‘This is a wonderful book that should be on the desk of every architect and planner. It shows how

Box 29 Tools for Specifying Green Building Products 
David Baggs
The rapid growth and market impact of green building councils and green building rating 
schemes in Australia and internationally can be observed in the current dramatic increase in 
the interest and implementation of more ecologically- and health-benign developments and 
buildings. In a recent informal media survey by the author across Australia, six out of seven 
new major commercial office buildings were advertised for lease with Green Star building 
sustainability ratings. This growth in ecologically sustainable development (ESD) is dependent 
on designers, engineers, practitioners and specifiers being able to locate ecologically- or health-
preferable products with reliable information about their performance.
Ecospecifier
1
is a guide to selecting ecologically- and health-preferable products, materials and 
technologies for the construction sector, specifically targeted at the needs of decision-makers 
and specifiers by: 
• 
Providing greater clarity about what is and is not ‘green’ 
• 
Enabling easier identification, specification or location of preferred products 
• 
Facilitating greater understanding of the issues surrounding ecoproducts 
• 
Providing clear, independently assessed, unbiased information
• 
Providing third party, independent and unbiased assessment of information provided by 
manufacturers and other sources. 
Ecospecifier assesses products using recognized Australian and international standards, codes, 
ecolabels, life-cycle assessment methodologies, and green building rating schemes. It also 
reviews independent test data, third party research and/or expert opinion to test manufac
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turer declarations and claims, and seeks advice from an expert National Product Standards 
Technical Committee.