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WASHINGTON, DC — The U.S. Department of Energy has launched a cool roof initiative, and Energy Secretary Steven Chu is urging other government agencies to follow his department’s lead.

“Cool roofs are one of the quickest and lowest cost ways we can reduce our global carbon emissions and begin the hard work of slowing climate change,” Chu said in a statement this week.

“By demonstrating the benefits of cool roofs on our facilities, the federal government can lead the nation toward more sustainable building practices, while reducing the federal carbon footprint and saving money for taxpayers.”

Cool roofs reflect sunlight and reduce heat gain, which decreases the need for air conditioning, saves energy and reduces carbon emissions. Cool roofs also reduce the heat island effect found in urban and campus settings where concentrations of black or dark roofs and paved surfaces create areas where the ambient air temperature is higher and the air quality is poorer.

Chu has directed his department to install cool roofs when constructing new ones, or replacing old ones, as long as it is cost effective to do so given the life expectancy of the roof.
This week, Chu detailed the DOE initiative, sent letters to the heads of other government departments and agencies and released the DOE Guidelines for Selecting Cool Roofs (pdf). The resource explains how cool roofs work, their benefits and how to select the right one for a facility.

Read more at GreenBiz News:

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is inviting small businesses and municipalities to nominate representatives to provide input on a proposed stormwater rule. The rule would strengthen the national stormwater program under the Clean Water Act (CWA) and focus on stormwater discharges from developed sites, such as subdivisions, roadways, industrial facilities, and commercial buildings or shopping centers.

Selected participants would provide input to a Small Business Advocacy Review panel, which will consist of officials from EPA, the U.S. Small Business Administration and the Office of Management and Budget. As required by the Regulatory Flexibility Act, EPA is establishing this panel because the rule could have a significant economic impact on small entities. The representatives will provide input on how EPA can minimize the potential burden on small entities of the proposed regulation. Nominations must be received by August 4, 2010.

More information about participating in the panel

More information about the rulemaking

At the world’s first Clean Energy Ministerial, U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu today announced that the United States is helping launch more than 10 international clean energy initiatives. These initiatives will cut energy waste; help deploy smart grid, electric vehicle, and carbon capture technologies; support renewable energy markets; expand access to clean energy resources and jobs; and support women pursuing careers in clean energy. The new programs offer partners concrete, technical actions to promote economic growth while reducing greenhouse gas emissions and other pollutants. The initiatives will eliminate the need to build more than 500 mid-sized power plants world-wide in the next 20 years.

“The Clean Energy Ministerial has brought together leaders from around the world to take unprecedented actions to deploy clean energy technologies—from energy efficiency to renewable energy to smart grids to carbon capture. These steps will promote economic growth, create jobs, and cut greenhouse gas emissions,” said Secretary Chu. “What we’ve seen here is that working together, we can accomplish more, faster, than working alone.”

Additional information on each of the initiatives announced at the Clean Energy Ministerial is available.

Constructing an additional bathroom is projected to be the most common home remodeling project in 2010, beating out the traditional favorites of remodeling existing bathrooms and kitchens, according to the website Remodelormove.com.  If you’re one of the multitude of homeowners stirring up dust this summer, consider a no-sweat way to save money on your home renovation: pick the right plumbing products.

Advances in plumbing technology and design mean that faucets, showers, and toilets can use significantly less water than standard models while still delivering the rinse, spray, and flush you expect.  Just look for the WaterSense label when selecting plumbing fixtures for your new or remodeled bathroom, and you can be assured that the products have been independently tested and certified to save water and perform well.  More than 2,500 different models of WaterSense labeled plumbing fixtures are available in a wide variety of styles, colors, and price points to help you save water and money.

Many water utilities and state governments offer rebates on WaterSense labeled products, creating an added financial incentive for buying smart showerheads and efficient toilets.

Thirty House Democrats signed on to a new bill on Thursday that would save Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) programs, which have been under attack from mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. PACE is a finance tool that helps homeowners afford energy-efficiency retrofits and renewable-energy installations.

The PACE Assessment Protection Act of 2010 would force the government-sponsored corporations to adopt standards that support PACE, based on Department of Energy guidelines.

