BuildingGreen Announces 2006 Top 10 Green Building Products

Summary: BuildingGreen Inc., publisher of the GreenSpec® Directory and Environmental Building News, announced its 2006 Top10 Green Building Products on November 15. This fifth annual award recognizes the most exciting products drawn from additions to the two publications. Three of BuildingGreen's winning products this year save energy, two save water, three products are made from recycled waste, one salvages material, and the last turns concrete into a “great flooring option for commercial buildings.”

The range of product types showing exemplary innovation is amazing," noted GreenSpec coeditor Alex Wilson. "Most of the Top 10 products this year have multiple environmental attributes." BuildingGreen's Top 10 product selections, as in previous years, are drawn primarily from new additions to the company's GreenSpec product directory, which now includes more than 2,100 listings.

A big driver in the development of green products continues to be the U.S. Green Building Council's LEED® Rating System (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design), which awards points for the use of certain product types or for the energy or water savings that green products can achieve. "Designers of LEED buildings are looking for green products, and manufacturers are responding," said Wilson. In the online version of GreenSpec, users can find products organized by LEED credits.

Top Ten
The 2006 Top-10 Green Building Products are:

• Polished concrete system from RetroPlate grinds, polishes, and chemically hardens new and existing concrete into attractive, durable, finished floors.
• Underwater standing timber salvage by Triton Underwater Logging harvests underwater standing trees from forests that were submerged decades ago by reservoirs created by hydroelectric dams.
• PaperStone Certified composite surface—made from cellulose fiber (paper) and a non-petroleum phenolic resin—is a dense, hard, water-resistant, solid-surface composite material from KlipTech Composites Inc., used for skateboard ramps, countertops, toilet partitions, and exterior rainscreen siding.
• Varia and "100 Percent" recycled-content panel products from 3form Inc., are interior panel products that offer a wide range of design options coupled with recycled content (“100 Percent” is 100 percent post-consumer recycled products) and low emissions.
• Recycled-content interior molding from Timbron International comes in a variety of profiles that are made from at least 90 percent recycled polystyrene—75 percent post-consumer and 15 percent pre-consumer material.
• SageGlass tintable glazing from Sage Electrochromics provides glare control on demand while preserving views courtesy of a multi-layer, thin-film tungsten-oxide coating that is as durable as low-e coatings.
• Water-efficient showerhead with H2Okinetic technology from Delta delivers superb performance via large droplets and uses just 1.6 gallons of water per minute.
• WeatherTRAK smart irrigation controls from HydroPoint Data Systems Inc. creates watering schedules based on physical landscape features (as well as weather data) beamed wirelessly to the controllers each day.
• Coolerado Cooler advanced, indirect evaporative air conditioner from Coolerado LLC is a revolutionary air conditioning system that relies on the evaporation of water to cool a space, yet does not add humidity to the space.
• Renewable Energy Credits from Community Energy Inc., often referred to as "green tags," provide a way for building owners who are unable to install their own renewable energy systems to buy conventional grid power, while also buying the environmental attributes of electricity produced from renewable energy.

For more information, Visit the BuildingGreen Web site or call 800-861-0954.