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The term "technology" refers to the application of knowledge for practical purposes.

The field of "green technology" encompasses a continuously evolving group of methods and materials, from techniques for generating energy to non-toxic cleaning products.The present expectation is that this field will bring innovation and changes in daily life of similar magnitude to the "information technology" explosion over the last two decades. In these early stages, it is impossible to predict what "green technology" may eventually encompass. The goals that inform developments in this rapidly growing field include: Sustainability - meeting the needs of society in ways that can continue indefinitely into the future without damaging or depleting natural resources. In short, meeting present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. "Cradle to cradle" design - ending the "cradle to grave" cycle of manufactured products, by creating products that can be fully reclaimed or re-used. Source reduction - reducing waste and pollution by changing patterns of production and consumption. Innovation - developing alternatives to technologies - whether fossil fuel or chemical intensive agriculture - that have been demonstrated to damage health and the environment. Viability - creating a center of economic activity around technologies and products that benefit the environment, speeding their implementation and creating new careers that truly protect the planet. Examples of green technology subject areas Energy Perhaps the most urgent issue for green technology, this includes the development of alternative fuels, new means of generating energy and energy efficiency. Green building Green building encompasses everything from the choice of building materials to where a building is located. Environmentally preferred purchasing This government innovation involves the search for products whose contents and methods of production have the smallest possible impact on the environment, and mandates that these be the preferred products for government purchasing. Green chemistry The invention, design and application of chemical products and processes to reduce or to eliminate the use and generation of hazardous substances. Green nanotechnology Nanotechnology involves the manipulation of materials at the scale of the nanometer, one billionth of a meter. Some scientists believe that mastery of this subject is forthcoming that will transform the way that everything in the world is manufactured. "Green nanotechnology" is the application of green chemistry and green engineering principles to this field. The 21st century has been called the "century of the environment." Governments -and individual citizens - can no longer assume that social challenges such as pollution, dwindling natural resources and climate change can be set aside for future generations. Through policy, research, education, incentives and forward-looking relationships with industry, government can play a central role in building a green future, community by community. The prospects for success have never been greater. A dawning era of creativity and innovation in "green technology" (also known as "clean technology") is bringing the promise of a healthier planet - as well as the prospect of growing businesses that can sustain its health. The excitement building around this sector is reminiscent of the early years of the information technology revolution. Green Technology is a non-profit initiative designed to inform government efforts toward sustainability, providing a forum in which government officials can communicate with those in the private sector who are developing and distributing green technologies. With headquarters in California, Green Technology is ideally situated to stay on the leading edge. California, with the world's eighthlargest economy, is setting the standard for state support for green technologies. With mandates for green building, renewable energy and "environmentally preferable" purchasing, California has made an unequalled commitment to a green future. While most states continue to lose construction jobs, California had the largest construction gain in the US in February, up 2.7 percent from January, adding 15,500 jobs. This according to an Associated General Contractors of America analysis of state employment data from the U.S. Labor Department. California has actually seen a slow and steady rise in construction jobs, adding 6,400 jobs in the past year. The state ranked sixth in construction jobs growth for the year ending in February. Solar to save school District $12 millionA 1.26 megawatt solar photovoltaic system at two campuses is expected to save the Mountain View Los Altos High School District more than $12 million through reduced energy costs and rebates over 25 years. The Cupertino Electric PV systems a 755 kilowatt array at Mountain View High Schooland a 515 kilowatt installation at Los Altos High School will cover parking lot canopies and are expected to meet almost half the districts electricity needs, producing 39.3 million kilowatthours of electricity. According to the district, the solar installations were funded by a local bond measure. New law to reduce pesticides in schoolsAccording to the California Department of Pesticide Control , California schools apply pesticides in their buildings and outdoor areas 27,000 times a year. A great many of these substances have had little or no testing for long term health effects of exposure. Not only are childrens bodies more vulnerable to the effects of toxic exposure than adults, but they also play in ways that expose them to toxins more than adults. A bill, SB394 (DeSaulnier), the Healthy Schools Act of 2011, would prohibit schools from using the most hazardous pesticides and also would prohibit high-exposure application methods, such as fogging. According to the DPR, 40 percent of schools are still using high-exposure pesticide spraying on playing fields, and almost 40 percent of preschools use fogging or spraying inside.

