Browsing environmental news sources so you don't have to. Contact Laura Barnes (lbarnes@istc.illinois.edu) with questions, comments, and suggestions.
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Toshiba Corporation is extending the time frame and scope of its Fourth Voluntary Environment Plan and defining new targets. The current plan was initially scheduled to run from FY2005 to FY2010, but the company will now extend it to FY2012, to coincide with the end of the First Commitment Period of the Kyoto Protocol.
Read the full interview at Corporate Climate Response.
One of the most common mistakes manufacturers make when trying to assess their carbon emissions is limiting their outlook to their own operations, points Bruce Anderson, General Manager of the Global Electronics Industry at IBM. ‘Manufacturers will stop by measuring only what they can directly control in their own facilities,’ he says. ‘They should be looking across the supply chain, from suppliers to logistics providers and contract manufacturers.’
Anderson will be presenting at the upcoming Sustainable Manufacturing Summit on April 8-9 at the Art Institute of Chicago. Over 50 top companies are confirmed to speak at the summit including GE, Honeywell, Philips, Dell, HP, Sharp, GM, Frito Lay, Motorola, General Mills, Patagonia, and Toyota.
Read the full story from the Associated Press.
Nissan wants to talk about more than a way to drive at its soon-to-be-finished Americas headquarters.
The Japanese automaker is showing off “green” features of the $100 million project as a kind of image signpost for car and truck buyers increasingly focused on environmental concerns.
Read the full story in Business Week.
To help shoppers make green choices, companies are slapping carbon labels on products. But even if the public can interpret the information, will it help reduce greenhouse gas emissions?
Displaying environmental leadership and encouraged by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the builder of the New York Mets’ new ballpark, the Queens Ballpark Company, L.L.C. (QBC), will build and operate the major league baseball team’s new stadium using some of the latest green technologies and practices. Today, EPA Regional Administrator Alan J. Steinberg, Mets Chief Operating Officer Jeff Wilpon, New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and other dignitaries announced a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), which spells out design, construction and operational principles ensuring that Citi Field meets high environmental standards and reduces its carbon footprint.
Read the full story from Reuters.
Growing more corn to meet the projected U.S. demand for ethanol could worsen an expanding “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico that is bad for crawfish, shrimp and local fisheries, researchers reported on Monday.
Read the full story in the New York Times.
Authors of an independent report say the Bush administration suppressed indications that pollution in the region may have serious health consequences.
Read the full story in the Seattle Times.
To reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels proposed Wednesday that all of the city’s taxis get at least 30 miles per gallon.
A full-color, graphic version of this newsletter is available online at:
http://www.greenerbuildings.com/enewsletter
SMBs Save Energy and $700K
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55695
More than 2,500 businesses in a suburb southeast of San Francisco participated in an energy efficiency program that will save one megawatt of energy annually. That translates to roughly $700,000 a year in energy savings.
New Software Helps Companies Control Energy and Emissions
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55705
PeopleCube and Building Sustainability Ltd. have joined forces to offer software that will help companies better manage their energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.
AMB Opens Southeast’s First LEED Industrial Building in Port of Savannah
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55718
The real estate investment company’s 347,000 square foot facility will be certified to LEED-Silver levels, and is the first building in a planned green business park at the fast-growing shipping facility.
ACE USA Offers Green Restoration Policy
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55694
The insurance company is now one of many to allow certain policyholders to upgrade their buildings in environmentally friendly ways after being damaged.
Insurance Company Adds Eco-Friendly Coverage for Commercial Buildings
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55674
Lexington Insurance Company’s Upgrade to Green coverage now applies to commercial buildings, allowing sites to meet green building standards.
London Aims for a 25 Percent Energy Cut in Public Buildings
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55662
Through the Clinton Climate Initiative, London is partnering with energy service companies to reduce the energy use of its public buildings.
ICC to Develop Green Building Certification
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55686
The International Code Council will unveil a certification program to ensure that code officials understand the application of green building technologies.
Summit Boasts Green Real Estate Opportunities
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55698
The most cost-effective ways to use green building practices and available incentives for sustainability were some of the topics at the 2008 Green Real Estate Summit.
New Green Building Classes Added in Pacific Northwest
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55683
A Pacific Northwest green building group will add a nine-month certification course to the newly formed Cascadia Sustainability Academy.
Calif. Awards Green Schools Grant
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55670
California’s State Allocation Board issued the first award under the High Performance Incentive Grant program aimed at encouraging green building practices in schools.
CarbonLite Programme Boosts Low Energy Building
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55659
CarbonLite offers resources and assistance in building low-energy and low-carbon residential and commercial buildings.
U.K. Group Helps Builders Meet and Exceed Waste Legislation
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55653
The Waste & Resource Action Program is offering a free template for Site Waste Management Plans, which will soon be mandatory for construction, as well as best practices for cutting waste.
Users’ Guide to Green Performance Contracting
http://greenerbuildings.com/tool_detail.cfm?LinkAdvID=97382
This guide from the Leonardo Academy addresses how all interested parties can bring sustainability into performance contracting.
How BIM and Green Tech Will Change the Construction Industry
By Scott Boutwell
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55702
Building Information Modeling, coupled with an array of alternative energy and green building technologies, is quickly changing how construction and renovations happen, and bringing high performance buildings to a new level.
LEED Certifi-able Vs. LEED Certified
Simi Hoque, Environmental Design + Construction
http://greenerbuildings.com/news_detail.cfm?NewsID=55720
In Boston, a new code requires all new construction over 50,000 square feet be LEED certifiable (note the suffix), which is a little like saying that buildings must be greenish. The code’s stipulation of certifiable is a missed opportunity, a weak gesture by city leaders to promote sustainable development in Boston.
Read the full story in the New York Times.
The Environmental Protection Agency announced a modest tightening of the smog standard on Wednesday evening, overruling the unanimous advice of its scientific advisory council for a more protective standard.
Via Librarians’ Internet Index.
Background about “Pharmaceuticals and Personal Care Products as Pollutants (PPCPs) [which] refers, in general, to any product used by individuals for personal health or cosmetic reasons or used by agribusiness to enhance growth or health of livestock.” Covers PPCP sources, where PPCPs are found (”any water body influenced by raw or treated sewage, including rivers, streams, ground water, coastal marine environments, and many drinking water sources”), and related topics. From the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
URL: http://www.epa.gov/ppcp/
Via ResourceShelf.
New Webcast: Open Science and Scientific Publishing
Recorded at MIT on November 13, 2007. Runs 76 minutes.Speakers:
Hal Abelson: Class of 1922 Professor of Computer Science and Engineering, MIT School of EngineeringJohn Wilbanks: Vice President, Science Commons
Anna Gold: Associate Dean for Public Services, Robert E. Kennedy Library, California Polytechnic State University
Summary:
Scientists and educational institutions in a digital age must push back forcefully against the old paradigms for scholarly communications, or risk imperiling the course of scientific research. These speakers describe how traditional modes of publication have constricted public sharing of ideas on which scientific progress is based, and propose approaches more appropriate for a web-based world.
Source: MIT World
Read the full story in Technology Review.
Cheap and easy-to-make dye-sensitized solar cells are still in the early stages of commercial production. Meanwhile, their inventor, Michael Gratzel, is working on more advanced versions of them. In a paper published in the online edition of Angewandte Chemie, Gratzel, a chemistry professor at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland, presents a version of dye-sensitized cells that could be more robust and even cheaper to make than current versions.
