Green Architecture

PASSIVE SOLAR DESIGN + Green Building

2009-05-05T00:46:00.001-07:00

DESIGNING WITH THE SUN
The first step in creating comfort and thermal delight in buildings is to understand
the relationship between the climate and our need for shelter. There is
an enormous variation in climates that buildings experience. These can be at
the scale of global climates, from the Arctic to the Sahara. They can be
regional climates in the centre of a continent or on the seashore. They can be
local climates on the sunny or the shady side of a hill or street. All will influence
the way in which a building should be designed in relation to the sun.
The sun can be a friend or an enemy in buildings. Poor climatic design of
buildings, all too often seen in ‘modern’ architecture, causes many buildings to
overheat, even in temperate or cold climates where such problems traditionally
never existed. The power of the sun should be understood and respected
by good designers of well-designed, passive solar buildings in which the free
energy of the sun is used to power the building but not allowed to interfere
with the comfort and economy of the building’s occupants.
The five things a designer needs to know for a good passive solar design are:
1 how strong the sun at the site is at different times of the year
2 where the sun will be at different times of the year in relation to the site
3 how much of the sun’s heat a building will need, or not need, at different
times of the year to enable the building occupants to be comfortable
4 how much storage capacity the building should have in relation to the
available solar gain at the site to meet those needs
5 what the additional requirements are for controlling the heat gain from
direct solar radiation, convection or conduction in a design and how they
can be met by envelope performance, building form and ventilation.
There are a number of factors that influence the incidence, or strength, of
solar radiation at the site including:
• the latitude of the site
• the altitude and azimuth of the site
• how much shade will be given by any obstacles that exist between the
building and the site
• the weather above the site.

AZIMUTH AND ALTITUDE OF THE SUN AT A SITE
The angle with which the sun strikes at a location is represented by the
terms altitude and azimuth. Altitude is the vertical angle in the sky (sometimes
referred to as height); azimuth is the horizontal direction from which it
comes (also referred to as bearing). Altitude angles range from 0° (horizontal)
to 90° (vertical: directly overhead). Azimuth is generally measured clockwise
from north so that due east is 90°, south 180° and west 270° (or 90°).
Because the Earth revolves around the sun once a year, we have four seasons.
The Earth’s axis remains in a constant alignment in its rotation so
twice a year the incoming solar radiation is perpendicular to the latitude of
the equator and only once a year is it perpendicular to the tropics of Cancer
and Capricorn,

The changing values of azimuth and altitude angles are predominantly a
reflection of the changes in the relative positions of Earth and sun. These are
governed by:
• the rotation of the Earth around the sun
• the rotation of the Earth about its axis.
One of the simplest tools we can use for the derivation of altitude and
azimuth angles is a graph using Cartesian coordinates
incorporates two types of line. Firstly, those representing the variation in altitude
and azimuth over the period of a day (given for the 21st or 22nd day of
each month). Secondly, those joining the points on the altitude–azimuth lines
for a specific hour. Thus the solar angles for 11 a.m. on 21 March may be read
off on the horizontal and vertical axes where these two lines meet (altitude
36°, azimuth 19°). Values for other days may be read by interpolating between
these lines.

It may appear that these are the only determinants of angular position,
however we are actually concerned with the direction of the sun’s radiation
rather than the Earth–sun position. Also, radiation does not travel in an
entirely straight line but is bent slightly by the Earth’s atmosphere.
The distance between the Earth and the sun is approximately 150 million
km, varying slightly through the year with the variation of the azimuth and
altitude angles with time.
All passive solar features involve the transmission of solar radiation through
a protective glazing layer(s) on the sun side of a building, into a building space
where it is absorbed and stored by thermal mass (for example thick masonry
walls and floors or water-filled containers). The typical processes involved are:
• collection – to collect solar energy, double-glazed windows are used on
the south-facing side of the house

• storage – after the sun’s energy has been collected, some heat is immediately
used in the living spaces and some is stored for later use. The storage,
called thermal mass, is usually built into the floors and/or interior walls.
Mass is characterised by its ability to absorb heat, store it and release it
slowly as the temperature inside the house falls. Concrete, stone, brick and
water can be used as mass
• distribution – heat stored in floors and walls is slowly released by radiation,
convection and conduction. In a hybrid system, fans, vents and
blowers may be used to distribute the heat.
There are several types of passive solar system that can be used in homes. The
most common are direct gain, indirect gain and isolated gain.
SYSTEM COMPONENTS
There are three key components to all passive solar systems for heating:
• collector
• mass
• heated space.
DIRECT GAIN SYSTEMS
Direct gain systems are most commonly used in passive solar architecture.
The roof, walls and floor are insulated to a high level. Solar radiation enters
through the windows and is absorbed by the heavy material of the building.
The whole building structure gradually collects and stores solar energy during
the day. Heavy building materials provide thermal storage. The collected
solar energy is gradually released at night when there is no solar gain.
Direct gain systems commonly utilise windows or skylights to allow solar
radiation to directly enter zones to be heated. If the building is constructed
of lightweight materials, mass may need to be added to the building interior
to increase its heat storage capacity. The proportion of a building’s heating
needs that can be met by solar energy increases as the area of sun-facing
glazing increases. Additional mass must therefore be used to reduce interior
temperature swings and delay the release of solar energy into occupied
spaces. While the mass that is directly illuminated by the incident energy,
sunshine, is the most effective for energy storage, long-wave radiation
exchanges and convective air currents in the solar heated rooms allow nonilluminated
mass to also provide effective energy storage.

Why Green Building?

2009-05-02T18:14:00.000-07:00

In order to understand the thinking behind green building principles it is necessary
to remember why we should be so concerned with such issues in the construction
industry. Perhaps producing more energy from renewable sources and protecting
wildlife and habitats is much more important? Indeed there are many who do not
give green building a high priority. It is surprising how many environmental
groups, for instance, appear to attach a low priority to their built environment.
Groups concerned with the natural environment, wildlife, habitats and so on,
sometimes inhabit or build dreadful buildings using toxic materials and high
embodied energy materials.
Many others see the issue purely in terms of energy efficiency or more
specifically fuel efficiency and are largely unconcerned about the environmental
impacts of the materials which they use to achieve reductions in gas, oil and
electricity bills. Government and European research and development
programmes such as Joule/Thermie, Save and Altener or the UK Clean
Technology programme seem largely designed to encourage high technology
development, leading to new and more products and systems which will expand
industry and create new markets.
When the four main principles set out above are taken into account, it becomes
clear that the building materials industry, the transport of materials and products,
their construction on site and then the pollution and energy wastage coming from
buildings collectively has a surprisingly wider impact on the environment than
most other human activities. The Vales have suggested that 66% of total UK
energy consumption is accounted for by buildings and building construction and
services.10 Thus the importance of buildings and the construction industry has to
be seen as one of the most, if not the most important user of energy and resources
in advanced society.
Major savings will not be achieved only by putting more insulation in homes
or using low energy light bulbs, a much more fundamental review of all building
materials production and construction methods, transportation etc. is required.
Thus if we are concerned about ozone depletion, wastage of limited natural
resources, such as oil, gas and minerals, the loss of forested areas, toxic chemical
manufacture and emissions, destruction of natural habitats and so on, tackling the
built environment is going to go a long way to addressing these issues.

What Is a Green Building?

