Green Language: A Glossary of Green Building Words

Image Gallery

Appropriate technologies: Technologies that satisfy basic human needs while minimizing environmental impact. Appropriate technologies help communities be more self-sufficient by using small-scale systems that people can manage directly on a local level. Examples include locally created and decentralized (off-the-grid) renewable energy and farmer’s markets that sell regional, sustainably grown food.

Building science: The study of how a building’s systems function together under various environmental conditions in an attempt to achieve an ideal balance of comfort, health and safety. Assesses heating and cooling systems, energy efficiency, ventilation and humidity control.

Embodied energy: Combined energy required to extract, manufacture, assemble, finish, transport and install building materials.

Green building: Construction, using any of various methods, that promotes resource conservation (materials, energy, water). It also reduces environmental impact and minimizes waste in order to create a healthy environment and keep operation and maintenance costs low. The entire lifecycle of the building and its components is considered.

Indoor air quality: A measure of whether ventilation, temperature and humidity are sufficiently diluting pollutants inside a structure. Common indoor air-quality problems include mold spores; outgasing of noxious chemicals by paints, finishes, adhesives, furniture and building materials; radon gas; and humidity levels that are too high or too low.

LEED: Abbreviation for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, a four-level rating system established by the U.S. Green Building Council. Buildings are rated in each of five categories:
sustainable sites, water efficiency, energy and atmosphere, materials and resources, and indoor environmental quality.

Lifecycle assessment (LCA): Reviews the environmental performance of a product or building over the course of its life, including financial costs, energy efficiency and maintenance requirements. The process includes an assessment of raw material production, manufacture, distribution and disposal.

Natural building: The use of building techniques and natural materials that are based on locally available and renewable resources, and that are harvested or used in ways that ensure resources are not depleted or permanently damaged.

Net metering: A method that allows homeowners’ electric meters to turn backward when they generate more electricity (via solar pannels, for example) than they use. When electric meters turn backward, the customer receives retail prices for the excess electricity generated. Without net metering, a second meter usually is installed to measure the electricity that flows back to the provider; the utility company purchases the power at a below-retail rate.