Author: EPA

You can make your organization’s buildings greener by improving their energy and water efficiency, employing renewable sources of energy, improving indoor air quality, and using materials more efficiently. This issue of the WasteWise Update looks primarily at the materials efficiency aspects of green buildings, including the reduction, reuse, and recycling of construction and demolition (C&D) debris, and the use of recycled, reused, and otherwise ‘resource-efficient’ building products. If green buildings are ultimately about the safe and efficient use of resources, then the ways in which materials are used and disposed of in the building process are essential to this growing movement. The United States Geological Survey has estimated that construction accounts for 60 percent of all materials used in the United States for purposes other than food and fuel. This amounts to billions of tons of material used every year to construct buildings, roads, bridges, and other structures.

Click here to view the document: WasteWise update: building for the future