Green Terminology

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• Active Solar - technologies are employed to convert solar energy into usable heat, cause air-movement for ventilation or cooling, or store heat for future use. Active solar uses electrical or mechanical equipment, such as pumps and fans, to increase the usable heat in a system. Solar energy collection and utilization systems that do not use external energy, like a solar chimney, are classified as passive solar technologies.

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• Bio Nutrient - Term used by William McDonough & Michael Braungart in the book Cradle to Cradle to describe materials that will readily decompose and become nutrient sources for other life.

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• Carbon Footprint - is a measure of the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) emitted through the combustion of fossil fuels.
• Carbon Offset - the act of reducing ("offsetting") greenhouse gas emissions. A wide variety of offset methods are in use, while tree planting has initially been a mainstay of carbon offsetting, renewable energy and energy conservation offsets have now become increasingly popular, and purchase and withdrawal of emissions trading credits is also seen.
• Carbon Sequestration - the act of cutting global warming emissions by capturing carbon dioxide (CO2) from large point sources like coal-fired power plants and storing it instead of releasing it into the atmosphere.
• Cradle to Cradle - a 2002 book by German chemist Michael Braungart and architect William McDonough. It is a manifesto calling for the transformation of human industry through ecologically intelligent design. Cradle to Cradle has also become a certification which provides a company with a means to tangibly, credibly measure achievement in environmentally-intelligent design and helps customers purchase and specify products that are pursuing a broader definition of quality.
• CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) - is a relatively new socio-economic model of food production, sales, and distribution aimed at both increasing the quality of food and the quality of care given the land, plants and animals, while substantially reducing potential food losses and financial risks for the producers. It is also a method for small-scale commercial farmers and gardeners to have a successful, small-scale closed market. CSA?s focus is usually on a system of weekly delivery or pick-up of vegetables, sometimes also flowers, fruits, herbs and even milk or meat products in some cases.

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• Downcycle - Term used to describe a type of recycling in which less than 100% of the original product results from the recycling process.

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• E85 - an alcohol fuel mixture that typically contains a mixture of up to 85% denatured fuel ethanol and gasoline or other hydrocarbon by volume. On an undenatured basis, the ethanol component ranges from 70% to 83%. E85 as a fuel is widely used in Sweden and is becoming increasingly common in the United States, mainly in the Midwest where corn is a major crop and is the primary source material for ethanol fuel production.
• Ecosystem - a natural unit consisting of all plants, animals and micro organisms in an area functioning together with all the non living physical factors of the environment.
• Embedded Energy - refers to the quantity of energy required to manufacture, and supply to the point of use, a product, material or service.
• EPA - an agency of the federal government of the United States charged with protecting human health and with safeguarding the natural environment: air, water, and land.

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• FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) - is a non-profit organization based in Bonn, Germany and founded in 1993. The Council's stated mission is "to promote environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial and economically viable management of the world's forests"

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• Greenguard - an industry independent, third-party testing program for low-emitting products and materials.
• Greenwashing - a term that is used to describe a company, government, or other organization that advertises positive environmental practices while acting in the opposite.
• Green Roof - a roof of a building that is partially or completely covered with vegetation and soil, or a growing medium, planted over a waterproofing membrane. The term "green roof" may also be used to indicate roofs that utilize some form of "green" technology, such as solar panels or a photovoltaic module. Green roofs are also referred to as eco-roofs, vegetated roofs, living roofs, and greenroofs.
• Guerrilla Gardening - political gardening, a form of nonviolent direct action, primarily practiced by environmentalists. It is related to land rights, land reform, and permaculture. Activists take over ("squat") an abandoned piece of land which they do not own to grow crops or plants. Guerrilla gardeners believe in re-considering land ownership in order to reclaim land from perceived neglect or misuse and assign a new purpose to it.

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• LEED - The Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System, developed by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), provides a suite of standards for environmentally sustainable construction
• LEED Certified -Generally speaking, the term is used to convey a standard of sustainability in a building. Buildings made out of post-consumer waste products or using non-toxic insulations, or that involve conservation strategies for energy, heat, water and waste can be considered components of what makes up a LEED certified building

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• Managed Growth Forest - also refered to as a sustainable forest, managed growth forests are timber lands which are monitored to ensure that harvest rates do not exceed growth rates in order to ensure continued used of the natural resource as well as the health of the eco system.

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• Off-Gas - The process of releasing (usually slowly) volatile materials from woods, some paints, some polymers, etc. Many of these volatile materials contribute to the deterioration of objects.
• Organic - Organic as it pertains to green items is generally a reference to a products that are produced without chemicals. However this term is often misued either by error on purpose in an attemp to greenwash (see Greenwash above). Items taht are truely organic should bear the USDA certfifed organic symbol

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• Passive Solar - technologies convert sunlight into usable heat, cause air-movement for ventilation or cooling, or store heat for future use, without the assistance of other energy sources.
• Photovoltaic - Photovoltaics, or PV for short, is a solar power technology that uses solar cells or solar photovoltaic arrays to convert light from the sun directly into electricity.

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• Renewable - energy derived from resources that are regenerative or for all practical purposes cannot be depleted.
• Recycle - the reprocessing of materials into new products.

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• Sustainable - a characteristic of a process or state that can be maintained at a certain level indefinitely. For planet earth, it is thus the intent to provide the best outcomes for the human and natural environments both now and into the indefinite future. One of the most often-cited definitions of sustainability is the one created by the Brundtland Commission, led by the former Norwegian Prime Minister Gro Harlem Brundtland. The Commission defined sustainable development as development that "meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs."

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• Techno Nutrient - Term used in the book Cradle to Cradle to refer to technological (as opposed to natural) compounds that may be used at the end of their life span to feed another technological compound or process.

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• Upcycle - Term used to describe an item that can be made into something of greater value in a second usage. An example would be an industrial salvage part that is upcyled into art.
• Urban Hardwood - Term used in reference hardwood that is collected rather than harvested from urban areas often as a result of a tree falling in a storm.
• USGBC - The United States Green Building Council (USGBC) is a non-profit organization devoted to shifting the building industry towards sustainability, targeting how buildings are designed, built and operated.

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• VOC - are organic chemical compounds that have high enough vapour pressures under normal conditions to significantly vaporize and enter the atmosphere. (The term VOC is also occasionally used as an abbreviation, especially in biological contexts, for "volatile organic carbon".) A wide range of carbon-based molecules, such as aldehydes, ketones, and hydrocarbons are VOC's.

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