Is your roofing cool?

As sustainable development has quickly moved from an admirable goal to a requirement, everyone needs to get up to speed on the terminology of green building.

Just in time comes a high-quality online dictionary of Green Industry Definitions, compiled by the Glenview, IL-based Metal Construction Association. This comprehensive, easy-to-understand list fills a need for companies who want to appropriately market products for the sustainable design movement, those trying to gather a better understanding of the terms, and building owners who want to be sure they use the right language in developing or marketing a high performance building.

For example, do you know what a bioswale is? (A landscape element designed to remove silt and pollution from surface runoff water. It is also known as rain gardens or constructed wetlands).

How about BEES? No, this is not a species of pollinating insects outfitted in Sting’s favorite sweater. BEES stands for Building for Environmental and Economic Sustainability. This software tool, developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, measures the environmental performance of building products by using the life-cycle assessment approach specified in the ISO 14040 series of standards.

Here’s one of our personal favorites: cool roofing. No, this isn’t a set of shingles that likes to chill with some jazz CDs. It’s a roof that reflects and emits a large percentage of the sun’s energy heat back to the sky instead of transferring it to the structure below.

MCA’s compilation of Green Industry Definitions is accessible in the Sustainable Design section of the association’s Web site, www.metalconstruction.org.

Everyone needs to get up to speed on the terminology of green building.

Just in time comes a high-quality online dictionary of Green Industry Definitions, compiled by the Glenview, IL-based Metal Construction Association. This comprehensive, easy-to-understand list fills a need for companies who want to appropriately market products for the sustainable design movement, those trying to gather a better understanding of the terms, and building owners who want to be sure they use the right language in developing or marketing a high performance building.

For example, do you know what a bioswale is? (A landscape element designed to remove silt and pollution from surface runoff water. It is also known as rain gardens or constructed wetlands).

How about BEES? No, this is not a species of pollinating insects outfitted in Sting’s favorite sweater. BEES stands for Building for Environmental and Economic Sustainability. This software tool, developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, measures the environmental performance of building products by using the life-cycle assessment approach specified in the ISO 14040 series of standards.

Here’s one of our personal favorites: cool roofing. No, this isn’t a set of shingles that likes to chill with some jazz CDs. It’s a roof that reflects and emits a large percentage of the sun’s energy heat back to the sky instead of transferring it to the structure below.

MCA’s compilation of Green Industry Definitions is accessible in the Sustainable Design section of the association’s Web site, www.metalconstruction.org.