Your September 2004 feature article on porous pavement [see

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Vol. 13, No. 9] could not have been more timely. We at the Portland Cement Association (PCA) have noted a tremendous demand for more information on this innovative construction technique. It is just one of the many applications in which concrete provides a... Read more

Kirei™ is a lightweight, formaldehyde-free panel made from waste fiber left over after processing sorghum, a grain crop grown widely in many parts of the world. The product was developed in Japan in the mid-1990s and introduced to the U.S. market in 2003. Kirei is a Japanese character meaning both clean and beautiful, according to Kirei USA... Read more

The Emerging Green Builders (EGB) chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council announced during Greenbuild the winners of the third annual USGBC Design Competition, intended to recognize students and young professionals in the building industry. More than 130 teams, including more than 270 individuals from 16 countries, competed to design a... Read more

A multifaceted approach to controlling asthma can significantly reduce its symptoms, according to a study published on September 9, 2004 in the

New England Journal of Medicine. More than 900 inner-city children with allergenic asthma participated in the study, which compared the symptoms of a control group to those of a group in which... Read more

Caulking installed during the 1960s and ’70s threatens public health, according to a study published in the July 2004 issue of

Environmental Health Perspectives. The warning was spurred by the discovery of high polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) levels in Boston-area buildings. The U.S. government banned the production of these chemicals in... Read more

The International Energy Agency (IEA) Solar Heating and Cooling Programme has presented its

Solar Award to

William Beckman, professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin at Madison (UWM). Beckman was recognized for his contributions to the solar energy field, including co-developing the TRNSYS building-energy analysis and... Read more

The U.S. Green Building Council is seeking applicants for the Mark Ginsberg Sustainability Fellowship. Established in honor of Ginsberg’s work in the Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, the three-month fellowship will focus on market developments and emerging trends in green building. Details are online at... Read more

DuPont has reached a tentative settlement in a three-year-old class-action lawsuit that could cost the company $343 million for exposing Ohio and West Virginia communities to perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), also known as C8 (see

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Vol. 13, No. 3). In the agreement, DuPont will pay $108 million, including $23 million to cover... Read more

Efficiency Vermont is now accepting applications for their

2005 Energy Efficient Design Awards, to be announced at the Better Buildings by Design conference in February 2005. To be eligible, projects must be located in Vermont and have been completed after January 1, 2001. Posters and registration forms are due December 22, 2004.... Read more

The wind energy Production Tax Credit (PTC) has been extended through the end of 2005 as part of a tax package signed by President Bush in October 2004. The PTC makes available a tax credit of 1.8 cents for each kilowatt-hour of electricity generated by wind turbines. Although the PTC had expired at the end of 2003, the recent extension is... Read more

National Design Awards. Recognized for the creation of “buildings, spaces, and places with completely positive intentions,” the architecture firm

William McDonough + Partners was given the

Environment Design Award.... Read more

Energetech America, LLC has announced plans for “GreenWave Rhode Island,” America’s first wave-energy project. The 500 kilowatt project will tap the power of an “oscillating water column” to force compressed air through a turbine. An existing undersea cable will then transmit the power to the New England electrical grid. The structure will be... Read more

Haliburton School of the Arts at Fleming College in Ontario has announced a new program in Sustainable Building Design and Construction. Joining other programs in sustainable design at the Boston Architectural Center (see

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Vol. 11, No. 2) and Carnegie Mellon University (see

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Vol. 11, No. 6), Haliburton’s... Read more

The Sustainable Buildings Industry Council has announced the winners of its 2004 awards program. The jury included BuildingGreen’s Alex Wilson. More information is online at www.sbicouncil.org.

Best Sustainable Practice Awards were given to:

•The

Massachusetts Technology Collaborative for

Sustainable Policy and... Read more

Americans spent a total of 3.5 billion hours waiting in traffic during 2002—about 46 hours per peak traveler—according to the 2004 Urban Mobility Report, published by the Texas Transportation Institute. “Congestion has grown everywhere, in areas of all sizes,” according to the report. Collectively, we wasted 5.7 billion gallons (216 billion... Read more

The egg of a Forster’s tern, a fish-eating seabird common in the San Francisco Bay, has been found to have 63 parts per million (ppm) of toxic PBDE flame retardants (see

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Vol. 13, No. 6), the highest concentration ever found in any animal, according to a September 10, 2004

Los Angeles Times article. According to... Read more

EBN’s editorial advisory board, left the full-time employment of the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) on July 1, 2004 to work with the John A. Clark Company on the development of Haymount. Haymount is a new town being developed outside of Washington, D.C. with an... Read more