By David Johnston and Scott Gibson
Looking for tips, techniques, and solutions to help you create energy and resource-efficient houses? The information in the Green From the Ground Up: Sustainable, Healthy, and Energy-Efficient Home Construction building manual is based on jobsite experience and teaches contractors to treat the house as a series of systems, then provides detailed green techniques for each of those systems.
Three hundred photographs and 60 illustrations cover foundations, framing, roofs and attics, windows and doors, plumbing, HVAC, electrical, insulation, indoor air quality, and interior finishes.
Author David Johnston is a green-building leader and consultant, and the founder of www.whatsworking.com and www.greenbuilding.com. Scott Gibson is a freelance writer and contributing editor to Fine Homebuilding magazine.
Edited by Alex Wilson, with Mark Piepkorn
Recently released in its third edition, Green Building Products: The GreenSpec Guide to Residential Building Materials helps guide builders, designers, architects, and homeowners through material choices to create healthy, efficient, and beautiful homes.
It includes descriptions and manufacturer contact information for more than 1,600 environmentally preferable products, and covers all phases of residential construction, from site work to flooring to renewable energy. Products are grouped by function, and each chapter begins with a discussion of key environmental factors to consider in those products. An index of products and manufacturers makes for easy navigation.
Editor Alex Wilson is president of BuildingGreen, an authoritative source for information about environmentally responsible design and construction, which also publishes Environmental Building News. Co-editor Mark Piepkorn has extensive experience with natural and traditional building methods.
By Jerry Yudelson
Green Building A to Z: Understanding the Language of Green Building provides an overview of sustainable building and technology, touching on points from history and global context to building and planning. The main text defines and provides background on key terms used to discuss green building. It also leads readers through a process of becoming a green-building advocate at work, home, or in your local area and working on initiatives within the government.
Author Jerry Yudelson is a consultant and engineer who has trained more than 3,000 people in the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED rating system.
By Russell P. Leslie and Kathryn M. Conway
Published by the Lighting Research Center (LRC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, The Lighting Pattern Book for Homes is intended to help homeowners and professionals design attractive, energy-efficient lighting for the kitchen, living room, bedroom, bathroom, home office, hallway, stairway, or porch.
The 222-page book illustrates prototype designs or “patterns” for energy-efficient lighting suitable for typical dwellings, and addresses products and techniques as well. Originally published in spiral-bound and hardcover editions, the book is now available for download at no charge. For a copy, visit www.lrc.rpi.edu/patternbook.asp?id=13306.
Also available on the Web site is the Builders Guide to Home Lighting, which includes some information from the Lighting Pattern Book for Homes, plus additional advice and practical details for installation.
Russell Leslie, a practicing architect, is associate director of the institute’s LRC and chair of the graduate programs in lighting. He is responsible for program development and operation of the LRC’s research and education. Kathryn Conway is an author, consultant, and researcher, and is principal of LED Consulting, in Nassau, N.Y.
