Forest Certification Stakeholder Forum

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Tuesday afternoon the Materials & Resources Technical Advisory Group (MR-TAG) for LEED hosted a public session for stakeholder input into the ongoing process of reevaluating LEED's certified wood and biobased products credits (see EBN Vol 15, No. 6). The MR-TAG, which I chair, had commissioned a team from Yale University's School of Forestry and Environmental Studies and Sylvatica to provide background research and tools to support the decision-making process.

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Waiting for Bill

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Well, I'm in—standing at the back of an auditorium that seats 6,000... at an event that does seem to me now like it will exceed 20,000 attendees. The registration lines this morning were astonishing, a mythical beast with multiple tails snaking up and down the expansive corridors of this sprawling structure. I tried to take pictures, but it was one of those scenes that a lens just can't convey. The west end of the third floor of the facility was choked this morning with people waiting for the auditorium to open.
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Friends of Bill

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Bill Clinton's keynote is this morning, and it's likely to be a madhouse. There are 13,000 pre-registrants for Greenbuild this year. In past years, up to 40% of attendees registered on-site. Yesterday morning at Member Day, USGBC honcho Rick Fedrizzi said that he expects 25,000 people. "My staff cringes every time I say that number," he joked, going on after the briefest pause to explain that "there isn't enough yogurt." I'm not sure that's the reason his staff is cringing; 25,000 is optimistic by any standard. He's a shoot-for-the-moon kinda guy, though—and he just might end up being right.
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USGBC Educator Summit

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I attended the USGBC Educator Summit this morning with a great group of green design educators. The opening speaker was Rachel Gutter, manager of the LEED for Schools program I believe.
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Greenbuild booth swag, part 1

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We may already have a winner for the best, smartest booth swag at Greenbuild '07: the "rethink the dress code—CLO.08" t-shirt from Big Ass Fans. Technically, these shirts may not be booth swag, since they 'cost' the very special Greenbuild price of a one-dollar donation—which funds are met in kind by the Big Assers and used to support ASHRAE Research on Standard 55: Thermal Environmental Conditions for Human Occupancy. CLO.08? It's the thermal insulation value of a t-shirt as defined by ASHRAE. Still don't get it?
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I hate to nitpick, but...

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Electric resistance heaters, outside, at the hotel. I guess the towel- and sheet-reuse program makes room for this kind of thing. (Nice place, though.)

"Saying that electric heating is 100 percent efficient is like saying that a Cadillac is 100 percent efficient because it burns up all the gasoline pumped into it."  —Lawrence Solomon, quoted in the 1993 book
Greenhome, by Wayne Grady. Read the EBN review.
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