2009-05-02T09:32:00.000-07:00

We’ve been talking about green buildings in general. Now let’s get a little
more speciŠc about what we actually mean by the term“green building.”
Utilizing the LEED system of the US Green Building Council, introduced
in the previous chapter, a green building is one that is built considering the
following Šve factors. However, most green buildings do not incorporate
all of these measures, but rather the project team picks and chooses those
that are appropriate for a project’s budget and goals.
1. Promote Selection of Appropriate Sites and
Environmentally Sustainable Site Development
• Locate projects on sites away from wetlands, above the 100-year šood
level, away from prime agricultural land and away from endangered
or threatened species habitat.
• Locate projects on sites where there is already urban infrastructure to
serve them.
• Locate projects on brownŠeld sites that have been remediated of contamination;
these usually have infrastructure already in place.
• Provide opportunities and building infrastructure for people to commute
to work using public transit and bicycles.
• Minimize parking to discourage excessive auto use.
• Provide low-emission vehicles and car-sharing arrangements to reduce
gasoline use.
• Protect open space in site development and restore open space on already
impacted sites.
• Manage stormwater to reduce the rate and quantity of stormwater
runoª, and use best practices to clean stormwater before it leaves the
site.
• Manage landscaping and parking lots to reduce excessive areas of
open pavement that cause heating of the area around a building in
summer, leading tomore air-conditioning use.
• Control interior and exterior light from leaving the site, helping to
make skies darker at night.
2. Promote Efficient Use ofWater Resources
• Control irrigation water use for landscaping, using as little as possible.
Select native landscaping which demands little or no added water.
• Look for alternative ways to reduce sewage šows from the project,
possibly even treating the wastewater onsite.
• Use water-conserving Šxtures inside the building, to reduce overall
water demand.
3. Conserve Energy, Use Renewable Energy and
Protect Atmospheric Resources
• Reduce the energy use (and environmental impact) of buildings 20%
ormore below the level of a standard building.
• Use onsite renewable energy to supply a portion of the building’s electrical
and gas (thermal energy) needs, using solar photovoltaic (PV)
panels or solar water heating.
• Commission the building by verifying the functional performance of
all energy-using systems after they are installed but before the building
is occupied.
• Reduce the use of ozone-harming and global-warming chemicals in
building refrigeration and air-conditioning systems.
• Provide a means to troubleshoot the building’s energy use on a continuing
basis by installingmeasuring andmonitoring devices.
• Supply 35%ormore of the building’s electrical supply with purchased
green power fromoªsite installations, typically fromwind farms.
4. Conserve BuildingMaterials, Reduce ConstructionWaste
and Sensibly Use Natural Resources
• Install permanent locations for recycling bins to encourage the practice
in building operations.
• Reuse existing buildings, including interior and exterior materials, to
reduce the energy use and environmental impacts associated with
producing new buildingmaterials.
• Reduce construction waste disposal by 50% or more to cut costs and
reduce landŠll use.
• Use salvaged and reclaimed building materials such as decorative
brick and wood timbers that are still structurally sound.
• Use recycled-content building materials that are made from “downcycled”
materials such as recycled concrete, dry wall, šy ash fromcoalŠred
plants and newspapers.
• Use materials that are harvested and processed in the region, within
500 miles, to cut the transportation impacts associated with bringing
themfromfarther away.
• Use rapidly renewable materials that have a ten-year regeneration
time or less, such as bamboo, cork, linoleum, wheatboard or strawboard
cabinetry.
• Purchase 50% or more of the wood products in the building from
forests certiŠed for sustainable harvesting and good management
practices.
5. Protect and Enhance Indoor Environmental Quality
• Provide non-smoking buildings, or separate ventilation systems
where smoking is allowed (such as in high-rise housing).
• Monitor delivery of outside air ventilation so that it responds to demand
by using sensors for carbon dioxide levels to adjust air šow.
• Provide for 30% increased ventilation above code levels, or natural
ventilation of indoor work areas, to increase the amount of healthy air
in the building.
• Conduct construction activities so that there is clean air at the startup
of systems and no dust ormoisture inmaterials such as ductwork and
sheet rock. The idea is to get rid of “new-building smell” and its associated
toxicity.
• Use low-emittingmaterials in the building to reduce sources of future
contamination, including oª-gassing frompaints and coatings, adhesives
and sealants, carpets and backing and composite (or engineered)
wood or agriŠber products.
• Make sure that areas where chemicals are mixed or used (such as inhouse
printing plants or large copy rooms) are separately ventilated,
and install walk-oª mats or grilles at building entrances to capture
contaminants before they enter the building.
• Provide for individual thermal comfort of building occupants, with
respect to temperature and humidity.
• Provide for occupant control of building lighting and ventilation systems.
• Provide for adequate daylighting of interior work spaces, using both
vision glazing and overhead light sources such as skylights and roof
monitors (vertical glazing).
• Provide for views of the outdoors from at least 90% of all workspaces
so that people can connect with the environment.