Sustainability education resourceLessonopoly, an open source educational resource, is offering a collection of sustainability education lesson plans from the Green Education Foundation. Lessons teach students things like how to research green resources in their communities for grades 5 8, understanding consumption and its effects on the environment for 5 8 graders, creating sustainable communities for a STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) unit. Resources are free to educators who join the GEF Community and Lessonopoly.org. Smart grid funding awardedThe Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) and Glendale Water and Power (GW&P) have each received $1 million grants for two smart grid projects from the California Energy Commissions Public Interest Energy Research Program. SMUD is partnering with Los Rios Community College District, California State University Sacrament and the California Department of General Services to expand smart grid technologies in the Sacramento area. GW&P will fund its advanced metering infrastructure project, installing new electric and water smart meters. School awarded for sustainability effortsDavis Magnet, an elementary technology and science magnet school received Costa Mesa Planning Commissions Mesa Green Design Award for implementing green projects and practices. The focal point for the award was the schools community garden, six composting bins, advanced lunchtime recycling programs and its Waste Free Wednesdays activities. The garden was started by James Christman, a kindergarten teacher as a learning garden with separate beds for each grade. Each bed has a theme related to the curriculum. Davis Principal Kevin Rafferty said the school plans to turn the entire quad into a garden with a gazebo for outdoor classes and resources for solar and wind energy measurements. Energy efficiency projects at Yuba Community College Financing for a central plant energy efficiency project at Yuba Community College District has been authorized. The $6.3 million expenditure is for a central plant at the districts Marysville campus, which will no longer need individual boilers and coolers to heat and cool its buildings. In addition,SunPower will also design, build and maintain solar arrays at Yuba College, Woodland community College and the Colusa County Outreach Facility and the future Sutter County Campus for almost $18 million. The district spans eight counties and almost 4,200 square miles in rural, north-central California. Funding green jobs training at high schools Senate Bill X1 1 (Darrell Steinberg), which would redirect $8 billion from a California Energy Commission fund for green partnership academies at high schools, is awaiting the Governors signature. The bill is part of a package of clean jobs legislation advanced by Democrats. It would provide an alternative course of study for students interested in pursuing green jobs. The clean energy jobs bills include SB 2X (Joe Simitian),approved by the Senate Energy and Utilities Committee and signed by the Governor in April. It creates a 33 Percent Renewables Portfolio Standard for California, requiring utilities to obtain at least 33 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2020. Some of Californias leading thinkers gathered recently in Sacramento at the Green California Summit. The questions on everyones mind: What policies will create sustainable jobs quickly? In a time of constrained spending, how can California create jobs without additional expenditures? Surprisingly, the answers may come from San Francisco. A recent lawinitiated by Lieutenant Governor Newsom and signed by Mayor Ed Leeis likely to become an engine of job creation. Every city, every state, should copy San Franciscos energy disclosure law for buildings. As a Silicon Valley venture capitalist, I should believe that technology will rescue our economy. After all, I spend my days searching for the next big thing: Hybrid vehicles, smart technologies, new sources of energy and the like. Sometimes called clean tech, these are the breakthroughs that could reduce our addiction of foreign oil, and create jobs. But will technology alone really create jobs? I worry that many of the existing technologies are languishing, unused. For example, in commercial and industrial buildings, smart lights and smart motors cut electricity consumption by more than 50 percent. Yet, even in California, these money-saving technologies are rarely used. My enthusiasm as an investor is muted when last years big innovation is collecting dust on the shelf. This is troubling. Why invest in new technologies when no one is using the existing money-saving technologies? If energy-saving products dont sell, it is bad news for the environment and terrible news for California workers. If money-saving innovations sit on the shelf, the unemployed sit at home. Economics 101 says when a technology saves money, it will be used. Not so in my experience. Amid the excitement about clean technology, the bigger problem is: How to motivate the use of existing energy-saving products. San Francisco may have solved the motivation problem with a blindingly simple idea: Grade buildings based on how much energy they use and publish the scores on the internet. San Franciscos recently enacted legislation requires that non-residential building owners calculate their ENERGY STAR score and disclose it publically each year. Today, most building owners have no idea what their ENERGY STAR score is. Spurred to action by the recent