The DuPont Benedictus Awards for Innovation in Architectural Laminated Glass may have a significant environmental flavor in 1996 with the inclusion of two prominent “green” architects on the jury. Bob Berkebile of BNIM Architects in Kansas City, Missouri and Randolph Croxton, Croxton Collaborative Architects, New York City, have both been... Read more

How can we be confident that a particular manufacturer or company is committed to environmental improvements? There are certification systems for specific environmental claims, or for particular products, but as the best management practices and environmental goals evolve, how do we know that the... Read more

As you might imagine, information about new building products comes into the

EBN office all the time. When a new product strikes our fancy, we extract what information we can from manufacturers, we play with samples (often mutilating them in the process), we talk with any users we can track... Read more

Voluntary certification of product environmental claims is a useful option, but it does little to prevent bogus claims by other manufacturers. A 1990 California law attempts to address this problem by establishing legal definitions for the terms “ozone friendly,” “biodegradable,” “photodegradable,” “recyclable,” and “recycled.” Companies are... Read more

A few years ago, construction waste management and job-site source separation would have been considered nearly synonymous. It makes sense, after all, that if the materials have more value when separated by type, we should try to avoid mixing them together in the first place. While source separation still makes sense for many jobs and for... Read more

published by Thousand Words, P.O. Box 9034, Berkeley, CA 94709; 510/883-0433, otg@ontheground.com (e-mail). $32 per year for four issues. Length varies: 32-36 pages.

On the Ground is a large-format, quarterly journal on community, landscape design, and the environment that premiered in the Fall of... Read more

I very much appreciate your recognition of the need for and efforts to identify priorities for “green building” (whatever that is). Such priorities can either be defined implicitly by the buildings a “green designer” creates or by some systematic process based on a hierarchy of environmental problems. Your... Read more

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Environmental Committee, Denver Chapter, AIA, and Colorado Chapter, ADPSR. 1995. Loose-leaf (without binder) or diskette (PC or Macintosh), $29.95. Order from: AIA Denver/SDRG, 1562 15th Street, Denver, CO, 80202; 303/446-2266, 303/446-0066 (fax).

Greatly improved from last year’s first edition, this... Read more

A major shake-up at Louisiana-Pacific Corporation this summer was brought on, in part, by allegations of falsifying pollution emission data. The entire upper management team of L-P, including Chairman and President Harry Merlo (who led the company since its split from Georgia-Pacific in 1973 and who championed L-P’s leadership role in the move... Read more

Just as certain segments of the HVAC and insulation industries have begun a widespread shift to the ozone-safe, chlorine-free hydrofluorocarbon HFC-134a, new environmental concerns have been raised about this compound. Researchers at the Cambridge, Massachusetts firm Atmospheric and Environmental Research suggested... Read more

More recently, suburban neighborhoods and office parks began replacing farms in ever-widening circles around the cities and towns. Conventional practice is to landscape the open spaces around... Read more

I read your article “Steel or Wood Framing, Which Way Should We Go?” in the Volume 3, Number 4 issue of EBN with considerable interest and anticipation, but did not see a sufficient discussion on the major reason for building differently with steel studs: the problem of mold growth at the thermal bridge over... Read more

Members of the U.S. Green Building Council have organized a non-profit Green Building Fund in the hopes of providing ongoing support for research and demonstration of environmentally sound construction projects. So far six organizations have contributed to the Fund’s initial project—a feasibility study documenting funding sources for green... Read more

2 Sink?

The manufacture of portland cement... Read more

Judith Kincaid, Cheryl Walker, and Greg Flynn for the Triangle J Council of Governments, PO Box 12276, Research Triangle Park, NC 27709; 919/549-0551, 919/549-9390 (fax). July 1995. Three-ring binder and diskette, 115 pages, $20 (specify diskette type when ordering).

Architects and specifiers who have... Read more

NOLS had established a base for sea kayaking and other water activities on the Baja California peninsula, in... Read more

A new “Mini Home Study Course” from the International Institute for Bau-biologie and Ecology™ (IBE) in Clearwater, Florida is designed to help the home-dweller understand, find, and remedy indoor air pollution, water pollution, and other home health hazards. Participants receive resource material, a video, and a Gauss meter. Contact IBE at 813/... Read more

In August 1994 the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) was approached by the Global Futures Foundation to help Mitsubishi respond to a boycott effort organized by Rainforest Action Network over the company’s poor logging practices in tropical rainforests. Out of that dialog have emerged two initiatives that may be... Read more

Researchers at the U.S. Bureau of Mines (USBM) and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) are looking into the idea of producing perlite using concentrated solar energy. Perlite is a natural volcanic rock that is expanded by rapid heating to between 870° and 1100°C. It is used as an insulation material and as a lightweight... Read more