Becoming a Green Building Advocate

2009-05-02T08:58:00.000-07:00

In Your Office orWorkplace
There are many things you can do where you work to promote green
buildings and sustainable design.Here are a few brief suggestions you can
implement right away.
Reducing Your Carbon Footprint
In early 2007 Swiss Re, amajor global insurance company, announced that
it would be supporting investments and purchases made by employees
that contribute to reducing carbon dioxide emissions. The new “COYou2
reduce and gain” program is part of Swiss Re’s commitments supporting
the Clinton Global Initiative. In 2003 Swiss Re declared that it wouldmake
its own operations carbon neutral by 2013. Now, as part of the Clinton
Global Initiative, Swiss Re has decided to support measures taken by its
employees that contribute to the reduction of CO2 emissions.
The “COYou2 reduce and gain” program supports employees’ investments
in measures that contribute to reducing greenhouse gas emissions,
particularly in relation to mobility, heating and electrical energy. Such
measures, which vary according to regional circumstances and preferences,
include low-emission hybrid cars, use of public transport and the
installation of solar panels or heat pumps. Fromnow until the end of 2011,
Swiss Re plans to rebate each employee one-half of the amounts invested
in these measures, up to a maximum per employee of 5,000 Swiss francs
(about $4,000) or the equivalent in local currency.
According to Ivo Menzinger, Head of Sustainability & Emerging Risk
Management,who is in charge of the “COYou2 reduce and gain” program,“Swiss Re is actively engaged in mitigating climate change and its consequences.
This program is an investment that will encourage our employees
to make a personal contribution and further raises awareness of the
issue.”1
Take action with your company or business. Some easy steps to take
include:
• If you operate a šeet of vehicles, convert them all to hybrids and cut
your normal gasoline consumption by 35%to 50%.
• Subsidize employees’ use of public transit, at least 50%ormore.
• Discourage single occupancy vehicle use by not paying for parking.
• Provide secured bicycle storage in your building with shower facilities
or nearby health club passes to encourage people to ride to work in
good weather. (This is also a great “wellness” initiative.)
• BuyGreen Tags or other “carbon oªsets” to cover 100%of your annual
travel mileage by car, bus, ferry and airplane. (There are a large number
of organizations that cater to this need.)
• Buy green power for the electricity consumption of your workplace;
wind-generated power is widely available froma large number of reputable
organizations;make sure it is “Green-e” certiŠed fromthe Center
for Resource Solutions.2
• Begin the journey to sustainability by examining all of your operations,
to see how to reduce their environmental footprint; this activity
can involve everyone in the organization; even simple steps like eliminating
wastebaskets under individual desks in favor of paper recycling
boxes sends a simplemessage, as does having the IT department set all
the printer default setting to “duplex” so people will stop printing on
one side of the paper for internal use.
• Undertake a LEED-EB assessment of your existing building operations;
LEED for Existing Buildings is a comprehensive evaluation and
benchmarking system that will help you “green” your operations and
engage the entire workforce in the eªort.
• Buy laptops and šat-panel monitors for everyone to cut energy use
from “plug loads,” often 20% or more of the total energy use of an
o‹ce.
• Re-lamp and install lighting controls, so you are using only the most
e‹cient Šxtures and lights don’t operate when people aren’t using a
roomor o‹ce.
• Join the US Green Building Council as a corporate or agencymember
and become part of the solution; once you join, everyone in the company
or agency can enjoy themembership beneŠts.• Study all of the other aspects of your business operations and work to
change each aspect, over time, to more sustainable options, then encourage
employees to take those same principles home.
In Your Home or Apartment
The most powerful agent of change is your own personal experience.
Think of what you can do to promote green buildings and green operations
where you live.Here are a few examples:
• Start keeping track of your gas, electricity and water use, along with
the number of gallons of gasoline purchased and airlinemiles šown.
• Try to cut down on energy and water use by 10% in the next year by
examining all of your habits and seeing where you can combine trips
or cut down on optional travel.
• Go even beyond 10% reduction: create a “year of living sustainably”
that commits you to dramatic changes in lifestyle tomeet sustainability
goals; if you have kids, enlist their help and creativity. It will
strongly supplement the education they’re typically getting in school.
• If you can’t stop traveling, because of your job or family needs, then
start by purchasing “carbon oªsets” or Green Tags for all of your
mileage, so that you’re oªsetting their impact with clean power or tree
plantings somewhere else.
• Buy a hybrid car or a more fuel-e‹cient vehicle; you can Šnd the top
ten green cars each year listed by the American Council for an Energy-
E‹cient Economy.3
• Look into state and federal incentives for installing solar electric and
thermal systems on your home; if you’re a renter, discuss the beneŠts
of doing this with your landlord ormanagement company.
• Call the local gas or electric utility company and ask for a home energy
audit to Šnd out what are the “low-cost/no-cost” things you can
do to cut down on energy consumption; in some areas, the local water
company will oªer technical assistance or free kits for cutting water
consumption.
• Install dual-šush toilets to cut water use fromtoilet šushing by half or
more; install other water-conservingmeasures such as drip irrigation.
• Form a neighborhood “sustainable living” group to engage the creativity
of others in Šnding additional ways to cut energy and water
use, reduce the use of poisons in landscapemaintenance and enhance
local recycling eªorts.
• Consider your purchasing patterns and their “upstream” impacts, including
waste in production, transportation costs (if made far fromwhere you live) and embedded energy of production, distribution,
use and disposal.
• For home remodeling, try to support local retail stores that specialize
in sustainable products, such as healthy paint and carpet and reclaimed
or salvaged buildingmaterials.
Your Town, City or State: The Power of Local Initiatives
Just as “all politics is local,” a statement famously attributed to former
speaker of the US House of Representatives Tip O’Neill, all successful sustainability
eªorts have their roots in local action.Withmore than 16 states
and 60 cities (as of early 2007) oªering local initiatives to promote green
buildings, there is ample precedent for you to engage your local school
board, city council, country board or commission and even state representatives
in this eªort.Drill down into each green building success story and
you will Šnd just a few local people, some in government, some in business
and some plain citizens, whose energy and foresight have made the diªerence.
Some of the initiatives already enacted, on which you can model
your eªorts, include:
• At the local level, secure a commitment from a school district, city or
county to build all future buildings and schools to at least the LEED
Silver level; some communities have committed to build LEED Gold
projects (the earliest on record was the City of Vancouver, British Columbia);
this may take some doing because you’re going to hear the
old familiar refrain “it costs too much,” and you’ll have to convince
people otherwise by using the examples in this book; among theNorth
American cities making this commitment are Seattle, Sacramento,
Portland (OR), Tucson, San Francisco, Calgary andMadison (WI).
• Some cities are taking the next step after greening their own operations,
requiring larger private-sector projects to meet LEED certiŠed
or Silver-level certiŠcations within the next few years. (Large cities
such as Boston andWashington, DC, have done this, and more cities
will be requiring such achievements or incorporating LEED requirements
and Architecture 2030 milestones into the building code in the
next few years.)
• If you have a municipal electric utility or public utility district, convince
it to oªer incentives for energy conservation and solar energy
systems; often the large cash šows of a utility permit it to oªer incentives
that will, over time, allow it to oªset expensive purchases of additional
generating capacity in the future; in Texas,Austin Energy, amunicipal
utility, has been promoting green homes since the early 1990sand has one of the most successful green home rating systems in the
country.
• Convince your mayor or city council to sign onto the USMayors’Climate
Protection Agreement, which commits cities to becoming carbon
neutral within the next decade, or sooner, in their own operations;
4 at the global level, former US President Clinton’s Climate
Change Initiative is engaging the 40 largest cities in the world to become
carbon neutral over the next 20 to 30 years.5 (Already, London
has signed on to this initiative.) In Denver,Mayor John Hickenlooper
has been aggressively promoting the Greenprint Denver plan for
sustainable development,6 and in Chicago, Mayor Richard Daley has
vowed to make Chicago the “greenest city” in North America by promoting
green buildings, green roofs and street tree plantings.
• Convince your city council or country commission/board to oªer incentives
to private sector projects that commit to building green; successful
incentives include faster processing of building permits andincreased“density bonuses” for high-rise o‹ces, apartments and condominium
developments; if you know a state legislator, talk to them
about sponsoring state initiatives to promote green buildings and renewable
energy; successful initiatives have included personal and/or
corporate income tax credits (Oregon and New York, along with 23
other states); property tax abatements for LEED Silver or better certiŠcations
(Nevada); sales tax elimination on solar systems (Arizona,
Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Massachusetts, Maryland and 12 other
states); and rebates for purchase of solar systems (California,Arizona,
Colorado and 30 other states).7
• Have the governor or state legislature require the state utility commission
to have all investor-owned utilities collect a tax on utility bills and
oªer “public purpose” funds for investments in conservation, onsite
power and renewable energy; in 2007 the California Public Utilities
Commission adopted an incentive payment system in the form of a
consumer rebate, to encourage people to install photovoltaic systems
on their roofs; the goal is “amillion solar roofs”within ten years.

Daylighting + Green Architecture

2009-05-02T07:46:00.000-07:00

Daylighting is an aspect of green building design that should be ubiquitous;
without adequate daylighting, people will not perform well and will
not be healthy. For building plans, this implies a design that is no more
than 66 feet wide, front to back, or about 33 feet to a window from any
workstation. This is a standard design requirement in many places in Europe,
where people’s health is placed before economic e‹ciency. Looked at
another way, a building should be oriented so that the long axis is eastwest;
this allows for maximum daylighting, from both south- and northfacing
windows.
Daylighting’s beneŠts are immediately apparent; people see better and
feel better whenever there is natural light for reading and working. Good
daylighting design can employ skylights, north-facing windows on the
roof, a central atrium, light shelves to bounce light into a space while shading
windows from the summer sun, and other techniques. Good daylighting is always indirect, without glare.Daylighting is usually combined with
electric lighting, so that there is a constant lighting level, typically 30 footcandles
at the desktop, or there is task lighting provided for each workstation.
According to a report from Carnegie Mellon University analyzing
daylighting research,“Eleven case studies have shown that innovative daylighting
systems can pay for themselves in less than one year due to energy
and productivity beneŠts…the ROI [return on investment] for daylighting
is over 185%.”38
A California study of the impact of daylighting examined 73 stores of
a chain retailer, of which 24 had daylighting. The results:
The value of the energy savings from daylighting is far overshadowed
by the value of the predicted increase in sales due to daylighting.
The proŠt from increased sales associated with daylight
is worth at least 19 times the energy savings.

