General Further Reading
International Information | South African Information | Books to Read | Online Magazines, Blogs, General Information
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- Built Green (tm)
In the US, there is a great organisation called Built Green. To read about an entire house built according to their hectic standards, go to http://thebuiltgreenhome.com/ . - To read about Built Green themselves (including their exhaustive checklist, massive list of online resources (US of course) and extensive list of features, which go far beyond what's on this web site), go to http://www.builtgreen.net/ .
- For more information, also look at http://www.builtgreenwashington.org .
- Particularly handy are also are building guides at http://www.energy.wsu.edu/code/code_support.cfm
- Green Star
From Australia, similar to Built Green http://www.gbcaus.org/default.asp, but you have to pay for the information - The Seattle City Government has excellent information available at http://www.seattle.gov/dpd/GreenBuilding/ .
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We
HIGHLY recommend that you read their Remodelling Guides, which detail
every room in a home and how to make it environmentally friendly
– for example, should you use a renewable wood product or a limited
resource like granite as a kitchen work surface... Nearly everything
they talks about is applicable to South Africa:
Seattle GreenBuilding Guides
- More information from them is available at http://www.cityofseattle.net/sustainablebuilding/
- Similar to the above, and with more great info on the Documents and Links shortcuts, is Green Building King County http://www.metrokc.gov/dnrp/swd/greenbuilding/index.asp
- http://www.ecobuilding.org/
- U.S. Green Building Council http://www.usgbc.org/
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Rocky
Mountain Institute http://www.rmi.org/
- excellent information!
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http://www.homepower.com/
- great magazine with online info too
- Energy-10
SoftwareThis is a software package for designing a house/building sustainably. Go to http://www.sbicouncil.org/ and scroll down to Energy-10 – it's $325. - Sensible House Project. Sections of info missing, but generally OK http://www.sensiblehouse.org/
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The US Department of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy site
http://www.eere.energy.gov/
has excellent information
- BASF have put a site together covering most topics - and where their products can help... still interesting though http://www.betterhomebetterplanet.com/index.php?mode=systems
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The
Cambridge Sustainability Research Digest has many excellent
articles
www.cpi.cam.ac.uk (under CPI Publications) - http://www.woking.gov.uk/environment/la21/greenhome is the equivalent of Built Green, but from Woking council in the UK
- http://www.findhorn.org/whatwedo/ecovillage/ecovillage.php - an entire village built sustainably
- http://www.earthcrafthouse.com/ - one of the US state building programs for sustainable housing - http://www.earthcrafthouse.com/resources/builder-guidelines.htm has guidelines that might be of use.
- http://glenwoodpark.com/ - entire US suburb built according to Earthcraft House criteria.
- http://southface.org/ - resources on how to build sustainable housing (US again)
- http://www.portlandonline.com/osd/index.cfm?c=41481 – building guide from Portland city, USA
- http://www.simondale.net/house/index.htm - extremely rustic yet beautiful UK home
- http://www.otherpower.com/ is a group in the USA who show people how to live off the power grid by making their own energy from scratch (e.g. building your own wind turbine!).
Some local information and links:
- Eskom Demand Side ManagementInformation from Eskom on how to save electricity - http://www.eskomdsm.co.za/resdsaving.php
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The CSIR has developed a system called SBAT (Sustainable
Buildings Assessment Tool) similar to the Built Green
checklists, but for SA conditions and no where near as extensive
http://www.buildnet.co.za/akani/2002/nov/04.html
- http://eco-web.com/ is an International site, but has a section per country, including SA. A vast list of suppliers and services
- http://www.sustainable.org.za/ - products across all categories
- http://www.gisa.co.za/index.php - index of green sites in SA
- http://www.solardome.co.za - products across all categories
- http://www.solien.co.za/ - various sustainability solutions
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An excellent web site is
http://www.sustainable.org.za/greenbuilding/
which details a sustainable office building in Cape Town
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Excellent local resource is at
http://www.sustainableprojects.co.za
Also from them is http://www.sustainable.co.za/ which contains information as well as a multitude of products that you can order - Sustainable Energy Society of South AfricaSome good info, some more products to look at http://www.sessa.org.za/
- CSIR http://www.sustainablesettlement.co.za/index.html
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The Green Building Council of South Africa is trying to set up
building codes, training and certification, and aims to be
affiliated to the world wide Green Building Council
organisation. Contact details are:
Nicola Douglas CEO
Phone: +27 21 659 6591 / +27 21 685 4020
Email: nicola.douglas@gbcsa.org.za
An internet search for “Green Building Council” will bring up various other countries councils.
There are a large number of books to read on this topic – go to Amazon.com and search for environmental house or sustainable design or anything like that. The books also contain substantially more information, problems and solutions than are listed on this site – but to go further would be to rewrite these books. We highly recommend that you read them, in addition to the resources above. Some of the great one's we've read are:
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The Good House Book by Clarke Snell ISBN 1-57990-281-2 (also has
links to other great resources, pg 216 onwards)
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Living Spaces by Konemann ISBN 3-89508-925-7
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The New Natural House Book by David Pearson ISBN 0684847337
Online Magazines, Blogs, General Information
- http://www.treehugger.com
- http://earth911.org/
- http://www.greenphase.com/index.html
- http://www.dendrite.co.za/category/climate_change/
- http://www.goodcleantech.com/
- http://www.urbansprout.co.za/
- http://green.msn.com/ (general)
- http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17950339/ (general)
- http://greenoptions.com/ (general)
- http://environment.about.com/ (general)
- http://www.motherearthnews.com/ (general)
- http://www.backwoodshome.com/ (extreme)
- http://www.homepower.com/home/ (extremely good for house hold power!)
- http://www.solarenergy.org/ (training on solar energy)
- http://mygreenelement.com/ (general)
- http://www.worldwatch.org/vsonline (monitoring worlds “vital signs”)
- Environment http://www.heldref.org/env.php
- Earth Island Journal http://www.earthisland.org
- World Watch http://www.worldwatch.org
- Eco-structure http://www.eco-structure.com
- http://www.naturalhomemagazine.com/
- http://www.eco-structure.com (building)
- http://www.innovateenergy.com/index.php
- http://www.carbonfree.co.uk
- http://www.lifeinbalance.co.za/