Health Product Declaration Group Names John Knott Director

The former developer has been tasked with making building product transparency the industry standard.

The Health Product Declaration Collaborative (HPDC), an organization that launched in 2012 to help manufacturers report health-related information for building products, has hired urban redevelopment expert John Knott Jr. as its first executive director.

Knott has more than 40 years of experience in making healthy places. Serving as the CEO and managing director of the Island Preservation Partnership, he helped develop the 1,206-acre Dewees Island oceanfront retreat, which is dedicated to environmental preservation. As president and CEO of the Noisette Company, he led efforts to restore 3,000 acres in the historic urban core of the City of North Charleston. Knott has worked on numerous award-winning projects, including the Baltimore Inner Harbor and the University of Texas Health Science Center, which won the AIA Committee on the Environment’s Top Ten Green Projects award in 2006, partly for the project’s focus on nontoxic materials. Knott is also a longtime member of EBN’s Advisory Board.

Creator of the CityCraft process, Knott has often taken a large-scale approach to restoring the health of communities and systems. Now, he will ask manufacturers to disclose residuals that account for even 0.01% of a product and fully disclose any known health hazards. The HPD format has quickly gained traction since its launch but has a long way to go in becoming the industry standard.

Aaron Smith, HPDC board treasurer, says Knott is up for the job; “Mr. Knott’s diverse industry experience and leadership roles bring an exciting perspective to the Health Product Declaration Collaborative that I believe will allow us to engage successfully with manufacturers and expand acceptance of the HPD across multiple stakeholder groups,” he told the Building Design and Construction Network.