Costs of Green Buildings

2009-05-02T07:21:00.000-07:00

As we showed earlier, a main barrier to implementing green buildings has
been the perceived cost increases for green measures. It is true that many
of the earlier green projects in the 2000 to 2005 period were more costly.
This is largely because the transition to new methods of design and construction
involves a lot of social learning that is accompanied by construction
mistakes, poor designs, unproven new products and a myriad of reasons
leading to extra costs. By 2005 and especially in 2006, however,many
design and construction teams had done enough green projects to start
lowering costs tomore conventional levels.
In 2006 the developer of a large LEEDPlatinumproject in Portland—
a very complex, 412,000-square-foot, mixed-use medical facility — reported
a cost premium (net of local, state and federal incentives) of about
1%on a $145million project.30 Now, this developer had designed and built
30 prior LEED projects and used a very experienced architect and engineering
team, already well-versed in green building methods. But their
success does point to the fact that future green buildings can be built without
any initial cost premium, once design and construction teams garner
enough experience.

What determines the cost of a green building?
• First and foremost, it depends on what the design teamand owner are
trying to achieve. If it’s a LEED Platinum building, they most likely
will use green roofs and photovoltaics, two expensive additions to a
project that may not be included in a LEED Silver or possibly even a
LEED Gold project.
• Second, it depends how early in the process the project decides to pursue
sustainable design and construction.As we show in the section on
integrated design, it’s best if that decision is made as early as possible,
even during the site selection process, so that a building can be properly
oriented, with a rectangular shape that allows for good daylighting
and e‹cient passive solar designmeasures.
• Third, it depends still on the experience of the design and construction
team with green buildings; the more experience, the less the cost
premium based on both fear of the unknown and lack of knowledge
about sourcing green products, for example. Less-experienced teams
often use green building consultants to help them out with their Šrst
project, to accelerate the learning curve.
Integrated design often leads to creative solutions that allow teams to
“tunnel through the cost barrier” and design a more energy-e‹cient
building at a lower initial cost.31 Typically, this is done by having the architecture
do some of the work of cutting energy use, as well as heating and
cooling a building with daylighting, shading devices, highly e‹cient windows,
orientation and heavy mass construction. Green buildings can also
cut other project costs by saving on infrastructure investments and connection
charges for storm drainage and sewage connections through total
water system management. Often, by thinking strategically in the Šrst 30
days of a project, you can inšuence 65% of total costs by assessing a
broader range of options,making choices among key cost drivers and having
a clear vision of results. This puts a premiumon thinking (vs. doing), a
concept thatmany Americansmay Šnd challenging.
One of the most widely cited studies of the costs of green buildings
was done by the international cost-consulting ŠrmDavis Langdon in 2004
and updated early in 2007. Using their own proprietary database of actual
building costs, and comparing 45 LEED projects with 93 other non-LEED
projects, Davis Langdon discovered that green building costs (for three
types of common projects—libraries, academic classrooms and laboratories)
were statistically no diªerent than conventional building costs when
normalized for year of completion (taking cost inšation out of the analysis)
and location (rešecting the variation of building costs by locality).
Their work showed that themajor cost driver is the building program, that
is, what the building is designed to achieve. A simple branch library in the
suburbs might be fairly cheap to construct, but a downtown main library
will likely bemuchmore costly, on a dollars-per-square-foot basis.You can
Šnd a large big-city downtown library by a name architect that costs $500
per square foot, as well as one that serves the same function and costs only
$230 per square foot.
The Šgure below shows the results of the most recent Davis Langdon
study for ambulatory care facilities (one of Šve categories with enough
data from which to draw Šrm conclusions).32 The 2007 update included
additional project types and more cost data, all standardized to Sacramento,
California,mid-2006 costs. The conclusions of the study were unchanged:
certiŠed green buildings don’t cost any more than conventional
buildings, on a per-square-foot basis. What matters most: the building’s
design objectives.

Jerry Yudelson, Green Building A to Z, New Society Publisher

Green buildings in Denmark

2009-04-30T18:03:00.000-07:00

From radical ecology to consumer-oriented
market approaches?
Kirsten Gram-Hanssen and Jesper Ole Jensen
Gram-Hanssen and Jensen explore the development of green buildings in Denmark over
the last three decades, identifying differences in design philosophies and techniques.
They look at four approaches to green buildings: as energy-saving devices, as ecological
grassroots alternatives, as subsidised large-scale urban projects, and as consumer
products in a market approach. Using detailed case descriptions, the chapter asks to
what extent it is possible to define some buildings or some approaches as more ‘green’
than others. The authors suggest that in order to more fully understand sustainable
buildings we must account for the social structuring of both the identification of environmental
problems and their resulting embodiment in built form.
Introduction
Green buildings in Denmark vary widely with regard to all aspects of physical and social
solutions as well as ideological rationales. Sometimes this has led to controversies
among different actors in respect of the definitions and content of green buildings. We
present these different rationales and describe how each in its own way has contributed
to a general development of green buildings. We argue that a common definition of
green buildings is not necessarily needed and that many different approaches to such
buildings might be more useful than one.
Wew use the term ‘green buildings’ as a unifying and neutral notion of what different
actors in different contexts have described as ‘sustainable’, ‘resource-saving’, ‘ecological’,
‘self-supplying’, ‘natural’, ‘healthy’, etc. However, in some of our case descriptions,
when describing the rationales of actors we use some of their own words. The chapter
looks at four approaches differentiated by different understandings or concepts of
green buildings and by different actors:
• Green buildings as energy-saving devices: after the oil crisis in 1973, strong efforts
were made to develop building technologies to improve energy performance, as
well as regulations for implementing these technologies.
• Ecological alternatives emerging from the grassroots: as a radical critique of
modern society, a number of alternative and green rural settlements grew up in the
1980s and 1990s, emphasising community, self-sufficiency, alternative technologies,
lifestyle and spirituality.
• Subsidised large-scale urban projects: commitment to the 1987 Brundtland
Report created a public drive towards green buildings, aimed at testing, approving
and institutionalising alternative technologies, with ample public funding, primarily
in impressive building projects under the Urban Renewal Act.
• Green buildings in a market approach: in recent years we have seen a trend
towards considering green buildings as individual market-driven consumer products.
Here green labels and life cycle analysis (LCA) tools aim to give consumers a
central role in the development of such products, based on the market and on
ecological modernisation rather than on public subsidies.
The different approaches partly follow a historical path. However, it is important to
note that these approaches and their actors coexist at the same time. A key question is
how far technological development in green buildings has been a matter of interaction
between the physical and the social contexts. As a background to this way of analysing
and presenting the subject, the chapter starts with an introduction to social theories of
technological development, especially in relation to environmental and urban issues.
Very different aspects of green buildings have been emphasised in different historical
periods and by different actors. An actor-oriented approach may ask whether
different notions of green buildings are just a matter of different social constructions or if
it is possible to define them independently of the actors by measuring their degree of
sustainability. In the conclusions we try to answer this question, maintaining on one
hand that we need to measure ‘greenness’ or sustainability but on the other that every
way of measuring it is problematic and limited.
Theoretical approaches to technological development
Different theories help in understanding how technologies develop in relation to the
social environment: the theoretical field known as the social construction of technological
systems (SCOT theories); the theory of ecological modernisation; and new urban
technological studies.
SCOT theories

The zero-energy house of 1975 garnered major national and international attention.

