The Clackamas Community Land Trust, based in Clackamas, Oregon, has issued a call for entries to its 2006 green-built dollhouse competition and show, which will take place September 25 through October 5, 2006, in Portland, Oregon. A fundraiser for the land trust, the competition offers separate categories for architecture professionals, design... Read more

As Google™ has proven, the power of search engines on the Internet cannot be overestimated. We’re pleased to report that, having learned that lesson and using hardware and software from Google, we’ve now improved the search capability for our website at BuildingGreen.com and our

BuildingGreen Suite premium information service. Our new... Read more

The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has added the following members to its Core Research Committee: Gail Brager, Ph.D., professor and associate director of the Center for the Built Environment at the University of California, Berkeley; Drury Crawley, AIA, technology development manager at the U.S. Department of Energy; John Fernandez, AIA,... Read more

Building materials giant USG Corporation has joined the Alliance for Sustainable Built Environments, a group launched in 2003 to educate the marketplace and top management on the benefits of reducing the impact of facilities on the environment and building occupants. “By joining the Alliance, USG can work with like-minded companies to help... Read more

Metropolis magazine, for their Hydro Wall design. Hydro Wall is a series of flexible bladders designed to store rainwater within a building’s walls. The water could be used for irrigation, flushing toilets, and a range... Read more

A study published in the journal

Cancer Research in June 2006 links bisphenol-A (BPA)—used to make the hard, clear plastic polycarbonate as well as most epoxies—to cancer. BPA, which mimics the human hormone estrogen, altered the structure of genes in rats’ prostate cells when they were exposed to low doses of the chemical, the study... Read more

The U.S. Conference of Mayors, which represents the 1,183 U.S. cities with populations of 30,000 or more, has called for all new buildings and major renovation projects to be climate neutral by 2030. The Conference unanimously adopted Resolution 50, “Adopting the ‘2030 Challenge’ for All Buildings,” during its 74th annual meeting, in June 2006... Read more

Charles Kibert, Ph.D., of the University of Florida’s Rinker School of Construction, has assembled an impressive collection of speakers from around the world for a sequel to the seminal Sustainable Construction conference he hosted in November 1994. Based on its draft agenda, the four-day affair looks to be a hybrid of Greenbuild’s practice-... Read more

The U.S. Army has announced that, beginning in 2008, all of its new buildings will achieve Silver or higher ratings in the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED® Rating System. LEED will supplant the Army’s own Sustainable Project Rating Tool (SPiRiT), which was modeled after LEED. The Army has also committed to certifying all of its housing once... Read more

Lead was discovered in Washington, D.C., drinking water in 2004 in alarming concentrations following the district’s switch from chlorine to chloramine for drinking water disinfection. Municipalities around the country took note when U.S. Environmental Protection Agency chemist Mike Schock hypothesized that the switch, made in response to new... Read more

ED+C) magazine has announced the winners of its annual Excellence in Design Awards. This year’s jury included

ED+C staff members as well as Rick Fedrizzi, president and CEO of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC); Jim Nicolow, AIA, head of the sustainability initiative at Lord, Aeck &... Read more

In a May 2006 announcement before the New York League of Conservation Voters, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced a new Division of Sustainability that will operate within the Mayor’s Office of Operations. Bloomberg’s announcement, in which he called sustainability “a philosophy of realistic optimism,” follows his 2004 creation of a... Read more