The blaring of the green
Wandering through the exhibits at Greenbuild - the multi-acre expo sponsored by the US Green Building Council - this week at the convention center, I couldn't help marvel at the inventiveness bubbling up from our building sector.
Oh, I don't mean the products, though some of them were certainly impressive. What, for example, could be more mesmerizing than the huge, slow-turning ceiling fans produced by a company that goes by the, well, fanciful name of Big Ass Fans? Still, I'm not sure I'll be wearing the complimentary baseball cap embossed with the company name, for fear a casual reader might miss the plural and take away a singular impression.
No, what struck me as extraordinary were the marketing claims. The convention's slogan might well be: "How Green Is Your Jargon?"
Consider the creativity behind this rebranding: "Asphalt: The Sustainable Pavement."
Or this one: "Steel is the New Green."
How green? Green as a beanstalk, according to one man of steel, who explained that most of the product produced in the United States is recycled, and not made from new iron ore.
Red though they may appear, bricks are green too, because they're durable and can be reused, claimed the Brick Association.
And don't forget precast/prestressed concrete. It, you see, is made of natural materials; what's more, a concrete building doesn't need the additional structural supports other edifices require. Or so says one of its devotees.
You may have heard that, because of all the energy it takes to produce, aluminum is iffy. Not so, insisted the able spinmeisters staffing the
Even lowly roof coatings have suited up and joined the battle to save the planet. They prolong the life of your roof, thus saving the products and energy it would take to replace it, as well as landfill space. Go with a white coating, and it will reflect heat up and away from the building, thus reducing your air-conditioning costs.
If some assertions seemed a little dubious, others were thoroughly believable. That of Aged Woods, for example.
"We turn old barns into plank flooring, so it is the ultimate recycling," explained Jeffrey Horn, president.
And Diogenes would certainly have been pleased to meet Jim Harrington, inventor of a system that stores rainwater in large, tough plastic blobs romantically called pillows, for later lawn-watering. Harrington, a resident of parched Atlanta, says his product is great for areas with watering restrictions, but candidly acknowledged that you'll be quite some time making your investment back.
But what of Greenscreen, which builds a metal lattice that coaxes plants up the side of parking garages and other structures, adding a leafy Ivy League look and cooling them off. Don't the plants have to be watered? "That is one element we are working on," conceded the booth-staffer.
Although everyone spoke well of the US Green Building Council itself, some participants wondered how other exhibitors justified their claims to be green.
"I am scratching my head at some of it," said one woman promoting a genuinely green product.
"Green stands for cash," joked another.
Bamboo came in for some bad-mouthing, given that much of it is imported from Asia, and thus racks the carbon count in transit. But green, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder, and so it, too, has its story, which I heard from a vice president of Mannington, a New Jersey-based flooring company.
"If I was defending bamboo," said David Kitts,who, truth be told, seemed a little reluctant to take Bambusa on as a client, " I would say it is a unique, rapidly renewable resource." But do the transportation costs outweigh those benefits? "They are just two different aspects," was Kitts enigmatic answer. Was I being . . . bamboozled?
One company even offered to turn your cellphone green by selling carbon offsets for the power it uses. (Here's an even better idea, gratis, for some idealistic young entrepreneur hoping to make the world a better place: inconsideration offsets for chronic cellphone yakkers.)
I confess that after an afternoon wandering Greenbuild, I felt more than a little greenwashed.
Thus I was glad to encounter Allison Friedman. Her own frustrations with trying to build a green house led her to co-found the website Rate It Green; it's still something of a work in progress, but her goal is to let users share good and bad experiences they've had in their efforts to go green. Her group has also produced "Green Building 101," a boffo resource guide.
And to meet David Bearg, a longtime green enthusiast and indoor air quality consultant, who cautioned to be wary of all this blaring of the green. "Everybody is claiming to be green and they can't all be," said Bearg, who said that the US Green Building Council's Leed (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) rating system can help.
Ian Bowles, the state secretary of environmental affairs, recommends that homeowners who want to reduce their carbon footprint should check out MassSave (www.masssave.org), a program operated by the state's electricity and natural gas utilities, for rebates and incentives on energy-efficient lighting, heating, and insulation.
He also recommends the Energy Star program (www.energystar.gov), a joint venture of the EPA and Department of Energy, as a good guide to energy-efficient appliances and a source of advice on home handyman projects to green your house.
Meanwhile, with a growing number of third-party verifiers evaluating firms' environmental claims, a would-be green-e-ologist willing to do a little research can make informed decisions.
But keep your wits about you. It's a (green) jungle out there.
Scot Lehigh can be reached at lehigh@globe.com. 