SCOT is a research area that is based on the view that technology is socially
constructed, in opposition to technological determinism, which sees technology and
science each as autonomous and separate from society. This area can be divided into
three approaches (Bijker et al. 1987).
First is the social constructivist approach, which claims that technological artefacts
are open to sociological analysis, especially with respect to their design and technical
content. This approach looks at the social structures behind the growth and assimilation
of a technology. It introduces the concepts of ‘interpretative flexibility’, ‘closure’ and ‘relevant
social groups’, and Bijker’s study of Bakelite is one of the core examples (Bijker
1987).
The second approach treats technology as a ‘system’ metaphor and stresses the
importance of focusing on the links and relations between technology’s physical
artefacts and institutions and their environments. In his study of the electrical system
Hughes argues that technological systems are socio-technical, because besides their
technical elements they also comprise organisation, legislation, knowledge and
financing, woven together into a ‘seamless web’ (Hughes 1987). He distinguishes
between radical and conservative innovations in relation to the existing systems. The
success of the new radical technologies depends on, among other variables, how the
innovators tackle the ‘reverse salients’ – the weak parts of new systems – so that the
166 Alternative design new technology can compete with existing systems. The aim of the ‘system builders’ is
to shape a system by excluding other systems and components and, if successful, by
adding momentum to the system, giving increased stability over time.
The third approach takes the system metaphor a step further, developing ‘actornetwork’
theory, which breaks down the distinction between human and non-human
actors (Callon 1987; Latour 1987). According to this perspective, to create new technology
is to persuade, seduce and motivate actors to participate in a network around
the new technology. One of the studies using this approach looked at electric cars,
an area in which the successful engineer has to combine consumers, ministries and
the battery electrons, convincing them all of the roles they have to play (Callon
1987). A key controversial element in this approach is the consideration of nonhuman
actors, such as electrons, as belonging to the same network as consumers and
engineers.
These SCOT approaches focus on technological development in general, with no
specific emphasis on green or urban technology. We supplement the approach with
insights from theories that follow the same lines but with a more specifically green or
urban viewpoint.
Ecological modernisation
The notion of ecological modernisation brings together discussions of society, ecology
and technology, though it is difficult to say if it is actually a social theory, a political
programme or a broader discourse in the public debate. Hajer distinguishes between
different approaches – or ideal-typical interpretations – to ecological modernisation and
to the reactions against it (Hajer 1998). According to Hajer, a central element in ecological
modernisation is the rationalising of ecology so that it can be built into programmes,
politics and institutions. Another element is about ‘technicalisation’ of ecology, whereby
some of the big international firms, helped by non-governmental organisations (NGOs),
are changing moral and ethical concerns into technology and market issues. In opposition
to this trend, one critic of ecological modernisation questioned: ‘Why try to resolve
the ecological crisis by drawing on precisely those institutional principles that brought
about the mess in the first place?’
Ecological modernisation is often associated simply with more effective production
methods and win–win situations where companies can earn money on cleaner technologies.
According to Spaargaren, however, the central point in ecological modernisation
is not that greening of production can bring profit but that a process of monitoring and
guarding of all the major substances and energy flows follows modernisation, through
the introduction of instruments such as LCAs and environmental performance indicators
(Spaargaren 2000). In this approach, the objective of ecological modernisation is
to bridge the gap between the technical and social environmental sciences, by bringing
real material flows into the over-socialised social sciences and to bring social systems
and human behaviour into the under-socialised natural and technical sciences. Furthermore,
the task as outlined by Spaargaren is to introduce a more consumer-led perspective
into the theories to make an effective tool for analysing domestic consumption of,
say, water and energy. The question that Hajer and other more radical social ecologists
ask is whether ecology is primarily a question of material flow management or whether it
is a cultural task of redefining society. As the case studies demonstrate, questions like
this are prominent in the debate and in the technological development of urban ecology.

Urban technological studies
Ecological modernisation discusses ecology in relation to social and technical questions,
but urban and housing issues have not yet become significant in this area.
Recent studies have rectified this lack. Guy and Shove have used the SCOT
approach, among others, to understand the development of different paradigms for
energy efficiency in buildings (Guy and Shove 2000). Graham and Marvin combine
SCOT theories with spatial political economy to describe recent developments in
urban technologies and state that cities are the greatest ‘socio-technical hybrids’ of
them all (Graham and Marvin 2001). One of the inputs for a spatial or geographical
political economy is Castells’ theory of how urban structures (as well as everything
else) are changed in the new, integrated, globalised society of networks (Castells
1996, 1997, 1998). Castells describes how new information technologies are some
of the prime supporters of global networks of everything from criminals to NGOs and
big international companies. As some of the old structure of the capitalist society fades
away, for example the nation state, new structures built on the power of identity emerge.
Before 11 September 2001, Castells had already described the strength of global
networks of religious fundamentalists and had also described the influence of the global
green movement.
Four paradigms of green building in the Danish context
Using these theories of technological development in an urban and ecological context,
we describe four different paradigms that can be found in the Danish development of
green buildings.
Green buildings as energy-saving devices
The first period of sustainable building in Denmark began in 1956, when the Suez crisis
threatened the country’s oil supply. Denmark was heavily dependent on imported oil for
heating in buildings as well as for all its other energy-consuming activities, so the crisis
gave strong support to researchers’ ideas for increasing the energy efficiency of buildings.
However, the first attempts to gain the attention and support of authorities in regulating
energy efficiency in buildings and to begin research studies in energy efficiency
failed, as the Suez crisis faded and oil prices fell to their lowest point ever. Thus the
development of the first low-energy houses was largely the result of a few visionary and
ambitious people. One such was Professor Korsgaard at the Danish Technical University.
The professor and his colleagues at the Thermal Insulation Laboratory were ready
and able by 1975 to build the zero-energy house, the first solar heated house in
Northern Europe (Fig. 10.1). This gained major national and international attention,
making the zero-energy house one of the most renowned examples of low-energy
houses of its time.
The zero-energy house’s aim was to show that it was possible to build a house at a
reasonable cost with already existing technology and that it could be heated and
provided with hot water simply through the use of solar heat, efficient insulation and
recycling of heat from ventilated air. Theoretically the only external energy supply would
be electricity for normal domestic consumption and for pumps and ventilation. The 120-
square-metre house was supplied with a 42-square-metre solar collector, and hot water for seasonal heat was stored in a 30-cubic-metre insulated water tank, the first of its
kind in Denmark. The house was built with insulation (mineral wool) as the prototype
constructive element, reducing the cold bridges. Other elements included switches to
turn off the convector fan when the windows were opened and a ventilation system with
heat exchangers, a feature widely used today in low-energy buildings. A two-year monitoring
period showed that the house had very low heat consumption, although not quite
zero – one main reason for this was that the heat loss from an underground storage tank
was much higher than expected.
An important factor in the attention given to the zero-energy house was that in the
1960s and 1970s Denmark experienced strong economic growth and the construction
of more than a million new detached houses – an extremely high number, given the
population then of approximately five million. These houses were all built with ample
space, and little consideration was given to energy consumption, and therefore half of
all imported oil was used to heat buildings, making oil a heavy burden on the national
budget. Given this, it is no wonder that the first low-energy buildings were also
designed as detached houses.
The zero-energy house was the first of a series of several other types of low-energy
building in the following years, the most remarkable of which were the Hjortekjærhusene
(six low-energy buildings built in 1978–9) and Skivehusene projects (1977, 1979 and
1984) (see Box 1). These buildings demonstrated potential for energy savings of up to
70 per cent, but with large variations among them. The amount of energy consumed for
heat, although considerably lower than in traditional houses, was often higher than
calculated. Surveys showed that the main source of this was the heat distribution
system and furthermore that the question of heat storage was crucial (Byberg 1984).

