CM/Spotlight: Sustainability Spotlight Table Of Contents 14 Penning The Law In Green Ink Green legislation mandating environmentally preferable products and procedures is becoming commonplace. 24 Drowning In Excess Learn how to use less water in your facility to reduce energy and operating costs. 18 Closed-loop Sustainability A sobering look at how beer made us more sustainable. 34 Greenwashing: The False Advertising Of The Green Movement Don’t let the idea of green overshadow what being green really means. 22 Following The Green Paper Trail Choosing environmentally preferable towel and tissue products for your facility can help pave your environmental path. Penning The Law By: Aaron Baunee, managing editor Ink Green legislation mandating environmentally preferable products and procedures is becoming commonplace. In Green Aaron Baunee is the managing editor of Cleaning & Maintenance Management magazine. He can be reached at abaunee@ntpmedia. com. In his years with the pub-lication, Baunee has amassed numerous articles, columns and commentaries pertaining to commercial cleaning and mainte-nance. Baunee encourages readers to communicate editorial ideas to him and welcomes discussions on pertinent industry happenings. Connect through social media: LinkedIn.com/in/AaronBaunee, Facebook.com/CMMOnline and Twitter.com/CMeNewsDaily I for more info Visit www.cmmonline.com and type in search keyword: Sustainsbility . For more information on related products, visit www.cmmonline.com , select SUPPLIER SEARCH from the main navigation bar, and enter keyword: Green Cleaning . It seems as though nearly everything is a certain shade of green these days. Inescapable, green pervades life — especially in the commercial cleaning and maintenance industry. The notion of mandated green initiatives began with former President Bill Clinton’s Executive Order 13101, which directed facility managers of more than 100,000 federally-owned buildings to begin purchasing and using green cleaning prod-ucts in their daily cleaning and maintenance. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Americans spend more than 90 percent of their time indoors where, according to estimates, the air is up to five times as polluted as that outside. In knowing this, Executive Order 13101 was a pioneering piece of legislation that set pre-cedence for green efforts in years to come. Because of the real and perceived value of being green — in essence, operating sustainably with man-agement best practices in place — some states, municipalities and various other entities have instated green legislation mandating sustainable con-struction, cleaning and maintenance of the built environment. These various pieces of green legislation take several forms, including: Requiring third-party recognition of sustainable construction projects; 14 CM/Cleaning & Maintenance Management ® • May 2011
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