GreenClips.79 08.27.97 GREEN ELEVATORS AT 4 TIMES SQUARE Otis Elevator Co. will supply elevators and escalators for the Conde Nast Building at 4 Times Square, the Durst Organization's 52-story green office tower under construction in New York City. Otis won the contract in part on its approach to the environment, health, and safety. "We had to prove that we used resources efficiently in our factories, packaging and transportation, installation and even construction site waste management," says Otis vice president Ray Moncini. "This will be the first installation in the United States of high-speed elevators with AC (alternating current) variable frequency drives," says Moncini. "These drives consume less energy and operate more cleanly than traditional DC elevator drive systems." AC-powered elevators improve indoor air quality, Otis says. Since their motor generators don't use carbon brushes, they don't produce carbon dust particles that can infiltrate heating, ventilating, and air conditioning systems. — The Hartford Courant News, August 19, 1997, p. C6, and an Otis Elevator press release. PG&E HOUSE GOES BEYOND COST EFFECTIVENESS Whole-system design can save both energy and capital costs, says the Rocky Mountain Institute. Designers of Pacific Gas & Electric's experimental house in Davis, California, reduced its cooling requirement by two-thirds using the standard method for prioritizing energy efficiency measures — pursuing those that pay the highest rate of return first, then working down the list to the cost effectiveness limit. Going further, they found that they could eliminate the cooling system entirely with additional measures that individually wouldn't save enough energy to pay for themselves. Yet taken together, they would save $1,500 on the capital cost of air conditioning and duct work. [For the Davis house, these measures include ceiling and oscillating fans, insulated doors, an attic radiant barrier, more tile flooring, a whole-house fan, double drywall in the living area, and low-emissivity gas-filled windows, says RMI's Dave Reed.] The Davis house uses 67 percent less energy than comparable houses in the area, saving $490 annually. But it would also cost $1,800 less to build, showing that a whole system approach can get beyond the cost effectiveness barrier to lower total cost. [For more information, email dreed@rmi.org.] — Rocky Mountain Institute Newsletter, Summer 1997, p. 1. ENVIRONMENTAL LOGIC: DEMOLITION WASTE RECYCLING General contractor Morse-Diesel International, Inc. has saved $42,000 in disposal costs by recycling 90 percent of the demolition waste from an Atlantic City, New Jersey project that includes a new 1,000-room hotel for Caesar's Palace and Hotel, a Planet Hollywood, and an ITT. The project's waste management consultant Environmental Logic of Patterson, New Jersey is paid a percentage of the savings from recycling. "In this initial demolition stage, only 152 tons of the 1,583 tons of total waste were nonrecyclable," says Morse-Diesel vice president Larry Capelli. Concrete and masonry went to MDI Transfer Station in Northfield, New Jersey, then to paving companies that will crush it for road building. Wood waste becomes mulch. Glass becomes glasphalt for embedding in roads as reflectors. Lacking a designated area on-site, pick-ups of the recycling containers that line both sides of a 200-foot road must be precise and quick. — The Construction Specifier, August 1997, p. 22, by Mary Kincaid. LOCAL AGENDA 21 The European Sustainable Cities and Towns Campaign will announce its second European Sustainable City Award in Brussels at the end of the year. So far more than 200 European local authorities have joined the campaign, committing to work with their communities on a Local Agenda 21 Action Plan. [Introduced at the 1992 Earth Summit, the Local Agenda 21 process aims to direct the social, environmental, and economic aspects of future development toward sustainability.] The plans of last year's winners — Graz, Austria; Albertslund, Denmark; Dunkerque, France; Den Haag, The Netherlands; and Leicester, UK — addressed common issues of jobs, energy, and waste. Many UK towns and cities are carrying out innovative Local Agenda 21 plans, but none of comparable size has ambitiously addressed the difficult questions Leicester has, like transportation and major office and leisure development. Leicester intends to integrate sustainability objectives in the most everyday city activities. Its Vision and Action Plans will be available the end of the year. For more information, call Alistair Reid or Anna Dodd at Leicester City Council, 0116 252 7258. [For a description of Local Agenda 21, visit http://www.rushmoor.gov.uk/gr91.htm.] — Green Futures, June/July 1997, p. 46, by Helen Holdaway, and p. 47. NEW GREEN CHICAGO-AREA PROJECTS Bigelow Homes, long a builder and advocate of energy-efficient housing, will now build HomeTown of Waterford on 140 acres in Aurora, Illinois. Eighty percent of the development's 1,000 homes will face north or south for light and winter heat gain. The single family homes will range from about $100,000 to $170,000, but Bigelow says the green extras will pay for themselves in three years. Meanwhile, the village of Matteson will build a $3.5 million village hall, a collaboration of architects Prisco Serena Sturm of Northbrook and the Croxton Collaborative. The village chose a green approach to improve the work environment, says Matteson's village administrator Ralph Coglianese. It hopes the new facility will serve as a model for other Chicago area municipal buildings. Prisco Serena Sturm is also busy with a new — and green — 33,000 square-foot office for the Tuthill Corporation in Burr Ridge. — Chicago Tribune, August 10, 1997, p. 1, Section 16, by John Handley. OLD LUMBER FOR NEW HOUSES Part of a growing lumber industry that's never cut down a tree, Mountain Lumber in Ruckersville, Virginia de-nails, cuts, and kiln dries wood from turn-of-the-century factories, aging inner-city warehouses, and dairy barns for products from furniture to tongue-and-groove flooring. Founded nearly 25 years ago, Mountain Lumber is now among the largest of 75 recycled lumber suppliers in the US. The Southern Forest Products Association estimates that as much as half of the pine flooring installed today is reclaimed lumber. Finished recycled wood costs about $9 per square foot for granary oak to $17 for antique American oak. And now, with the cost of new dimensional lumber for framing at $300 to 400 per thousand board feet, the reclamation industry is expanding to offer rough-cut studs and joists from old buildings that are less expensive than fresh-cut pine. — The Christian Science Monitor, August 13, 1997, by Skip Thurman.