By Susan Vallee •
June 1, 2008
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Let me first preface this post with the following: I’m not a construction professional. I’m just a curious homeowner seeking out the best building materials for my home. With that said, I was familiar with three options in residential construction - concrete block, wood frame or the super green alternative, rammed earth.
Turns out there are new options that combine the wonderful qualities of Portland cement with recycled post-consumer plastics (Rastra) or recycled wood fibers (Durisol).
By Eva Pratesi •
May 29, 2008
Last week I was in Florence to visit the fifth edition of Terra Futura, the national meeting-exhibition of the “good practices” of sustainability. The goal of this event is to bring the whole society towards a process of global sensitization. 500 expositive areas and more than 4000 companies showed visitors a lot of products and services, which have been made according to the sustainability’s principles. A free exhibition with a calendar of cultural events including conferences, seminars, workshops and laboratories focused on many themes: energy, water, pollution, recycling, architecture, and economics.
Among others, interior design and fashion departments were on show in Terra Futura.
Where better than in Florence? Fashion and clothing have been representing a must for centuries here and the city hosts the world`s biggest men`s fashion event: Pitti Immagine Uomo. Every year in January and June, many Italian and foreign designers arrive in Florence to participate to this cool show, calling a very big attention on the city.
I ran across this article at The Oil Drum and thought it was too tasty to pass up. It describes a new design to help concentrated solar power (CSP) increase efficiency and reduce cost.
Here’s the problem: solar thermal collectors focus the sun’s heat onto a clear tube of fluid (see: Intro to Solar Thermal). The collectors generate the most energy when the sun’s rays are parallel with the tube of fluid. Since the sun moves across the sky throughout the days and seasons, it only reaches this “sweet spot” certain hours each day. But, if the solar collectors could move to track the sun, their power output could increase dramatically. Keep in mind that CSP is one of the most efficient forms of solar power.
Editor’s note: Chicago has become quite the hot spot for green building, so our friends at GreenBuildingTalk (who are based there) have frequent opportunities to hear from some of the brightest minds in the field. Today’s post share excerpts from a presentation by architect Peter Pfieffer, and was originally published on Monday, April 21, 2008.
ALNO hosted a K/BIS press breakfast on 4/12/08, at their new showroom in the heart of Chicago’s design district. Aside from enjoying a great mimosa and walking through ANLO’s impressive kitchen cabinetry displays, I sat in on renowned green architect Peter Pfeiffer’s presentation he gave that morning focused on “Greening the Kitchen”.
Named “one of the most influential residential architects of the past decade,” by Residential Architect and honored as the “National Green Advocate of the Year,” by the National Association of Home Builders,” Pfeiffer has demonstrated a life-long commitment to mainstreaming green building in North America. He is a founding principal of Barley + Pfeiffer Architects, a firm recognized nationally for its pioneering use of environmentally responsive building design and construction techniques, which has completed 400 green projects nationally since it’s founding in 1987. Pfeiffer’s work has been published both in the United States and abroad, in such diverse venues as the Washington Post, The New York Times, Fine Homebuilding, and Better Homes & Gardens magazine. On multiple occasions he has been a guest on National Public Radio as well as the HGTV network.
By Olga Orda •
May 20, 2008
Image source: National Geographic
A short, weekly “school of hard knocks” history of why paper supply chain management is not as easy as it looks - but can be. A Green Printer dispatch.
Deforestation hurts. Just ask Harrison Ford - he waxed his chest and demonstrated just how close forests are to his heart.
Sustainable management of forests, not simply trees or more recycling, is what Rainforest Alliance’s executive director Tensie Whelan recently advocated for in GreenBiz and she’s right: while recycling has its environmental limits, sustainably managed forests as a whole ensure the well-being of the forest ecosystem and biodiversity survival for generations to come. 
By Skye Kilaen •
May 20, 2008
Amenity designs bedding, pillows, wall art prints and nursery decor. Luckily for us, they also offer four of their fabrics in running yardage, printed on a blend of organic cotton and hemp. All of their fabrics are “printed by hand with non-toxic, water-based, eco-friendly dyes.”
