Top 10 Green Building Products 2011

Check out these innovative Green Building Products that made it in to the Sustainable Industries' Top 10 Green Building Products for 2011.

The products are selected by a panel of expert judges and Sustainable Industries’ editorial team from a pool of products nominated by their audience. Winners are selected based on environmental performance, scalability/market impact, innovativeness, design aesthetic, value and compatibility with the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED rating system.

Modlet
Some green building products are developed to tackle big problems. Not the modlet. The device, which is short for “the modern outlet,” was created in response to millions of tiny problems. Specifically, it aims to curtail power wasted by plug-in appliances when they’re not in use.

Mobile Solar Power System
Pure Power Distribution designed its Mobile Solar Power System to replace dirty, noisy diesel generators, which create air pollution in the form of carbon dioxide, particulate matter and carcinogenic compounds.

Juice Bar
The Juice Bar isn’t a building product in the conventional sense, but our panel of judges said that accommodating electric vehicles is something that designers and builders increasingly need to consider. By 2015, automakers are expected to sell more than 3 million electric vehicles worldwide, according to a report by Pike Research, with almost 5 million charging stations being installed.

 
Indow Windows
When Sam Pardue learned it would cost $35,000 to replace the distinctive-but-leaky windows on his 100-year-old Portland home, he saw an opportunity. The solution? Indow Windows. Inspired by the thermal lining of refrigerator doors, these thermal inserts can achieve 94 percent of the energy savings of double-pane replacements at a fraction of the cost.

HydroRight Dual Flush Converter
Plenty of homeowners are happy to cut down on water use, but few are willing to replace their toilets to do it, according to Michael Schuster, president of MJSI, Inc. That’s why his company began offering the HydroRight Dual flush converter, a drop-in device that turns a typical toilet into a “European-style” two-button operation.

 
Greensulate
To most people, fungus is far from welcome inside their walls. The folks from Ecovative Design want to change that — for them, it’s a building material. Specifically, Ecovative Design uses mushroom roots to make its Greensulate rigid insulation and EcoCradle packaging material.

 
Breathe Living Wall
Plants do a lot more than spruce up a room. They improve indoor air quality and save energy by lightening the load of ventilation systems. But how do you get more of the green stuff into the built environment? DIRTT Environmental Solutions’ Breathe Living Wall system is a simple yet scalable way to introduce more plants into buildings.

 
Adura Wireless Lighting Controls
Adura Technologies has been around since 2005. While its wireless lighting controls aren’t a new product — or the only lighting control system on the market — our judges said its open source technology, intuitive interface and retrofit-friendliness make it a solid way to cut electricity use.

 
SAGE Glass
Glass buildings are bright and beautiful, but they may be too bright at times. SAGE offers a high-tech solution: electrochromic glass that can shift from clear to darkly tinted at the flip of a switch. That can bring sizeable energy savings, lowering peak demand by as much as 24 percent.

 
SmartSlope Living Retaining Wall
Furbish took inspiration from Europe’s densely populated, greenery-filled cities to create SmartSlope Living Retaining Walls, which bring plant life to the U.S.’s urban landscapes.

Visit www.sustainableindustries.com to learn about the latest in sustainable trends in 9 different industries.