Former Supreme Court Justice William Brennan once said: "I can get a year's worth of work done in 11 months, but not 12." I really can identify with that right now as three of my seven days of vacation have evaporated into emergency work (including pumping a foot of water out of our basement in the aftermath of a deluge here --  5 inches in four hours), plus poorly planned punts of regular obligations such as this newsletter. I just couldn't leave you, dear readers, even for a week!

I have managed to break up the work with short excursions with the family -- a 30-minute body surf break here, a $5 palm reading on the boardwalk there (You are very smart and will live a long life and be successful in your business!  Five dollars, please.) Who wouldn't pay five bucks for that kind of news?

Just for the heck of it, I'll start with the radioactive news (check out the comment string!) that the proposed Park51 community center and mosque near Ground Zero is planning to become LEED certified. My wife and I spent a couple of weeks volunteering with the Salvation Army starting the day after the disaster on September 11, 2001. So, I'm no stranger to the evil that was wrought there, nor to the amazing good that sprang from peoples' hearts in the immediate aftermath.

I can see both sides of this: The project sponsors who want the site built because doing so reflects the best of who we are -- and those who don't, who argue that even if the motivations are pure, it's the wrong place for it. One thing that clearly unites those opposed is that they're mad. Sometimes you need to stand up to "mad" and other times you need to respect the sentiments behind the anger. In this instance, the cries of "hallowed ground" ring a bit false, maybe it's the din of all the strip clubs in the shadow of Ground Zero that make it hard to hear. This seems like one of those times you need to stand up to "mad" because if we don't, we become that which we abhor.

There are a couple of new green lists and programs in the neighborhood, including one that is highly transparent and useful.

On the great public resource front, San Francisco just unveiled a really great green procurement tool that lists all of the more than 1,000 products and services that meet the city's preferred purchasing program, which was supported by data from GoodGuide, another Bay Area organization that provides a range of triple bottom line information about products and companies. What's in the water out there (I'm sure there's a website where you can find out!).

Oki Data just announced a 17 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions that result from taking some very simple measures, such as zoning lighting and installing basic variable speed drives to HVAC equipment and better instrumentation on their refrigeration equipment. On one hand this shows that significant savings in many instances are not that hard to achieve, but it also shows how basic and antiquated is our built environment.

Project FROG and YKK announced a partnership that hopefully will help us leap over business as usual into a new and better way of building.

Not to be outdone by the Princeton Review, Sierra magazine recently announced its Top 20 "Coolest Schools" that have done the most to reduce their greenhouse gas footprint. The winner this year -- the fourth time the list has been released -- is Green Mountain College. With a name like that, how can you lose. If one looks at the Top 20 Coolest Schools list, you'll see a lot of overlap with the Princeton Review's Honor Roll, which means that these honorees are really walking the talk. Congratulations all around.

The Look-Grandpa-I-picked-up-the-$20-bill-you said-was-fake-but-it's-real! goes to REC Solar for its plans for nation's largest solar carport array at the Southern Arizona Veterans Affairs facility.  There's something poetic about using the sun to help heal people who were damaged fighting for oil. Neft said.*

Rob Watson is the executive editor of GreenerBuildings.com. You can reach him at rob.watson@greenerworldmedia.com and follow him on Twitter @Kilrwat.
 
Image CC licensed by Flickr user hmerinomx.

* Neft is the Russian word for oil.