production facility for Gridcore on November 1, 1994, in Long Beach, California. The plant, which has been in production since April, employs 30 workers and produces a structural building panel out of recycled fiber—primarily cardboard, newsprint, and urban wood waste (see... Read more

It is now possible for environmentally concerned architects and builders to specify and buy framing lumber, white cedar shingles, and hardwood flooring that have been independently certified to be from well-managed forests. The Seven Islands Land Company, headquartered in Bangor, Maine, has just... Read more

Inventor Day Chahroudi of Suntek was one of the key developers of low-emissivity (low-e) coatings for window glazings in the 1970s. Since 1980 he has focused much of his creative energy on a radically new energy-control glazing system: Cloud Gel™. Cloud Gel is normally clear with high solar transmittance, but when warmed up or exposed to... Read more

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has completed a nationwide county-by-county survey of radon in buildings and produced a map showing relative risk. The study found the highest radon levels in the western mountain states, upper Midwest, Appalachian Mountain states, and Maine. The Southeast across to Texas and Pacific Northwest... Read more

According to a new report by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration, energy demand in the commercial building sector grew by 1.0% per year during the 1980s, second only to transportation, which grew at 1.4% per year. In 1989, commercial buildings consumed 5.8 quads of energy... Read more