This indicated a lack of development of other technical components and the necessity
for a parallel development of the local infrastructure. Moreover, at the end of the 1970s
it was clear that diffusion into the market of the concept of low-energy building was
slow. The whole building market had declined, and low-energy buildings cost more than
traditional buildings, largely due to the fact that anything developed from a prototype will
be relatively expensive (Byberg 1984). On the other hand, findings from these pioneer
low-energy buildings have to a large extent been incorporated into Danish building
regulations and consequently have had a major impact on the construction of new buildings
(Saxhof et al. 1988).
The oil crisis of the 1970s also led to a fundamental restructuring of Danish
energy policy. The Ministry for Energy was formed in 1975, and in 1976 the
Programme for Energy Research was launched, leading over the next 25 years to
massive research and development projects concerning energy efficiency in buildings
and renewable energy (Energistyrelsen 2000). These projects were strongly
influenced by the people who were behind the first low-energy buildings. The development
of low-energy buildings in Denmark can therefore be described not just in
terms of technical development, but also in terms of its basis in an ‘infrastructure’
consisting of political and financial support, institutional security (the Thermal Insulation
Laboratory was established in 1959) and access to influential legislators.
Energy research in Denmark can be characterised as a ‘closed community’ (Guy and
Shove 2000), with close relationships between researchers, ministries and industry
enabling, such influence.
The researchers’ efforts are to some degree parallel to Thomas Hughes’s notion of
‘system builders’ (Hughes 1987). A moot point is whether their low-energy buildings
are to be seen, in Hughes’s terminology, as radical or conservative technology. On
one hand, the ideal was to establish a system that is based on low-energy buildings
and a renewable energy supply, which would mean a radical break with the existing
energy infrastructure. Furthermore, potential ‘reverse salients’ (such as problems with
heat storage) reduced the economic competitiveness of the low-energy buildings. For
those making low-energy buildings it was also a problem to get integrated effort from
the rest of the actors in the building industry. On the other hand, low-energy building
has, in Hughes’s terms, to a large extent been institutionalised, as basic concepts
have now been incorporated in building regulations, and must accordingly be considered
a conservative technology. This viewpoint also reflects a certain flexibility in the existing system (in spite of the momentum, according to Hughes), allowing change
and adaptation to new demands, rather than requiring the substitution of a whole new
system.
Although the low-energy building approach peaked, in terms of public attention, in
the 1970s, the funding, research and influence on building regulations have remained
until today, and there has also been a major diffusion of technologies to other types of
sustainable buildings. Recently, however, funding for energy research has, for the first
time since the energy crises in 1973, been drastically reduced, which implies a radical
change for low-energy building and research. But from 1985 ‘sustainability’ widely
replaced ‘energy saving’ as the key term in green buildings. This was due to the
Brundtland Report, which made possible a much broader interpretation of the themes
and technologies relating to green buildings.
Grassroots alternatives
A very different approach to green buildings is found in grassroots and citizen-initiated
projects (Box 2). The catchwords for the technology of this approach are closed cycles
and self-sufficiency, with inspiration coming from similar actors all over the world. Water
and waste should be recycled, energy locally produced from renewable resources and,
very importantly, the technologies should be organised in neighbourhoods to
strengthen and revitalise local social life. The ecological vision is followed by a social
vision of a more holistic everyday life – a life that is not split between work, family and
home. In this sense the urban ecological movement follows in the footsteps of the
collectivist movement of the 1960s and 1970s, and is a reaction against the lifestyle of
detached suburban houses. Furthermore, for some at the grassroots there is a spiritual
dimension to the relationship between humans and nature; for others there is an ethical
concern for future generations. Common to both groups is that human–nature relationships
need to be reconsidered.
Green buildings in Denmark 171
Box 2: Examples of grassroots or citizen-initiated projects
Projects in existing neighbourhoods
Baggesensgade 5 (Copenhagen) 1983
Hyldespjældet (Albertslund) c.1988
Vestergror (Copenhagen) 1988
BO-90 (Copenhagen) 1992
Øko-byen (Copenhagen) 1984
New-build eco-villages
Bofællesskabet Sol og vind (Beder)1980
Dyssekilde (Torup) 1990
Andelssamfundet (Hjortshøj) 1992
Munksøgård (Roskilde) 2000
Friland (Djursland) 2002

Green Architecture - Theory, practice and proof

2009-04-30T17:29:00.001-07:00

Learning from green buildings that teach
Kathryn Janda and Alexandra von Meier
Janda and von Meier investigate two ‘green’ academic buildings: the Environmental
Technology Center at Sonoma State University and the Adam Joseph Lewis Center at
Oberlin College. Both are designed for use as teaching tools and both demonstrate
sustainable architecture. Both employ a variety of passive and active systems to achieve
their goals. Both have ‘epic’ stories to tell about the evaluation of their performance. As
self-proclaimed exemplars of sustainable architecture these buildings were set apart
from standard construction practice by a heightened degree of ‘inspection, assessment
and expectation’. But did the measures adopted by engineers and critics reflect the
intentions of the builders or did they quantify something different? What was it that the
buildings were designed to teach? The authors argue that the quantitative data
collected ‘may raise more questions about building performance than they resolve’.
Noting that ‘numbers rarely change our notions of what we already believe to be true’,
Janda and von Meier thus bring into question the use of quantitative data taken at a
particular moment in time as the sole criterion for the ‘goodness’ of buildings.
Introduction
Buildings present a significant challenge for the natural environment. Roodman and
Lenssen (1995: 5) claim, for instance, that buildings account for 16 per cent of the
world’s water use, 20 per cent of its wood harvest and 40 per cent of its material and
energy flows. Although new buildings can be constructed in a more sustainable fashion,
quite often they are not. What can we learn from those constructed to be sustainable?
Technical lessons are often sought from such exemplars. Did the argon-filled, doublepaned
windows in this building save energy? Did using paint low in volatile organic
compounds in that building reduce off-gassing? While such questions are important
stepping stones to ‘better’ designs, each green building example contains a set of
social lessons as well. David Orr (1993) has coined the phrase ‘architecture as pedagogy’
to describe the concept that we learn from buildings, not just in them. Similarly,
W. J. Rohwedder (2003) extends this idea to describe ‘pedagogy of place’.
To explore the lessons learned from specific architectures in particular places, we
investigate two ‘green’ academic buildings: the Environmental Technology Center
(ETC) at Sonoma State University, California, and the Adam Joseph Lewis Center
(AJLC) at Oberlin College, Ohio. Both are designed to be used as teaching tools and
both demonstrate sustainable architecture. Both employ passive and active systems to
achieve these goals. Both also have ‘epic’ stories to tell about the social structures and
institutional values that resulted in the adoption of some architectural strategies and the
rejection of others. Finally, each author has first-hand knowledge of and daily experience with one of these buildings. Our own participation with these structures and our observation
of other uses and users helps to frame our understanding of the differences and
similarities between them. Through our comparative analysis, we hope to raise new
questions concerning the social and institutional context in which sustainable buildings
are constructed, used and evaluated.
These buildings were designed to be far better than average, but by what measure
are they better? Are there ways in which they are worse? Despite much public critical
acclaim, people involved with both buildings are frequently called on to prove that the
pedagogical, architectural and environmental theories behind them are working in practice.
Among many dimensions, we focus on the presence, absence and use of ‘data’,
looking at several factors with respect to data gathering, use and evaluation. First, we
examine how the presence or absence of quantitative data enhances or obscures
stories of building performance. Second, we describe how institutional requirements
shape the desire for and impact of ‘hard numbers’. Finally, we discuss who learns what
from ‘buildings that teach’: students, faculty and the academic institutions themselves.
Background
Although both the ETC and the AJLC have ample amounts of glass on the south side
and use thermal mass for passive heating and cooling, these buildings do not shout
‘sustainability’ to passers-by. Neither structure relies visually on elements that the
general public would likely identify as ‘green’: a biomorphic shape, obvious photovoltaic
arrays or windmills, or a garden on the roof.1 Instead, both building designs share a modern aesthetic and a geometric vocabulary typical of today’s commercial and institutional
structures (Figs 3.1 and 3.2).
The Environmental Technology Center at Sonoma State University (SSU) is a 2,200
square foot (204 square metre) building with one large seminar room that functions as
an auditorium, classroom and laboratory. It is situated on a site internal to the SSU
campus, which is located about an hour north of San Francisco. Funded in part by
grants from the National Science Foundation and the California Energy Commission
and completed in 2001, the ETC was conceived as a ‘building that teaches’
(Rohwedder 1998), offering an immediate hands-on experience of high-efficiency technology
and green building to general audiences as well as an abundance of real-time
data for building science buffs.
Use of the ETC comprises university classes – including technical courses on
energy, environmental studies courses and selected courses from other departments –
and classes and events involving outside agencies and the general public. These
include, for example, meetings by the local chapter of the Green Building Council,
training workshops for energy auditors, work meetings for Sonoma County’s Climate
Protection Campaign and public events such as the Green Building Expo, with lectures
and vendor exhibits. The ETC has also become a favourite classroom for two other
departments: the Psychology of Yoga class appreciates the warm floor in addition to
the light and spacious feel, and the a cappella Chamber Singers enjoy the acoustics.

