LivingGreen

Neighborhood tests food recycling. Are green buildings always healthy? Giving green buildings a smarter skin. Five sustainability tips for small businesses. Green practices conflict with homeowners associations. Green home guidelines will sunset this year. The carbon footprint of water. Also, follow @jetsongreen on Twitter or fan Jetson Green on Facebook for more news, links, and commentary.

Recently we caught wind of a Passive House under construction in North Carolina. Chris Senior, certified Passive House consultant, along with his company Anchorage Building Corporation, the contractor, sent us these media files and a note that the home will be on the Raleigh area NAHB National Green Building Home Tour on May 15 and 22. The ultra low-energy home will have a heavily insulated shell (R20 slab, R42 walls, and R62 roof) with a continuous whole-house air barrier.

Major lighting companies are working tirelessly towards becoming the first to own the LED market.  The super-effiicient light source is the future of lighting, but so far, for most consumers the available LED bulbs have been too expensive and dimmer than the incandescent bulbs we're used to.

But that seems to be changing.  In the next few months, 60-watt equivalent bulbs in the $30 - $40 price range will be hitting the shelves.  In comparison, just two years ago, a 60-watt equivalent cost $90 and a 100-watt dimmable bulb went for $360.

Could you live in 144 square feet of space? That’s what James Stuart of Canada set out to do and in the process created a mini prefab home with all the necessary amenities inside of 12 x 12 foot cube. Built from standard materials, the mini home starts at CDN$25,000 and has a teensy footprint.

Holyoke Cabin is an excellent example of an elegant, efficient use of shipping containers to create a cozy cabin off the grid. Two used shipping containers, obtained for $800 apiece, serve as the starting point for this quaint prefab residence located outside of Duluth, Minnesota.

With all the talk and shtick over "green" products, it’s easy to forgot that Tom's of Maine has long been a leader in natural consumer products and sustainable business practices. Started in 1970 with a $5000 loan, the company's products now take shelf space at 40,000 retail outlets, including Trader Joe's and Whole Foods. From its beginnings, with its groovy ClearLake Laundry Detergent, Tom's has still shown product innovation, most recently with its new line of toothpaste. Colgate-Palmolive bought 84% of the company in 2006, but one important stipulation of the deal allowed Tom's of Maine to continue its good-for-the-earth business practices without interference from above.

Author and food luminary Michael Pollan has been widely praised for his thoughtful inquiries into how our food is produced and what it means for...

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