Green Books

Are you looking for ways to live more sustainably, reduce the carbon footprint of your home, or remodel your house with sustainable materials that will save you energy, time and money? The following resources are either available online or at your neighborhood Houston Public Library.

Green Building Resource Center Book of the Month

This great book lifts the veil on how globalization degrades the environment.

From Goodreads: Shocking Bestseller: The original version of this astonishing tell-all book spent 73 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list, has sold more than 1.25 million copies, and has been translated into 32 languages.
New Revelations: Featuring 15 explosive new chapters, this expanded edition of Perkins's classic bestseller brings the story of economic hit men (EHMs) up to date and, chillingly, home to the US. Over 40 percent of the book is new, including chapters identifying today's EHMs and a detailed chronology extensively documenting EHM activity since the first edition was published in 2004.

Residential

Complete Guide to the Green Home (2008). Philip Schmidt

Eco: An Essential Sourcebook for Environmentally Friendly Design and Decoration (2003). Beth Wihide

Got Sun? (2005). Rex A. Ewing

Green from the Gound Up (2008). David Johnston & Scott Gibson

Green Remodeling (2008). John D. Wagner

Little House on a Small Planet (2006). Shay Salomon

Low Carbon Diet (2006). David Gershon

Natural Remodeling for the Not-So-Green-House (2006). Carol Venoliaa

Power with Nature: Alternative Energy Solutions for Homeowners (2005). Rex A. Ewing

Sustainable Residential Development (2007). Avi Friedman

The Carbon-Free Home (2008). Stephen Hren

The Good House Book (2004). Clark Snell

The Green Self-Build Book (2007). Jon Broome

The Home Energy Diet (2005). Paul Scheckel

The Not So Big House (1998). The Not So Big Life (2005). Sarah Susanka

Visualizing Density (2007). Alex MacLean

Wind Power: Renewable Energy for Home, Farm, and Business (2004). Paul Gipe

Your Green Home (2006). Alex T. Wilson

Commercial

Building Green (2005). Clarke Snell

Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We make Things (2002). William McDonough & Michael Braungart

Green Building A to Z (2007). Jerry Yudelson

Green Building Fundamentals (2009). Michael Montoya

Green Building Products (2008). Alex Wilson & Mark Piepkorn

How Buildings Learn (1995). Stewart Brand

Losing Our Cool: Uncomfortable Truths About Our Air-Conditioned World (and Finding New Ways to Get Through the Summer) (2010). Stan Cox

Over (2008). Alex MacLean

The World Without Us (2007). Alan Weisman

Green Living: Changing the Status Quo

Program Director Steve Stelzer’s Top Twenty for 2018

1.  Drawdown (2017). Edited by Paul Hawken

2.  The All New Don’t Think of an Elephant (2014). George Lakoff

3.  The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know is Possible (2013). Charles Eisenstein

4.  The Upcycle (2013). William McDonough & Michael Braungart

5.  The Story of Stuff (2010). Annie Leonard

6.  Fantasyland (2017). Kurt Andersen

7.  Climate Change, What Everyone Needs to Know About It (2015). Joseph Romm

8.  The Soil Will Save Us (2014). Kristin Ohlson

9.  The Righteous Mind (2012). Jonathan Haidt

10. The Sixth Extinction (2014). Elizabeth Kolbert

11. Countdown (2014). Alan Weisman

12. Scarcity (2014). Sendhil Mullainathan & Eldar Shafir

13. Junkyard Planet (2015). Adam Minter

14. Over (2008). Alex MacLean

15. Reinventing Fire (2011). Amory Lovins & Rocky Mountain Institute

16. 2052 (2012). Jorgen Randers

17. 1491 (2005). Charles C. Mann

18. Brain Rules (2014). John Medina

19. Navigating Environmental Attitudes (2012). Thomas Heberlein

20. The Vanishing Middle Class (2017). Peter Temin

Abundance: the Future is Better Than You Think (2012). Peter H. Diamandis & Steven Kotler

Blessed Unrest, Ecology of Commerce (1993). Paul Hawken

Confessions of an Economic Hit Man (2005). John Perkins

Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole (2008). Benjamin Barber

Don’t Think of an Elephant! (2004). The Political Mind (2008). George Lakoff

Ecological Intelligence (2009). Daniel Goleman

Garbage Land On the Secret Trail of Trash (2005). Elizabeth Royte

Guns, Germs, & Steel (1997). Collapse (2005). Jared Diamond

Home from Nowhere (1998). World Made by Hand (2008). The Long Emergency (2006). Too Much Magic (2012). James Howard Kuntsler

Hot, Flat, & Crowded v 2.0 (2009). Thomas L. Friedman

My Ishmael (1998). Beyond Civilization (2000). Daniel Quinn

Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution (1999). Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins, L. Hunter Lovins

Our Choice (2009). Al Gore

That Used to Be Us (2011). Thomas Friedman and Michael Mandelbaum

The Corporation (2005). Joel Bakan

The Impending World Energy Mess (2010). Hirsch, Bezdek, Wendling

The Lorax (1971). Dr. Seuss

The Secret Life of Compost (1997). Malcolm Beck

The Tipping Point (2002). Blink (2007). Outliers (2008). David and Goliath (2013). Malcolm Gladwell

The Wal-Mart Effect (2006). Charles Fishman

Toxics A to Z (1991). Harte, Holdren, Schneider, Shirley

Worldchanging: User’s Guide for the 21st Century (2008). Alex Steffen, Editor