The ETC was the subject of Congressional testimony before the House Energy
Subcommittee by its director (von Meier 2001), at the invitation of Congresswoman
Lynn Woolsey (Democrat), who had supported the ETC since its inception. Representative
Woolsey subsequently arranged for an Energy Subcommittee field hearing to
take place at the ETC, chaired by Congresswoman Judy Biggert (Republican, Illinois).
Nationally recognised energy experts testified at the field hearing (US House of Representatives
2002), with the space of the ETC serving as a concrete example of the
concepts of energy efficiency and renewable resource use they advocated.
Like the ETC, the Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies serves many
purposes. The AJLC is a two-storey, 13,600 square foot (1,260 square metre) building
with three classrooms, a library, an auditorium, six offices, a conference room and a
kitchen. It also houses a ‘Living Machine’ that treats and internally recycles wastewater
from within the building, which is sited on the edge of the Oberlin College campus, near
Richardsonian Romanesque academic buildings and down the street from Victorian-era
homes. Like the ETC, it was designed as a building that teaches. In the words of David
Orr, the chair of Oberlin’s Environmental Studies Program, the project team wanted a
building that would ‘help redefine the relationship between humankind and the environment
– one that would expand our sense of ecological possibilities’ (Reis 2000).
The AJLC has enjoyed considerable critical acclaim. It has received architectural
awards from the American Institute of Architects, construction awards from national and
state contractors’ organisations and an Ohio governor’s award for energy efficiency and
has been named one of the thirty ‘Milestone Buildings for the Twentieth Century’ by the
US Department of Energy. An early model of the building is included in an architectural
textbook on the interactive effects of buildings and the environment (Fitch and
Bobenhausen 1999: 336), a diagram appears in a popular environmental science
textbook (Miller 2001b: 537), and it has been the subject of numerous articles in the
press. Part of its notoriety has to do with its star architectural team, William McDonough
and Partners, which is famous for several sustainable buildings as well as a book on the
topic of sustainability (McDonough and Braungart 2002). Part also has to do with the
dedication and eloquence of its on-campus champion, David Orr, who is a prolific writer
and a dynamic speaker and has published several articles about the AJLC’s design
process (Orr 2002, 2003a, 2003b). Orr also plans to use the AJLC as the basis of a
book on the subject of design and organisational learning.
Equally the AJLC has been the subject of much controversy. At the centre of this
debate is a contested statement that one of the goals of the AJLC was to be a ‘net
energy exporter’. An Oberlin faculty member outside the Environmental Studies
Program has argued that the building consumes far more energy than the photovoltaic
(PV) array delivers (Scofield 2002a, 2002b, 2002c). Proponents of the building do not
deny that it currently uses more energy than it generates; early documentation indicates
that the goal of net energy exportation was a long-term one, intended to be reached only
as PV efficiencies improved beyond the 15 per cent that is common today.
We believe that the stories surrounding these two buildings – including the range of
perspectives on how ‘efficient’ or ‘consumptive’ they are, as well as how their performance
is accounted for and by whom – have much to say about how expectations for
sustainable architecture are shaped. Although framed in technical terms (such as air
changes per hour or Btu per square foot) these goals have social implications as well as
technical bases.

