Greenlist(tm) Bulletin 08/01/2008
This is the weekly bulletin of the TURI Library at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. Greenlist Bulletin provides previews of recent publications and websites relevant to reducing the use of toxic chemicals by industries, businesses, communities, individuals and government. You are welcome to send a message to jan@turi.org if you would like more information on any of the articles listed here.
Titles here, abstracts below:
- ING sets green initiatives
- One-of-a-kind Shower Clean Suit has Japan raving
- CPSC staff finds synthetic turf fields OK to install, OK to play on
- Slippery customer: a greener antiwear additive for engine oils
- REACHing for less toxic alternatives
- Americans willing to pay more for eco-friendly products
- Lawmakers agree to ban toxins in children's items
- Rohm & Haas unveils 'green' products
1. ING sets green initiatives
Source: Commercial Property News, July 25, 2008
ING Real Estate is the latest firm to introduce a new set of sustainability guidelines for acquisitions, development projects and asset management of its real estate investments, designed to encourage more green transactions and practices as part of ING Group's worldwide commitment to reduce its carbon footprint.
The company's initiatives are based in part on the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design system, so the firm is requiring that, in most instances, ground-up development will be certified under LEED New Construction, LEED Core & Shell or LEED Neighborhood Development standards, with a targeted Silver or higher certification. Acquisitions
will require an assessment to identify sustainable elements and opportunities to improve existing sustainability, and the current portfolio will undergo sustainability targets to encourage the addition of green property characterizations and Energy Star ratings benchmarks.
2. One-of-a-kind Shower Clean Suit has Japan raving
Source: MerinoInnovation.com
Japanese business people have been rushing into Konaka Group stores this spring/summer 2008 season, to get their hands on the latest must-have, convenient, quality Shower Clean Suit. The Shower Clean Suit is the world's first wool non-iron suit that can be rinsed under a normal shower stream to remove the dirt, stains and smells of the day. The suit can be washed in the evening, ready to wear the following morning, with no ironing required.
The Shower Clean Suit is a joint product development between: Australian Wool Innovation (AWI), The Woolmark Company (TWC), and suit manufacturer Konaka & Co.
The Shower Clean Suit fabric design means that the day's dirt can simply be washed off without using detergent. Smog, dirt, smoke, smells and stains from food and drink are simply rinsed off after a few minutes under a 40 degree shower. The Shower Clean Suit is an environmental innovation that eliminates the need for costly and harmful chemical dry cleaning and is a revolution in Merino wool
technology.
3. CPSC staff finds synthetic turf fields OK to install, OK to play on
Source: U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, July 30, 2008
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) staff today released its evaluation (pdf) of
various synthetic athletic fields. The evaluation concludes that young children are not at risk from exposure to lead in these fields.
CPSC staff evaluation showed that newer fields had no lead or generally had the lowest lead levels. Although small amounts of lead were detected on the surface of some older fields, none of these tested fields released amounts of lead that would be harmful to children.
Lead is present in the pigments of some synthetic turf products to give the turf its various colors. Staff recognizes that some conditions such as age, weathering, exposure to sunlight, and wear and tear might change the amount of lead that could be released from the turf. As turf is used during athletics or
play and exposed over time to sunlight, heat and other weather conditions, the surface of the turf may start to become worn and small particles of the lead-containing synthetic grass fibers might be released. The staff considered in the evaluation that particles on a child's hand transferred to his/her mouth would be the most likely route of exposure and determined young children would not be at risk.
Although this evaluation found no harmful lead levels, CPSC staff is asking that voluntary standards be developed for synthetic turf to preclude the use of lead in future products. This action is being taken proactively to address any future production of synthetic turf and to set a standard for any new entrants
to the market to follow.
As an overall guideline, CPSC staff recommends young children wash their hands after playing outside, especially before eating.
4. Slippery customer: a greener antiwear additive for engine oils
Source: NIST Tech Beat, July 22, 2008
Titanium, a protean element with applications from pigments to aerospace alloys, could get a new role as an environmentally friendly additive for automotive oil, thanks to work by materials scientists
from Afton Chemical Corporation (Richmond, Va.) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). In a recent paper, the researchers established that a titanium compound added to engine oil creates a wear-resistant nanoscale layer bound to the surface of vulnerable engine parts,
making it a credible substitute for older compounds that do not coexist well with antipollution equipment.
Modern engine lubricating oil is a complex, highly engineered mixture, up to 20 percent of which may be special additives to enhance properties such as viscosity and stability and to reduce sludge formation and engine wear, according to Afton specialists. For years antiwear additives for high-performance oils have been phosphorous compounds, particularly ZDDP,** that work by forming a polyphosphate film on engine parts that reduces wear. Unfortunately phosphorus is a chemical poison for automobile catalytic converters, reducing their effectiveness and life span, so industry chemists have been searching for ways to replace or reduce the use of ZDDP. It's not a simple problem because the additive has several useful functions in addition to wear resistance.
Titanium is one candidate replacement. Mechanical tests of an organic titanium compound at Afton demonstrated that it provided superior wear resistance when added to a fully formulated engine oil, suggesting that oil chemists could use less ZDDP. Just how the titanium compound works was an open question, however. Surface analysis tests could detect titanium in the wear tracks of test surfaces but not with enough sensitivity to determine its chemical nature-and whether, for example, it was just lying there or bound to the metal surface. To resolve the issue, the researchers turned to NIST's soft X-ray beamline at the National Synchrotron Light Source (NSLS) in Brookhaven, N.Y.
