Building Materials

The final years of the U.S. housing boom and a disastrous series of Gulf Coast hurricanes created a golden opportunity for Chinese drywall manufacturers. With domestic suppliers unable to keep up with demand, imports of Chinese drywall to the U.S. jumped 17-fold in 2006 from the year before. That imported drywall is now at the center of complaints of foul odors seeping from walls.

On bright days, the rooftop of the Anaheim Hilton is so blindingly white that it looks like a mirror positioned directly at the sun. That dazzling glare might just be the greenest thing to happen to the top of a building since solar panels. The white coating deflects nearly 85% of the heat that hits it, reducing the surface temperature by as much as 50 degrees. That means less energy is needed to cool the hotel's interior, cutting air-conditioning costs and carbon emissions.

Emily McCarthy thought the foul smell in her new Florida town house was coming from Samson, the family dog. McCarthy and her husband gave the English Springer bath after bath. But the stink wouldn't go away. And that wasn't all. Electrical outlets turned black. The air conditioner went on the blink. Then McCarthy, 33, started waking up with a bloody nose. It turns out the home was built with imported Chinese drywall.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is planning a government takeover of his country's cement industry, his latest effort to impose state control over key sectors of an economy battered by shortages and inflation. Chavez made the declaration during a televised cabinet meeting late Thursday. He has long accused foreign cement companies of keeping prices high and supplies tight by exporting their products to other countries while Venezuela is suffering a housing shortage.

Groaning and trembling slightly, a three-floor, 400-ton concrete structure was playing its part Wednesday in an earthquake simulation project meant to help prepare California for the Big One. In an obscure area east of Interstate 15, investigators at the UC San Diego Camp Elliott Structural Research Center are testing the strength and flexibility of precast concrete. The goal of the $2.

Architectural writer and music critic Thomas Small, 49, and wife Joanna Brody, 44, a public relations consultant, had outgrown their two-bedroom town house in Santa Monica. So in 2004, they bought a "decrepit" Culver City cottage to remodel.

It's an appealing idea: Order a prefabricated steel building, have it shipped to your home, bolt it together with a few buddies over a weekend -- and save over traditional construction. Many people have purchased a garage, barn or workshop from one of the nation's numerous sellers of such buy-and-build products with this scenario in mind. But, says John Knight, founder of Santa Clarita-based Knight Building Systems, some Southlanders end up disappointed.

Building materials maker James Hardie Industries was sued Wednesday by Australian securities regulators over its handling of compensation for people sickened by asbestos in its products. Hardie's operational headquarters are in Mission Viejo, although it is incorporated in the Netherlands. It was founded in Australia more than a century ago.

CARMEN ROGERS found her new home almost by accident a couple years ago while flipping through the pages of a magazine at the supermarket checkout line. There it was photographed on a steep hillside in Montecito, the home that architect Barton Myers built for himself and his wife in 1998. Divided into three separate structures, the steel-and-glass house is uncompromisingly industrial in style yet is still in harmony with the unspoiled, oak-filled hillside.