law, the owner of one iconic San Francisco building discovered the building had an ENERGY STAR score of 1, the lowest on the scale of 100. High utility bills had been ignored in this San Francisco landmark, but the threat of public disclosure finally inspired an energy makeover. ENERGY STAR scores grade commercial buildings based on how much energy they use per square foot. Buildings are compared to similar buildings in similar climates; office vs. offices, schools vs. schools, etc. A straightforward tool on the EPA website calculates the score. Until now, few building owners anywhere bothered to calculate their scores. That is about to change in San Francisco. Brilliant in its simplicity, public disclosure of ENERGY STAR scores will start a stampede to upgrade buildingsa rush to the top motivating the good buildings to higher levels of efficiency and embarrassing the laggards into action. An anemic score of 17 in a class A San Francisco office tower will generate action: An energy auditor will be hired, meters installed, lighting ungraded, fans and motors tuned, and old refrigerators replaced. The ENERGY STAR score of 17 will become 77. New jobs will be created and the building

owners and tenants will spend less on their utility bills. In San Francisco, building owners will no longer ask what is the cheapest air conditioner or the cheapest light fixture, but rather, How can I get my building to an 80 or 90? Excellence will become the goal. And as building owners install smart thermostats, smart lights and smart fans, jobs will be created. In an era of tight budgets, San Franciscos law costs the taxpayer little. Building owners save money through reduced utility bills and Californias unemployment declines. San Franciscos law is a model that every California city and county should follow. By some calculations, grading and disclosing building energy consumption could create over 100,000 new jobs in California. If that is the case, San Franciscos landmark legislation could be the most import ever enacted in California. Winners have been chosen for the 2011 Green California Leadership Awards. In cooperation with the Board of Advisors for the Green California Summit, the awards were established to recognize outstanding environmental achievements by cities, state agencies and other government entities in California. Covering categories ranging from climate change to purchasing, the awards offer a unique and rare public recognition of public sector accomplishments in sustainability. All nominated projects must be publicly financed and executed, and must have provided a measurable benefit to the natural or human environment. The awards will be presented during the a reception at the Green California Summit and Exposition on April 19 at the Sacramento Convention Center. There are many green heroes in state and local government, said Carl Smith, Green Technology editor in chief. These awards are not so much a competition as an opportunity for the Summit to recognize as many of these individuals as possible, and to spotlight achievements in communities from all parts of the state. Award Winners:Climate Change: The Climate Change award honors initiatives to reduce human contributions to greenhouse gases, and the City of Tulare is being recognized for its Energy Efficiency Strategy (TEES). The TEES initiative includes a variety of programs that are structured to reduce the overall amount of greenhouse gases (GHG) generated by the community. In Tulare, municipal operations, retail and commercial operations and the residential sector each take steps and participate in a meaningful way towards reducing GHGs. TEES includes four biogas fuel cells in Tulares fuel cell plant, creating 1.2 MW of energy each day. Alternative fuels are used in the citys fleets, and Tulare has completed retrofits on all its municipal facilities. Looking toward the future, the city is retrofitting all of its city-owned streetlights and building a 1.0MW solar project at its wastewater treatment plant. Energy Innovation: The Energy Innovation Award goes to the California Department of General Services (DGS) for its ARRA (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009) Small Building Program. Using ARRA funding, DGS instituted a revolving loan program for energy projects on state-owned buildings less than 50,000 square feet, of which there are over 11,000 in California. During phase 1 of the program, energy efficiency measures are being implemented in 452 buildings belonging to six state agencies. The retrofits are expected to save almost $1.5 million. The goals of the Small Building Program are to not only save energy but to create jobs, make investments in economically distressed areas, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, improve indoor air quality, stimulate the economy and make investments that have long-term economic benefit. The program has involved collaboration between multiple state agencies, private sector utilities and municipal utilities. Green Building: California government has served as a model for what can be achieved in green building. This year, the City of Sacramentos Community Reinvestment Capital Improvement Project (CRCIP) receives the Green Building award. The project, completed in 2010, entailed the new construction of five LEED Silver or Gold (green building designations from the US Green Building Council) city facilities. These include three public libraries, one state-of-the-art multi-use gymnasium and one community center expansion with