Inside Outdoor Spring 2017

44 / 48

Change. In other words, CO2 is the
base unit of equivalence or one (for
one metric ton). So over 100 years,
one ton of methane is equal to 34
tons of CO2.
As the earth continues to heat
up, more permafrost, methane clath-
rates under the ocean floors and the
Antarctic Ice Sheet continue to melt,
adding CO2 at an accelerating rate.
Montebello Agreement
(see REACH)
The Security and Prosperity Part-
nership (SPP) also is known as the
Montebello Agreement, so named for
the city in Quebec where the summit
was held. The SPP Web site states
that this is a Bush Administration,
White House-led initiative to increase
security and economic prosperity in
North America. Part of this voluntary
framework is to establish risk char-
acterization by 2012 of over 9,000
chemical substances produced in
the U.S. in quantities over 25,000
pounds per year. By 2020, Canada,
Mexico and the U.S. will “strive to
achieve…inventories of all chemi-
ommerce.” Many
view the Montebello Agreement as a
North American reaction to REACH,
the European Union’s Registration,
Evaluation, Authorization and Restric-
tion of Chemicals, which went into EU
law last June.
National Resources
Defense Council (NRDC)
A not-for-profit 501(c)(3), the
NRDC is an international environmen-
tal advocacy group based in New York
City. Membership tops more than
1.3 million people, with an operating
budget exceeding $120 million and
employing more than 400 people
including attorneys, policy experts
and scientists. The NRDC policy focus
is on climate change, clean air, clean
water, nuclear proliferation, urban
quality-of-life, habitat preservation
and a host of related sustainable de-
velopment (see Sustainable Develop-
ment) concerns. Robert F. Kennedy,
Jr., is a Senior Attorney at NRDC.
Net Zero Building (NZB)
The National Renewable Energy
Laboratory’s Paul Torcellini, et al, de-
fine a net zero building as “…a build-
ing with greatly reduced energy needs
through efficiency gains such that the
balance of the energy needs can be
supplied by renewable technologies.”
Torcellini, et al point out there is no
commonly understood definition or
understanding of NZB. Factors such as
net-zero site energy, net-zero source
energy, net-zero energy costs and
net-zero energy emissions shape the
evolving definition of this building con-
cept. A working definition of NZB is
building construction designs that pro-
duces zero annual carbon emissions or
nearly zero energy consumption. Net
zero building is also referred to as, net
zero energy building, zero net building
and zero net energy building.
Non-Renewable Energy
Non-renewable energy is an energy
source that cannot renew itself at a rate
commensurate with economic demands
within human lifetimes. Fossil fuels such
as petroleum, coal and natural gas
are not renewable as the timeframe to
renew what has been consumed takes
hundreds of millions of years. Such is the
case with petroleum where plant matter
undergoes catagenesis on its way to be-
coming fossil fuels. Uranium, aluminum,
gold and other elements or compounds
extracted from the earth are also non-re-
newable. Uranium, a non-renewable fuel
for nuclear power generation, according
to OECD’s Robert Vance, reached its
Hubbert Peak (i.e. peak uranium – simi-
lar to peak oil) in the 1980s.
Oeko-Tex
International Association for Re-
search and Testing in the Field of Tex-
tile Ecology or Oeko-Tex, was estab-
lished in 1993 by the Austrian Textile
Research Institute, the German Ho-
henstein Research Institute and the
Swiss Textile Testing Institute Testex.
Today it has evolved into a group of
14 test institutes throughout Europe
and Japan. Its certification programs,
Oeko-Tex 100, Oeko-Tex 100plus and
Oeko-Tex 1000 focuses on what they
term the four parts of textile ecology:
production, human, performance and
disposal ecology. Verification of Oeko-
Tex 100, 100plus and 1000 submis-
sions are achieved through the ISO
14000 suite of environmental proto-
cols, ISO laboratory testing protocols,
DIN EN, and IEC standards. Oeko-
Tex’s standards also exceed the cur-
rent best practices as defined by the
EU’s REACH (see REACH). The testing
institutes forward their results to the
Oeko-Tex Secretariat, which evaluates
the applications, issues certificates
to passing applications and tests for
compliance during the issued period.
Organic
In textile technology, organic
refers to standards ensuring sustain-
able practices during all phases of
fiber production. Beginning with
every aspe n under the
National Organic Program (NOP)
guidelines, post-harvest wet pro-
cesses such as dying and bleaching,
textile fabrication, manufacturing of
goods, transportation, worker envi-
ronment, labeling/compliance, pack-
aging, exportation and importation
are comprehensively addressed.
Presently, there are no processing
standards for organic fibers from the
U.S. federal government beyond culti-
vation ending with the consumer.
For standards related to organic
food, please see
Oxo-biodegradation
A two-step process that begins
with degradation by oxidation, fol-
lowed by biodegradation.
A variation of this developed for
polymers, such as polyethylene, add
a degradability component during
the material’s manufacturing. The
ad poly-
m - (light)
or hydro- (water) degrade within
90 days in a commercial composting
environment.
It is purported that in non-com-
mercial composting environments,
the biodegradation will take place but
at a much slower rate.
Data Points
t
www.inside utdoo .com
Direct Feed
OutdoorT xtile
GreenGlossary
RetailReport
OutdoorTextile
GreenGlossary
RetailReport
www.insid
Inside Outdoor | Spring 2017 44