BuildingGreen Report

News Brief

July 31, 2006

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

News Brief

July 31, 2006

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

Feature

July 31, 2006
The treated wood industry is in the midst of major changes today. The leading treated wood product, chromated copper arsenate (CCA), was taken off the market for many uses at the beginning of 2004 (see

EBN

Vol. 11, No. 3). The mainstream, copper-based replacements for CCA corrode fasteners more rapidly than CCA, increasing the risk of... Read more

News Brief

July 31, 2006
The nonprofit SustainLane.com has named Portland, Oregon, the most sustainable of the 50 largest cities in the U.S. Second and third went to San Francisco and Seattle, respectively, while Columbus, Ohio, was named least sustainable. The rankings were based on 13 factors: air quality, housing affordability, innovation, knowledge base and... Read more

News Analysis

July 31, 2006
Perfluorooctanoic acid, better known as PFOA or C8, has appeared in blood samples in polar bears, pregnant women across the U.S., and Chinese villagers. It is extremely resistant to breakdown, it is bioaccumulative, and an advisory panel to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has called it a “likely carcinogen” (see

EBN

Vol.... Read more

Op-Ed

July 31, 2006

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

News Brief

July 31, 2006

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

News Brief

July 9, 2006
Carpet Monsters and Killer Spores: A Natural History of Toxic Moldby Nicholas P. Money. Oxford University Press, New York City, 2004. Hardcover, 178 pages, $19.95.

My Office is Killing Me!: The Sick Building Survival Guideby Jeffrey C. May. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 2006. Paperback, 317 pages, $18.95.

In 2000,... Read more

News Brief

July 9, 2006
New York City’s first office tower to earn LEED® certification from the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), 7 World Trade Center has earned a Gold rating in LEED for Core and Shell (LEED-CS). USGBC President and CEO Rick Fedrizzi congratulated the project team, noting that the building “will help us use the language of architecture to build a... Read more

Product Review

July 9, 2006
Light-emitting diodes (LEDs), based on semiconductor technology, have become the lighting technology of choice in outdoor signs, screens, traffic signals, and indicator lamps on vehicles and appliances. Until recently, however, high cost and product development obstacles have kept LEDs out of the residential lighting market. That may be about to... Read more

News Analysis

July 9, 2006

If a proposed regulation from the California Air Resources Board (CARB) is adopted as planned on September 28, 2006, the U.S. market for particleboard and similar interior-grade panel products will change dramatically. The proposed regulation drastically reduces the allowable levels of urea-formaldehyde (UF) emissions from composite wood... Read more

News Brief

July 9, 2006

Behnisch, Behnisch & Partner in Stuttgart, Germany, under the leadership of Stefan Behnisch, is now Behnisch Architekten. The firm’s Venice, California, office, led by Stefan Behnisch and Christof Jantzen, AIA, has also changed its name, to Behnisch Architects. Founded in 1989, the firm has long been recognized as a leader in architectural... Read more

News Brief

July 9, 2006

In May 2006, the U.S. Senate confirmed Dirk Kempthorne to succeed Gale Norton as head of the Department of the Interior, which manages 20% of all land in the U.S. Kempthorne, who has served in the U.S. Senate and as governor of Idaho, has worked to open national lands to logging, mining, and drilling; the League of Conservation Voters (LCV)... Read more

News Analysis

July 9, 2006
On June 12, 2006, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Stephen Johnson announced the launch of WaterSense, EPA’s new water efficiency program, noting that the program’s aim is “spreading the ethic of water efficiency and promoting the tools to make wise water choices.” Like EPA’s successful Energy Star™ program for energy-... Read more

News Brief

July 9, 2006
The International Interior Design Association (IIDA) has announced the winners of its first annual

Smart Environments Awards. Co-sponsored by

Metropolis magazine, the awards were intended to recognize the most environmentally and socially responsible, beautiful, and functional interior designs of the past five years. The winners are:... Read more

News Brief

July 9, 2006
A McDonald’s restaurant in Savannah, Georgia, has achieved a Gold rating in the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED® rating system for Core and Shell (LEED-CS) development. Designed by Adams + Associates Architecture in Mooresville, North Carolina, and developed by Melaver, Inc., the first-ever LEED-certified McDonald’s features bike racks, porous... Read more

News Analysis

July 9, 2006

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

News Brief

July 9, 2006

Two projects under development, one in Boston, Massachusetts, and one in Cabinda, Angola, were among the projects recognized in June at the fourteenth Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU) in Providence, Rhode Island. CNU’s 2006 Charter Awards recognize work that demonstrates an understanding of urbanism and the principles embodied in the CNU... Read more

News Brief

July 9, 2006

An upscale Tahoe Vista, California, restaurant, Wild Goose, recently became the first restaurant to receive certification from the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED® rating system for commercial interiors (LEED-CI). CCS Architecture, of San Francisco, remodeled the 10,000 ft2 (930 m2) restaurant for East West Partners. Among Wild Goose’s... Read more

News Brief

July 9, 2006
Virginia San Fratello and collaborators Ronald Rael and Isaiah Dunlap won the third annual Next Generation Award, sponsored by

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