Materials selection needs will heavily influence the advancing sustainable design and building movement that is drawing international attention and emphasizing reuse in 2012.

Accountability, transparency and continuous improvement will provide the underlying themes in a year that will see movement toward clarifying a dizzying landscape of environmental performance claims, according to the Western Red Cedar Lumber Association. Following are six sustainability trends to watch this year.

1. Full disclosure, accountability moves front and center. Measurement and performance will matter more than ever, predicts green building consultant Jerry Yudelson. States and cities have stepped forward to require commercial building owners to disclose actual building performance, placing increased emphasis on materials selection and the veracity of their environmental performance data.

2. Materials transparency following. Emphasis on accountability and growing pressure from users, governments and specifiers to minimize confusion about green claims is driving the industry toward a uniform system for evaluation of the environmental costs of building materials, according to Jack Draper, executive director of the Western Red Cedar Lumber Association.

3. Environmental Product Declaration emerging. Recent attention on EPD has the industry considering the so-called environmental equivalent to the nutrition label as a potential transparency solution. The U.S. Green Building Council release of Pilot Credit 43 toward LEED certification has given EPD a boost. The credit creates a new incentive for product manufacturers to obtain third-party certification of their environmental claims, and to release environmental footprint data such as that found in EPDs.

4. Continuous improvement is the new standard. Companies will focus their attention on improved product design with a goal of creating net environmental benefit. Naturally sustainable materials, such as those with a net carbon sink, provide an environmentally efficient model that will serve as a bellwether.

5. Retrofit is still in. Green remodeling and retrofit of existing buildings gained steam last year, a shift from almost exclusive focus on new design and construction. That trend shows no signs of letting up. Some project market share value will reach as high as 30 percent by 2014. Materials with verified environmental performance will play a large part in advancing the sustainability and efficiency of the retrofit trend.

6. U.S. green building movement going global. International influences on the U.S. green building movement have the industry ripe for growth and change. Emerging green building markets abroad and tightening transparency requirements will carry a noticeable impact in the U.S., heightening the importance of third-party environmental validation, especially for those who do business in other countries.

For more information, visit www.wrcla.org.