, who, as chief architect for the Naval Facilities Engineering Command (NAVFAC), was instrumental in the adoption of a comprehensive sustainable design policy (see EBN

Vol. 7, No. 10), has now moved to the National Park Service. Effective December 20, 1999 Emmons became associate director for professional services,... Read more

The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) was created in the early 1990s to establish worldwide, environmentally sound standards for forest management practices and to monitor the agencies that choose to certify forestry programs to those standards (see EBN

Vol. 6, No. 10). Although some forest industry groups participated in the FSC’s... Read more

(C&A) was one of two companies named 1999 Recycler-of-the-Year by the Society of Plastics Engineers, in recognition of the company’s ER3™ recycled-content vinyl carpet backing system. C&A also received the 1999 Outstanding Buy Recycled Business award from the Buy Recycled Business Alliance and the... Read more

The European Space Agency reported in early December that

stratospheric ozone levels over parts of Belgium, Britain, The Netherlands, and Scandinavia have dropped significantly—though not as low as levels above the Antarctic. Measurements taken in The Netherlands found localized ozone levels to be two-thirds below the norm for this time... Read more

Innovations in Wallcoverings, Inc., a 25-year-old manufacturer of vinyl wallcoverings and upholstery,... Read more

by John Bower, 2000. The Healthy House Institute. Paperback, 416 pages, $21.95

The Healthy House video series described above. Bower has by now published a handful of titles on healthy houses, and each is better than the last. This book is no exception—well organized,... Read more

The City Design Center at the University of Illinois at Chicago is seeking entries for Design Matters, an Internet catalog of

affordable housing projects built since 1985 that demonstrate high quality and value to their occupants and to society at large. Projects will be selected by the Center and its nationwide advisory team based on a... Read more

More than half of the

world’s rivers are either going dry or are polluted, according to the World Commission on Water for the 21st Century. During 1998, for the first time ever, more people were displaced for want of useable water (“environmental refugees”) than those displaced by war: 25 million vs. 21 million war-related... Read more

by David Johnston, 2000. Home Builder Press, Washington, D.C. Paperback, 175 pages, $45

My family couldn’t disagree more with the comment you received about the quality of light from tubular skylights [see feature in EBN

Vol. 8, No. 10, and letter in EBN

Vol. 8, No. 11]. We had two Solatubes installed last month: one in a fairly dark kitchen, and the other in an interior windowless bathroom. They passed both the “... Read more

A survey of

comments from key players in the IAQ industry published in the January 2000 issue of

IEQ Strategies reveals some interesting trends. Asthma, especially in children, is seen as an increasingly important health issue related to IAQ. Overall, the importance of VOCs and tobacco smoke as air quality issues is declining,... Read more

In other

green power news, the city of Palmdale, California has announced that it is following Santa Monica’s lead (see EBN

Vol. 8, No. 6, p. 3) in purchasing its municipal power from renewable sources. Green electricity will be purchased from Commonwealth Energy Corporation in Tustin, California.

, LLC, which provided consulting and marketing services for green building in the commercial and hospitality sectors and operated a showroom for green products on Wall Street in New York City, has ceased operations. At press time, details about the reasons for the closure and possible future plans were unavailable.... Read more

In the next few months the U.S. Department of Energy is expected to issue a long overdue energy efficiency standard for fluorescent lamp ballasts. This new standard is the result of a negotiated agreement between energy conservation interests, ballast manufacturers, and other stakeholders. According to this Joint Agreement, the new standard... Read more

Neil Kelly Cabinets’ Naturals Collection (see EBN Vol. 7, No. 8) received the 1999 Founder of the New Northwest award from Sustainable Northwest, an organization working to promote economic development that is rooted in the maintenance and enhancement of the environment. Visit www.sustainablenorthwest.org for details, or contact Neil Kelly at... Read more

by Bob Kobet and Wendy Powers of Conservation Consultants, Inc., Stephen Lee of the Carnegie Mellon University School of Architecture Center for Building Performance and Diagnostics, and Christine Mondor and Marc Mondor of Big Picture Designs, 1999. Paperback, 50 pages, free from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, P.O. Box... Read more

The

City of San Francisco Department of the Environment is seeking applicants for a new position of Resource-Efficient Building Coordinator. The position involves overseeing of pilot projects, coordination with other City departments, and outreach within the City government and to the general public. For more information, contact the... Read more

or Concrete

Asphalt and concrete account for the vast majority of paving today. These materials are very different: asphalt is a mix of aggregate and leftover heavy hydrocarbons after more valuable, lighter fractions of crude oil have been extracted; concrete is a hardened, rock-like material usually made by... Read more

Rebuild America has announced its

1999 National Energy Champion Award winners. Among the twelve winners are:

Portland Partners for Energy Efficiency program of the Portland Energy Office, represented by senior energy program manager Curt Nichols;

•Partnership Leader of the Year:

Hilary... Read more

I was startled to read your survey of tubular skylight products (“Daylighting – Part 2,”

EBN

Vol. 8, No. 10, October 1999), which made no mention of the quality of light produced. As a residential designer with extensive daylighting design experience in both remodel and new-build situations, I would never specify one of these... Read more