Webwatch

Authors: António A Martins Teresa M Mata

Publish Date: 2011/05/10

Volume: 13, Issue: 3, Pages: 417-419

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Abstract

The pollution prevention network exchange P2Rx is an association of eight US regional pollution prevention centres that cover all the United States It was created in 1997 by the US Environmental Protection Agency and currently is partly funded by it Its main goal is the implementation and development of a network to facilitate access to information related to pollution prevention and waste reduction throughout the USTo fulfil their goals the centres act mainly as information hubs and promoters of the networking between states federal agencies local governments and other stakeholders such as industry and technical assistance providers The various centres work with a wide variety of partners including many governmental or private organizations in various activities including the participation in pollution prevention or waste reduction programs education activities amongst othersThe P2Rx site was developed to support the activities of the consortium and the needs of the various stakeholders It serves more as a hub presenting links to other resources in particular websites Yet from the main page it is possible to go directly to a description of what is P2Rx what are its main goals and how it operates Also a news and events section can also be accessed directly from the initial page including featured videos on pollution prevention and other relevant information The site presents on the left a list of links that includes the members of P2Rx main websites and other specialized in specific topics as for example bibliographic resources For example in the “infohouse” link connecting to the site http//wwwp2paysorg/infohouse/ it is possible to find an extensive database of pollution prevention and waste reduction publications most of them freely available and many of them old and hard to find Other available links point to repositories of publications hosted in other sites or ongoing projects that deal with specific aspects The “Topics Hub” area is particularly interesting as people from different backgrounds and/or industry can find particular information on particular areas of activity Also available is a networking area where opportunities can be found in various subjectsThe site could have been better designed as there is a wide variety of page designs between the different site pages and many of them can be hard to read Also some activities of P2Rx are presented in the secondary pages as for example the services that the consortium performs Therefore the search facility can be very helpful in assisting people looking for what they want Regardless the limitations and the focus in the US reality the website is very interesting to people working in pollution prevention and waste reduction with different backgrounds for example in industryThe Consortium for research industrial materials CORRIM is a research association created in the late 1970’s to update and expand the findings of a 1976 report of the US National Academy of Sciences regarding the production and utilization of renewable materials in the construction industry Currently the consortium includes 15 US members and Canadian research institutions and some companies private organizations and governmental institutionsAlthough initially mainly focused on the energy questions the progresses in environmental science the collection of data and a deeper understanding on the impacts of the construction industry lead in 1998 to a change in CORRIM goals Nowadays the main goals are the development implementation and managing of research and educational programs concerning the production use and disposal of wood and other biobased materials in the economy as a whole but focused in the construction industry The expected main result is the development of a comprehensive and peerreviewed database containing the environmental impacts of woodbased materials through its entire life cycle to serve as tool for companies in their strategic planning and investments in particular when selecting the more adequate materials Therefore the research activities focus on life cycle assessment carbon accounting integration amongst several activity sectors wood products and bioenergy basics

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