WDMA's Environmental Standards Task Group Upgraded to Deal With Expanding Issues

The Window & Door Manufacturers Association (WDMA) is gearing up to deal with what the environmental standards task group chairperson called the tremendous confusion about how door and window manufacturers should comply with environmental standards.

Task group chairperson Peter Walker of J.M. Huber Corp. reported at the WDMA summer meeting in August that the group has been:

• Moved outside the door division to cover all products
• Upgraded to a standing committee
  
• Upgraded to an "A" priority
  
• Deemed a strategically important issue

Walker emphasized that environmental standards issues are not just about wood products, but other materials used by WDMA members such as metal, vinyl and glass.

"We have to greatly elevate the scope, focus and priorities of the association in environmental matters," he said.

The changes revealed at the summer meeting are to help WDMA deal with the tremendous amount of activity in the environmental arena. Walker said his group has discovered hundreds of organizations working on environmental issues in all kinds of venues and guises.

Walker said the environmental situation is much bigger than interior doors, the area initially covered by the task group. After the WDMA meeting in August, the task group was reformed to include membership by the window side of the WDMA. Walker drafted a letter in early September to the interior door standards committee to disband the interior door environmental standards task group and reform it immediately to include members from window products companies. The new task group will report to the WDMA technical review board.

Rick Perry, director of industry standards for WDMA, has been contacting association members in the window division about volunteering to join the environmental standards task group to help deal with what he calls the Green Monster.

The purpose of the original interior door standards task group formed in February 2003 was to develop a standard (or an appendix to existing standards) that identified the varying degrees of environmental certification demanded by the interior door market and would allow for definition of those product requirements.

"This sounds like a reasonable and achievable assignment, but once the interior door standards committee began its investigations, we discovered than an effort to promote buildings that are environmentally responsible, profitable and healthy places to live and work had turned in the Green Monster. He said the task group will determine which environmental standards WDMA will support," said Perry.

"Don't get me wrong! WDMA believes strongly in environmentally responsible practices and sustainable design, but this issue is being inundated with questionable information and many misconceptions."

"The task group determined that there is, literally, hundreds of groups and organizations involved in environmental activities and dozens of organizations that are involved with forestry-related practices. This profusion has led to the development of dozens of directories listing green building products and numerous voluntary (and some not-so voluntary) compliance programs. It is no wonder that the Green Monster is causing so much noise in this industry," Perry added.

The goal of the new task group is to shed as much light on what is going on in government agencies, non-government groups and other associations.

"There is a tremendous amount of confusion about how to comply with various guidelines," Walker said.

Ancillary to that is the number of new regulations by the federal government and state governments as well as the number of voluntary compliance programs such as the Leadership In Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) program by the U.S. Green Building Council. Walker noted that a number of government agencies have "sort of tacitly approved the LEED program."

Walker put quote marks around the word voluntary because a lot of architects and government agencies are specifying LEED and moving the program from voluntary to compulsory status.

"It is very important for WDMA members to realize that," he said.

"A lot of architects are not fully aware of what is contained in LEED and the number of incongruities involved in the awarding of points toward a LEED rating."

For example, the Sustainable Forestry Initiative developed by the American Forest Products and Paper Association is not recognized by LEED.
The WDMA task group continues to petition the LEED people to make changes.

"We keep putting information in front of them," said Walker. "We have not gotten changes made yet, but at least they are listening. It is a step in the right direction."

One of the issues with LEED is that there is almost an anti-wood bias, according to Walker.

LEED, which started in the new commercial building segment and is expanding into renovation and residential segments, is just one of many programs.

"As we started to dig into the environmental arena we literally found hundreds of organizations. So, what we will try to do is develop a watch list or matrix of about 6 to 12 key organizations to keep an eye on what they are doing. There is no way we can follow all the organizations, but we want to try to learn how to interact with the top groups," he said.

The matrix will include environmental programs, their respective materials requirements and related certification agencies.

In addition to organizations like the U.S Green Building Council which have developed environmental programs, there are dozens of environmental groups that do not have formal programs but they have agendas like not allowing manufacturers to use chemicals like chlorine in the production of vinyl windows or protecting timber from being used for products. These groups are working on legislation that affects everybody in the window and door industry. Organizations like Greenpeace are trying to get chlorine and other chemicals banned.

"Some of these organization agendas are based on junk science, as well as emotional issues and scare tactics like saying chlorine will pollute the earth and kill people," said Walker.

He added that there has to be a balanced approach to everything involving the environment.

"As an association we want to take an active role in environmental stewardship. We want to raise the level of awareness of WDMA members about what is going on out there and identify ways we can participate. We want to provide guidance to our member companies," he said.

To help WDMA members keep informed about the complicated environmental situation, Walker said his task group plans to utilize the association website.

Walker is also seeking the help of other members of the association.

"We want group participation to help the task group review and comment on various environmental documents. That kind of help is useful when people in the LEED program send 84 pages of documents to WDMA and want comments back with a short turn around time of less than two weeks," said Walker.

The existing WDMA Statement of Beliefs concerning green products was developed by the now disbanded WDMA green products task group and was approved by the WDMA board of directors on August 12, 2000. In addition to sorting through all the programs affecting the industry, Walker said the task group wants to develop an updated environmental statement for the WDMA. The last one was issued about four years ago. "A lot has happened in the last four years," said Walker.