Amenity’s fabric designs are based on nature, with names like “river” and “cove.” Don’t think about cute little leaf prints, though, except in their nursery collection. As you can see from the pillows above, made up in their “trail” fabric, we’re talking about some seriously bold and funky design.
In 2000, Gerding Edlen Development selected GBD Architects to renovate 5 blocks of historic brewery buildings located in a former industrial area of Portland, Oregon known as the Pearl District. The success of the Brewery Blocks project sparked a rebirth of the neighborhood; in 2005, The Sierra Club recognized the Pearl District as one of the nation’s best neighborhood redevelopment projects. Since that time, the district has continued to thrive; Gerding Eldlen’s latest building in the Pearl District, also designed by GBD Architects, is a 16-story condominium tower known as The Casey.
By Susan Vallee •
May 18, 2008
I remember reading the little placard on the bathroom vanity advising me to hang my damp towels with curiosity. We were on vacation and it was the first time I had ever heard of such a thing. We did this at home, but it seemed more practical - a way to avoid doing laundry each night. There was also a note about turning the lights out when we left our room. Little things.
We discussed the hanging of the towels and the turning off of the lights over a shrimp dinner that night at some tourist trap. I remember my mom saying that if we all do a little, we can do a lot. So I thought it was great when I heard of Florida Gov. Charlie Crist’s new executive order that requires state agencies and departments to hold meetings and conferences at lodgings that meet the new Florida Green Lodging standards.
Aesthetic. Original. Functional. Who knew solar panels could make a statement?
Apparently Peter Richardson knew when he submitted a winning solar design to the International Design Awards. His idea is to turn disused water ways into functional space by populating them with solar panels shaped like water lilies. Aiming to increase quality of life, while generating energy, the lilies so impressed the Glasgow City Council that they expressed interest in developing a pilot project.
The technology itself is easily within reach:
“They can be moved and dismantled and are simply tethered to the river bed, integrated motors can rotate the discs so their orientation to the sun is maximised throughout the day.” (Project Description)
In other words, no new technology required, just some clever design. My concern would be recreational or commercial river traffic (how “disused”must the waterway be?). Would waves from wake disrupt the solar lilies? What about an impact on wildlife or wildlife’s impact on the panels? What if the river ices over in the winter? One hopes a pilot project would figure out the kinks.
What do readers think - would a product like this in your local water way make an impact on your community? (More images here)
The iconoclastic owner of the San Jose tract home featured in this article takes exception to the notion that green is expensive. Green, to him, is rooted in conservation of all resources, not the least of them being money.
Frank Schiavo’s compact, tract-built, three-bedroom ranch-style home in a modest San Jose neighborhood demonstrates that remodeling to create a cutting-edge green home is neither difficult nor expensive. Heated with sunlight and cooled by night air, his home is comfortable, quiet and tasteful, filled with light and local art. With only modest investments in a sun room, extra insulation, new windows, a very small array of rooftop photovoltaic and solar hot water panels, his electricity bill for the coldest, cloudiest months of the year averages a few dollars a month. His gas bill is even more modest.
What’s most impressive about Schiavo’s house isn’t that it’s so comfortable and practical for him to own, it’s that it demonstrates that lofty resource conservation goals can be achieved on a modest remodeling budget.
Off the Grid Homes combines beautiful images with technical information for sustainable homes.
The book by architect Lori Ryker is less of a manual for systems to be used in off the grid homes (though it does include good information about the systems and strategies that are used in sustainable off the grid living) and more of a showcase of state of the art homes at the intersection of appealing architecture and high sustainability.
For many, the phrase “off the grid home” brings associations of a rudimentary, hand-built, rustic cabin. It usually suggests a rough hewn character and images of anything other than refinement and elegance. But that image is far from the case in examples presented in this book.
In addition to being the 