Yet the bill’s author, Rep. Mike Thompson of northern California, hopes the legislation persuades Fannie and Freddie to accept a compromise before it’s signed into law.

The finance tool certainly has a lot of friends. It’s been backed by $150 million in Department of Energy stimulus funding, the vice president’s Middle Class Task Force, 23 state legislatures, governors such as Arnold Schwarzenegger [PDF], and mayors such as Michael Bloomberg [PDF]. California Attorney General Jerry Brown sued Fannie and Freddie yesterday to defend the PACE programs, the largest of which are in California.

PACE programs let home and business owners pay for rooftop solar arrays, high-efficiency furnaces, insulation, and other improvements through a surcharge on their property tax bills, removing high up-front costs. Fannie and Freddie dislike that those tax assessments have senior lien standing to mortgages, even though analyses and pilot programs have found that energy efficiency and PACE programs can make borrowers more financially secure.

Read the complete article at GRIST

MGM Resorts has won the Green Key designation for the efficiency and sustainability of its operations at 12 resorts, according to a report in Nevada Appeal.

The resorts include 11 in Las Vegas and one in Michigan, according to the company, and are the first hotels in both states to receive the Green Key designation.  Green Key evaluates hotels on a scale of one to five Keys, with five Keys being the highest ranking. Results are based on a comprehensive evaluation of the hotel’s sustainability efforts.

The properties earning “5 Keys” are ARIA and Vdara at CityCenter.  “4 Keys” designations went to: Bellagio, Excalibur, Luxor, Mandalay Bay, MGM Grand Las Vegas, The Mirage, Monte Carlo, New York-New York and MGM Grand Detroit. Circus Circus Las Vegas earned a “3 Keys” designation.

MGM Resorts’ focuses on five goals – natural resources conservation, sustainable construction and renovation, waste management, sustainable procurement, and communication and education.

Read the complete article at Environmental Leader

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences National Toxicology Program (NTP) and the National Institute of Health Chemical Genomics Center (NCGC) welcome the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to the Tox21 collaboration. The Tox21 collaboration merges federal agency resources (research, funding and testing tools) to develop ways to more effectively predict how chemicals will affect human health and the environment. The collaboration was established in 2008 to develop models that will be able to better predict how chemicals will affect humans. FDA will provide additional expertise and chemical safety information to improve current chemical testing methods.

“This collaboration is revolutionizing the current approach to chemical risk assessment by sharing expertise, capabilities and chemical information, which will lead to both a faster and deeper understanding of chemical hazards,” said Dr. Paul Anastas, assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Research and Development. “Through the Tox21 collaboration, 2,000 chemicals have already been screened against dozens of biological targets and we are working to increase the number of chemicals to 10,000 by the end of the year.”

There are tens of thousands of chemicals currently in commerce and current chemical testing is expensive and time consuming.

“This partnership builds upon FDA’s commitment to developing new methods to evaluate the toxicity of the substances we regulate,” said Dr. Janet Woodcock, director of FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research.

FDA will collaborate with other Tox21 members to prioritize chemicals that need more extensive toxicological evaluation, and develop models that can better predict human response to chemicals.

EPA contributes to Tox21 through the ToxCast program and by providing chemicals and additional fast, automated tests to NCGC.  ToxCast currently includes 500 chemical screening tests that have assessed over 300 environmental chemicals.

“Using the best science to protect human health and the environment is the ultimate goal of this collaboration,” said Linda Birnbaum, Ph.D., director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the NTP.  “The addition of FDA to this effort allows biomedical researchers and regulatory scientists to work together side by side to more rapidly screen chemicals and find more effective ways to protect the health of the public.  The NTP is pleased to bring its toxicology and coordination expertise to bear on making Tox21 a reality.”

A major part of the Tox21 partnership is the robotic screening and informatics platform at NCGC that uses fast, automated tests to screen thousands of chemicals a day for toxicological activity in cells.

“Our robots screen in a day what would take one person a year to do by hand, allowing a fundamentally different approach to toxicology, which is comprehensive and based on molecular mechanisms,” said Dr. Christopher Austin, director of the NIH NCGC.