a performing arts events center. The planning of the project was a collaborative effort that brought together the local community and public entities to develop the vision of economic stability, environmental sustainability and social equity in making the project a reality. In addition to leading by example as the city develops its internal infrastructure, the project also forwards the goals of the City of Sacramento's 2011 Sustainability Implementation Plan by reducing the City's Greenhouse Gas Emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. Purchasing: Procuring green products entails first determining what it means for a product to be green. This years award-winner in the category of Purchasing, the City and County of San Francisco, has pioneered a green purchasing program that is being emulated by many other cities and communities. In San Francisco, the Department of the Environment (SFE) and the Office of Contract Administration have taken lead roles in implementing the Citys Precautionary Purchasing Ordinance. Since the ordinance passed in 2005, SFE has created a list of over 1,000 green products for City staff with environmentally preferable specifications for 34 green product subcategories, and 13 citywide commodities contracts. Overall purchases of Required Green Products were almost $7 million. Seventy-nine percent of purchases for computers, 72 percent of janitorial papers, 78 percent of janitorial cleaners, 50 percent of lighting products and 93 percent of office papers meet strict environmental standards. In 2010, SFE rolled out a new website that lists all of the Citys green products and specifications, along with vendor information. Waste Management: The Waste Management award goes to the County of Santa Cruz for its Zero Waste Program. Under the program, the county passed the threshold of 70 percent waste diversion, one of the highest diversion rates in California. Recent efforts have included restrictions on polystyrene and single-use bags, a thriving green business program, increased waste diversion in the hospitality and tourism industry, recycling for special events, businesses and multi-family housing complexes, retail takeback programs for fluorescent light bulbs, pharmaceuticals and used motor oil, expanded recycling of construction and demolition debris, a food waste composting program for local businesses and support for home-based composting and a one-of-a-kind agricultural plastic film recycling program. Santa Cruz organizes frequent cleanup programs at local beaches, streams and other public areas in partnership with local environmental organizations, and special events to promote environmental awareness including one of Californias largest Earth Day

celebrations. Transportation: The California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) has won the Transportation award for its innovative recycled paving project using Cold Foam Recycling on storm damaged state Highway 84 on Ryer's Island. The original repair strategy was to remove the top eight feet of the roadway and reconstruct it with asphalt concrete and base materials, but it was rejected by the Central Valley Flood Protection Board as a danger to existing levees; moreover, it would be logistically impossible to get the materials to the island. The team decided to instead replace the top eight feet of the pavement for the entire three miles, and to repair the severe areas of failed slopes, with geosynthetic reinforced earth. With the Cold Foam In-Place Recycling strategy employed for the project, no asphalt or underlying aggregates were wasted. Natural resources were preserved, landfill space was not used, and almost no materials were imported to or exported from the project site. In-Place Recycling saved the taxpayers over $2.42 million. Water Management: The Water Management award, recognizing significant savings in water conservation and efficiency, goes to the City of Fillmore for its Water Recycling Project. Since 1955, the City of Fillmore has treated wastewater at a plant that was permitted to discharge effluent to the Santa Clara River. This $72 million project replaced an existing plant with a new, state-of-the-art water recycling facility that ended the practice of river discharges and enabled full-scale reuse. Because of the new facility, not only is there is no more river discharge of effluent, there is 100 percent effluent reuse. What has resulted is a project that goes far beyond wastewater treatment and through its various educational and community programs, encompasses recreation, education, transportation, entertainment, environmental preservation, sustainability, and quality of life for the City of Fillmore and County of Ventura. Green Culture: The Green Culture Award recognizes systemic efforts within an organization or community to promote the understanding and application of sustainability concepts. The City of Pasadena receives this award for its far-reaching Green City Action Plan. Based on the framework of the United Nations Green Cities Urban Environmental Accords, Pasadenas ambitious Green City Action Plan follows seven major themes: energy, waste reduction, urban design, urban nature, transportation, environmental health and water conservation. To engage the greater community in implementing the plan, Pasadena created an interdepartmental Green Team as well as a City Council-appointed Environmental Advisory Commission, which meets monthly to ensure public dialogue

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