The NIST beamline instruments use low-energy ("soft") X-rays that can be precisely tuned to specific elements to measure chemical bonds both at the surface of a sample and deeper into the bulk of the material. Powered by the NSLS, the facility is at least 10 times more sensitive than commonly available instruments. The measurements revealed that the antiwear enhancement comes from
titanium chemically bound into the metal structure of the engine surface, forming a hard oxide, iron titanate. Comparing the test data to that of several possible compounds, the research team was able to identify the specific oxide.
While considerably more work remains to be done, the results suggest that titanium could play an important role in future low-phosphorus lubricating oils.
5. REACHing for less toxic alternatives
Source: The Boston Globe, July 28, 2008
Lead in lipstick, phthalates in toys, Bisphenol-a in baby bottles, flame retardants in breast milk, Teflon in people's bodies. What do these have in common? They are consequences of the disjointed systems
we have in the United States to regulate and manage hazards posed by toxic chemicals in everyday products.
There is growing scientific evidence linking toxic chemicals in our air, water, food, homes, and bodies to chronic health effects in humans and ecosystems. Environmental health scientists and policy experts agree that flaws in the design of both chemical substances and our regulatory
framework are to blame. By passing a "safer alternatives" bill, state lawmakers can begin to address this.
The European Union recently instituted a broad overhaul of its chemicals regulation. Known by its
acronym, the REACH program will require that firms manufacturing or importing chemicals or chemical-containing products into Europe understand their health and environmental hazards and seek permission to continue using chemicals of "high concern." The US government, along with the chemical industry, fought vigorously against REACH. In this country, other than piecemeal, ineffectual, and costly efforts to address the chemical du jour through single chemical restrictions, there has been little initiative to overhaul our decades-old federal chemicals management framework, despite ample evidence of its limitations.
6. Americans willing to pay more for eco-friendly products
Source: Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, July 29, 2008
Many Americans, including those who are enduring financial hardship, are willing to pay more for environmentally friendly products, according to a survey conducted by GfK Roper Public Affairs
& Media and the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies.
"Many American consumers, even in the face of economic uncertainty, express a willingness to pay more for environmentally friendly products," said Anthony Leiserowitz, director of Yale Project on Climate Change. "Toyota can't make the Prius fast enough to meet consumer demand, to cite just one example, and many see 'green' products as the wave of the future."
Half of the respondents to the survey said they would "definitely" or "probably" pay 15% more for eco-friendly clothes detergent (51%) or for an automobile (50%). Forty percent said they would spend 15% more on "green" computer printer paper and 39 percent would do the same for "green" wood
furniture. Americans who said their current financial situation is "fair" or "poor" were just as willing to spend 15% more on environmentally-friendly detergent or wood furniture as those Americans more confident of their current financial situation.
Moreover, a majority of Americans said it is important to them that a number of products they purchase be environmentally friendly -- automobiles (66% say it is "important" or "essential"), clothes detergent (62%), and computer printer paper (51%). The survey also reveals that Americans want additional information about the environmental impacts of products to appear on labels. Solid majorities say
that it is either "important" or "essential" to have eco-labels that describe the environmental impacts caused by product manufacture (73%), use (73%) and disposal (79%).
7. Lawmakers agree to ban toxins in children's items
Source: The Washington Post, July 29, 2008
Congressional negotiators agreed yesterday to a ban on a family of toxins found in children's products, handing a major victory to parents and health experts who have been clamoring for the
government to remove harmful chemicals from toys. The ban, which would take effect in six months, would have significant implications for U.S. consumers, whose homes are filled with hundreds of plastic products designed for children that may be causing dangerous health effects.
The rare action by Congress reflects a growing body of scientific research showing that children ingest the toxins by acts as simple as chewing on a rubber duck. Used for decades in plastic production, the chemicals are now thought to act as hormones and cause reproductive problems, especially in boys.
It also signals an important crack in the chemical industry's ability to fend off federal regulation and suggests that the landscape may be shifting to favor consumers. The movement to ban the toxins accelerated last year when California prohibited their use in children's products.
8. Rohm & Haas unveils 'green' products
Source: TradingMarkets.com, July 27, 2008
Rohm and Haas introduced two dozen 'green' products for the architectural and industrial coatings markets at the recent American Coatings Show (ACS) in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Five products within the Rhoplex series of acrylic emulsion polymers were introduced at ACS, including low-VOC and APEO-free Rhoplex Multilobe 400 and Rhoplex AC-464 acrylic binders. Other Rhoplex polymer products include multi-substrate-capable Rhoplex VSR-50 for flat through gloss coatings, Rhoplex VSR-1050 for scrub resistance and washability in flat through semigloss paints,
and Rhoplex HG-706 for block resistance in semigloss and gloss paints in all colors. For color retention and durability in coatings for sports surfaces such as tennis courts is Rhoplex SS#4.
You are welcome to send a message to jan@turi.org if you would like more information on any of these resources. Also, please tell us what topics you are particularly interested in monitoring, and who else should see Greenlist. An online search of the TURI Library catalog can be done at http://library.turi.org for greater topic coverage.
This page updated Friday August 01 2008