GreenClips.58 10.23.96 DUTCH HANDBOOK OFFERS GREEN PICKS Dutch consultant W/E has produced a "Handbook of Sustainable Building: an Environmental Preference Method for Selection of Materials for Use in Construction and Refurbishment." W/E developed its Environmental Preference Method in 1991 to organize data it was collecting on the life-cycle impact of building materials and components on the environment. The handbook covers 30 material and component types from substructure and shell to internal elements, finishes, and services. For each type, the guide lists first, second, and third green preferences, and not-recommended options. It offers a brief account of the reasoning behind the choices. It also identifies a "basic selection", the greenest option that is technically proven and adds little or no extra cost. The handbook looks well informed, says reviewer Barrie Evans. But if you agree with the authors' value judgments, he notes, you may want a bit more transparency in how they arrived at them. David Anink, Chiel Boonstra, and John Mak wrote the handbook recently published by James & James. - The Architects' Journal, October 10, 1996, p. 45, by Barrie Evans. HOW TO ENCOURAGE INFILL DEVELOPMENT Local government policies, not market demand, often make developers prefer building on raw land instead of infill sites. So say the authors of a Local Government Commission publication titled Building Livable Communities: A Policymaker's Guide to Infill Development. Local governments could make widespread infill development feasible and profitable for the private sector by - zoning for mixed-use and higher-density development; helping with project financing through pre-development grants and loans; streamlining the permit process; stabilizing struggling neighborhoods by encouraging rehabilitation of existing buildings; providing in-kind assistance with loan and government funding applications, and by sharing studies and marketing information; enhancing public services like police and street cleaning; and addressing contaminated sites. - Urban Land, September 1996, p. 37, by Rick Cole, Nancy Bragado, Judy Corbett, and Sharon Sprowls. BRE LAUNCHES HEALTHY BUILDING CENTRE The UK's Building Research Establishment (BRE) has launched a Healthy Building Centre offering access not only to BRE's healthy building experts but also to outside consultants like medical doctors or lawyers if needed. Although BRE charges competitive consulting rates for the service, one-stop efficiencies make it a bargain. The Centre's laboratories are engaged in a mix of research and project studies. Researchers conduct cleaning trials in a full-size variable air volume (VAV) air-conditioning system that replicates all the problems of live systems. A chemical lab uses gas chromatography to identify precise levels of the 200 volatile compounds often present in an ordinary house. And a pathology laboratory both identifies the presence of agents and isolates problem-causing ones. Contact the Healthy Building Centre by emailing Dr. Gary Raw, rawgj@bre.co.uk. - The Architects' Journal,October 10, 1996, p. 46, by Ruth Slavid. SEATTLE BUILDER REDUCES WASTE Sunshine Construction applied extensive waste-reduction and resource-efficient practices in expanding and remodeling a house on Seattle's Queen Anne Hill. Before construction, the builder suggested many resource-efficient measures including changing new rafters from 2 x 12s to engineered wood I-beams and reducing the size of other structural components and trim. Sunshine salvaged building materials from the existing structure including windows, blinds, cabinets, doors, an iron porch and stair rail, bricks, appliances, and over 2,000 linear feet of lumber. The builder reused the salvaged lumber and all lumber cutoffs possible for non-structural purposes like blocking, furring, and nonbearing walls. And it salvaged about 1,200 gallons of insulation from the attic, reusing it later in the project. - EcoBuilding Times, Fall 1996, p. 11, by Jon Alexander. CHEMICAL EXEC URGES ENVIRONMENTAL INNOVATION Chemical industry executive Claude Fussler's new book Driving Eco-Innovation is a guidebook on environmental innovation in industry. To secure their own long-term futures and the planet's, this vice president for environment, health, and safety at Dow Europe challenges companies to radically improve the environmental performance of their production. Available from Pitman Publishing, Fussler's sustainability how-to book finds existing tools for comparing environmental performance inadequate. Life cycle analyses are too detailed for immediate comparisons of different options, he asserts, and environmental management systems are often not conducive to radical thinking. Instead, Fussler and his colleagues at Dow devised an "eco-compass" that compares a new product to an existing practice by measuring - the quantity of materials wasted in their manufacture; their risk to health and environment; energy use throughout their life; their revalorization potential by recycling, incineration for energy, or reuse; their natural resource conservation; and length of their useful life. - Financial Times, October9, 1996, p. 19, by Leyla Boulton. TEXAS TONER TAR Texas Department of Transportation (TexDOT) officials are looking into using waste toner from discarded printer and copier cartridges in road asphalt. TexDOT engineer Rakeesh Tripathi says characteristics of the polymer styrene and carbon black in toner complement asphalt. "We know carbon black is a good filler material," he notes. Tripathi says it does not have any toxic environmental impact and is easier to process than other materials becomes itcomes in powder form. Recycling specialist Rebecca Davio says the toner research is part of TexDOT's larger effort exploring recycled materials in asphalt. Next year TexDOT plans thirteen 1,000-foot long field tests of toner and other materials including glass, shingles, and shredded brush. - ENR, September 30, 1996, p. 21, by Aileen Cho.