Summary: BuildingGreen, LLC, publisher of the GreenSpec® Directory and Environmental Building News™, announced its 2009 Top-10 Green Building Products November 12. This eighth annual award, announced at the U.S. Green Building Council’s Greenbuild Conference in Phoenix, recognizes products highlighted in recent additions to the GreenSpec Directory and coverage in Environmental Building News.

The Watkinson School Center for Science and Global Studies in Hartford, Conn., will be New England's first Project FROG facility, says FROG CEO Mark Miller, AIA. Rendering by Project FROG.

“Our selections of the Top-10 Green Building Products represent a wide range of product types in many different application areas,” notes BuildingGreen founder and executive editor Alex Wilson. This year’s list ranges from a recycled-content concrete block to a flywheel energy storage system for data centers, a mobile solar generator for job-site power, and an advanced modular classroom for schools.

The Silva Cell subsurface structure resists soil compaction, protects tree roots, and enhances soil drainage. Rendering courtesty Deeproot.com.

Energy-saving products among the Top-10 include a line of mineral wool insulation, an integrated rain-screen/insulation wall cladding for commercial buildings, a heat-pump water heater, and an energy control system for lighting in commercial buildings. A structural matrix system, Silva Cell, provides a support system for urban tree roots, helping trees survive in largely impervious environments and helping to manage stormwater runoff.

One of the nation’s most innovative furniture makers, Baltix, is being recognized for new products that incorporate a variety of biobased, FSC-certified, and recycled-content materials. “Many of the Top-10 products this year have multiple environmental attributes,” Wilson says.

The Mobile Solar Power system delivers photovoltaics and battery storage conveniently to remote locations. Photo courtesy of Mobile Solar Power.

BuildingGreen’s Top-10 product selections, as in previous years, are drawn from new additions to the company’s GreenSpec product directory. About 200 product listings have been added to the GreenSpec database during the past year. “New products are being introduced all the time, making it a challenge for our staff to keep up,” Wilson says. “We also continue to come across products that have been on the market for years, but were under our radar screen.” The GreenSpec database includes more than 2,100 product listings.

A major driver of the development of green products continues to be the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED™ Rating System, which awards points for the use of certain product types for their energy-saving attributes. In the online version of GreenSpec, users can find products organized by LEED credits as well as by building category and the CSI MasterFormat structure.

The 2009 Top-10 Green Building Products are:

• Pozzotive Plus CMUs and Concrete Brick from Kingston Block
• Thermafiber Mineral Wool Insulation Products
• Invelope Integrated Wall Insulation and Rainscreen System
• Baltix Recycled- and Biobased-Content Office Furniture
• Project FROG Modular Green Classroom
• Rheem HP-50 Heat-Pump Water Heater
• Convia Energy-Management Infrastructure
• Pentadyne GTX Flywheel Energy Storage
• Silva Cell Subsurface Tree Protection and Stormwater System
• Mobile Solar Power Generator.