The social construction of ‘green building’ codes

2009-04-30T16:57:00.000-07:00

Competing models by industry, government and NGOs

Steven A. Moore and Nathan Engstrom
In 1992 the city of Austin, Texas, was the first in the country to create a residential
green building programme and by the end of the century about 26 similar ones
emerged in 16 different states. Moore and Engstrom argue two related points. The
first is that ‘green building’ reflects the latent fusion of two powerful late-nineteenthcentury
ideas, preservation of the natural environment and protection of the public
health. These two concepts were so ideologically opposed at the turn of the twentieth
century that it took a full century of changing conditions to reconcile the opposing
assumptions that motivated their respective supporters. Second, the authors hold
that, once reconciled under the broad umbrella of ‘sustainable development’, green
building programmes foreshadow North American building codes of the twenty-first
century. Some US green building ‘programmes’ are departments within municipal
governments, others are the products of homebuilder associations, and at least two
are non-profit non-governmental organisations. Taken collectively, these
‘programmes’ reflect a changing cultural horizon with regard to public health and the
built environment. Taken individually, however, they reflect contradictory social values
that vie to redefine how a private house embodies a public ‘good’. The authors’ project
is not to predict how these conflicting social values will become resolved, but to better
understand the social construction of green building programmes as antecedents of
twenty-first-century cultural values that will ultimately become realised as standardised
building codes.
Green building as good building
Building codes in the United States derive principally from English precedents. Their
adoption can be understood as acceptance by mid-nineteenth-century Americans of
those utilitarian values which made it possible to restrict some individual freedoms, like
shoddy building practices, in favour of general health, safety and welfare. The political
will to pass such legislation was, no doubt, strongly influenced by a series of devastating
fires that damaged or destroyed eleven nineteenth-century American cities and
the chronic outbreaks of typhus, yellow fever and smallpox that plagued many other
cities (AIA 1990: 9). These crises were inevitably followed by legislation and the
founding of institutions intent on eliminating those building practices that would most
obviously contribute to repeat fires and epidemics. Historians generally refer to this
phenomenon as the era of ‘sanitary reform’ or the ‘public health movement’.
If we accept this dialectical relation of crisis and reform it is tempting to interpret the
appearance of ‘green building programmes’ in the US, not as a new phenomenon, but
as a continuation of two nineteenth-century social movements: the public health movement
and the environmental movement. The environmental crises experienced by contemporary city dwellers are, after all, not different in kind from those experienced by
nineteenth-century urban dwellers. Poor air quality, fouled water and general environmental
degradation are the unintended consequences of industrial development that
are shared by both periods. It does not really matter if the sources of pollution have
shifted from smokestacks to tailpipes – the threat is the same. What is different in our
current situation is that the dramatic fires and epidemics of the nineteenth century have
been replaced by more subtle and pervasive effects that derive from long-term industrial
development. Energy scarcity, water scarcity, climate change and chemical sensitivity
are environmental conditions that even the economically comfortable can no longer
avoid by moving further out of town. It is now solidly middle-class citizens, not only the
industrial proletariat, who experience the crisis of environmental degradation and seek
environmental security from government, industry or third-party experts. The risks associated
with environmental degradation have, then, been somewhat democratised. And
with the democratisation of risk has come economic and political controversy (Beck
1992: 191–9).
The production of environmental programmes and building codes is, of course, not
entirely a matter of science. Rather, it is a highly social and contentious process in which
some interests are suppressed and others are reinforced. The presence of competing
interests is reflected in the confusing array of codes and green building standards that
have emerged in response to contemporary environmental conditions. Commercial
construction certification schemes like LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental
Design), BEES (Building for Economic and Environmental Sustainability) and BREEAM
(Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method) are just a few
examples. Such conflicting standards tend to frame problems and propose solutions in
ways that define opposing ‘goods’. All manufacturing standards are, in this view,
socially constructed agreements that favour a particular set of actors because they
contain the interests of the standard-makers (Latour 1987: 201).1
Beginning with the sociologist Max Weber (1864–1920), many have argued that the
history of modernisation has been synonymous with standardisation (Weber 1958:
181–2; Feenberg 1995: 4). Weber understood that the institutions of modern
commerce are better able to optimise exchange value by imposing a single structure on
diverse populations and spaces. This logic suggests that those outside an emergent
technological network run the risk of being excluded from certain exchanges. If your
locomotive is of the wrong gauge, your motor of the wrong voltage or your software of
the wrong operating system, you are excluded. The mechanisms of commerce, then,
favour dominance by a single technological standard. It does not really matter what that
standard is – DOS versus MAC, for example – so long as it is commensurable with the
endless array of local conditions. If we apply the logic of modernisation to the homebuilding
industry, it suggests that the emergence of multiple green building
programmes and model environmental codes are competing attempts to standardise
the many variables of ‘good’ building to include ‘green’ building practices.
On this basis, we hypothesise that standards designed by industry, government, and
non-governmental organisation (NGO) environmentalists will differ. This hypothesis is
based on the assumptions that these organisational types generally represent opposing
political interests and that with authorship of a building code comes the power to regulate
the social and technical constitution of the artefact. We also assume that, in practice,
standardised codes represent, to one degree or another, the negotiated interests
of industry, government and environmentalists. Building codes can, then, be understood as the temporary resolution of social conflicts that are, in turn, materialised
as buildings. The establishment of codes, by any means, pushes the building industry
down a particular technological path. Green building codes will, for example, push us
away from paints that rely on volatile organic compounds to those that do not and from
harvesting old-growth timber towards substitute technologies such as engineered
wood products. In these and other similar cases some technological networks will
benefit and others will necessarily suffer.
Green building programmes intend to challenge existing building codes and seek to
redefine the agreements that shaped them on the grounds of the general welfare.
According to this utilitarian logic, private dwellings contribute to or detract from several
kinds of public resources or public goods. With regard to the construction of private
houses, two types of damage to public resources can be assessed by environmental
accountants. The first are those negative environmental impacts that derive from gathering
building materials and energy from distant locales. Water pollution caused by
timber ‘clear-cutting’ or strip mining is an example of this type, where costs are borne by
downstream citizens reliant on access to clean water. The second is the public cost to
maintain the health and welfare of those citizens who build badly, either out of ignorance
or malice. An example of this type is personal injury and property damage derived from
building on a flood plain, where costs are borne by taxpayers. In the eyes of utilitarians,
the loss of either type of public good trumps private property rights because such
ruinous acts increase the public cost to maintain the ‘civic economy’. If we agree, then,
that the general welfare is promoted by green building we have also agreed in principle
that green building is a necessary if insufficient condition for good building.
The balance of this chapter is in four sections. The first section establishes the early
linkage between building codes and the public health movement and the delayed linkage
of building codes to the environmental movement. The second section examines how
changing technological standards both reflect and attempt to resolve cultural conflict. To
make these arguments concrete, we will, in the third section, empirically examine three
cases that demonstrate how government, industry and environmentalists infuse technological
standards with opposing values. Finally, our conclusion will argue that through a
process of crisis, reform, codification and standardisation today’s green building
programmes foreshadow the social construction of twenty-first-century building codes.
Building codes, public health, environmental preservation
In this section we argue that the long-term development of building codes related to
human health is rooted in nineteenth-century utilitarian thought and becomes fused with
the environmental preservation movement at the beginning of the twenty-first century.
The codification of building standards, as all architecture students learn early in their
careers, begins with Article 229 of the Code of King Hammurabi (Mesopotamia 1780
BCE) (Sanderson 1969: 5). The Greeks and Romans certainly contributed to the establishment
of construction standards, but it wasn’t until 1189 in England that a building
act representing municipal legislative power was developed. Five hundred years later, in
1676, a document resembling a modern building code was created through an Act of
Parliament to regulate the rebuilding of London after the devastating fire of 1666 (AIA
1990: 8). These pre-modern codes were, in emphasis, fire-prevention ordinances. The
emergence of the industrial revolution and rapid urbanisation in the nineteenth century,
however, created new conditions that catalysed the codification of building standards.
The idea that there is a collective or ‘public’ health, and that it is linked to environmental
conditions, emerged in mid-nineteenth-century England as ‘the sanitary idea’.
Most historians attribute the first or most prominent articulation of this idea to Edwin
Chadwick, son of James. The elder Chadwick was a devotee of the revolutionary Tom
Paine and had sufficient status among radical thinkers of his day to gain his son a position
as the personal secretary to Jeremy Bentham, a progenitor of utilitarianism. It was
Bentham who argued for the ‘greatest happiness principle’, that ‘the end of life, ethically
speaking is “the greatest good for the greatest number”’ (Reese 1980: 53). Although
the younger Chadwick was profoundly influenced by the utilitarians in philosophical
matters, he is remembered, not as a thinker, but as a civil servant and man of action. At
the behest of Parliament, he published in 1842 his Report on the Sanitary Condition of
the Labouring Population of Great Britain, which proved to be as historically influential
as it was then controversial. Chadwick’s report was considered radical because, first, it
relied on rigorously gathered empirical data rather than deductive logic, and second, it
employed such methods to reject the commonly held idea that disease was the fatalistic
imposition of God’s will. With equal temerity, Chadwick challenged the received
wisdom that held poverty to be the main cause of ill health. Chadwick argued the
reverse, that ‘the attack of fever precedes the destitution, not the destitution the
disease’ (Chadwick 1965: 210). For Chadwick and his fellow ‘sanitarians’, disease was
not an outward sign of moral depravity, but the misfortune of those subjected to
degraded environments. In the eyes of historian William Luckin, Chadwick was a ‘protoenvironmentalist’
because he identified an environmental cause of disease before there
was any scientific understanding of pathogenic organisms (Melosi 2000: 46). It was not
until some 20 years after the publication of Chadwick’s report that ‘germ theory’, based
on the work of Pasteur and others, would begin to supplant the then dominant ‘miasma’
theory of disease.
Chadwick’s medical logic might have remained simply prescient were it not for the
political implications of the sanitary idea. Beginning with the utilitarian formula of ‘the
greatest good for the greatest number’, he reasoned that true ‘civic economy’ required
‘preventative measures in raising the standard of health and the chances of life’
(Chadwick 1965: 246). It was a short mental step from advocating the economic value
of public health to advocating the creation of a general building code backed up by a
strong central government capable of enforcing such standards (Chadwick 1965:
339–47). The utilitarians were, then, precursors of the modern welfare state.
In recent years utilitarianism has been much criticised for its easy disregard for the
civil rights of minorities. Bentham, Chadwick and their followers constructed an attitude
towards social order that we now regard as highly authoritarian and technocratic. They
were not predisposed to trust in the ability of common citizens to make sensible choices
concerning much of anything. Rather, their idea of ‘civic economy’ relied on an educated
elite to manage efficiently the interests of society, which they conceived to be essentially
economic in nature.
Such an efficiently managed or sanitised society was the nightmare of Michel
Foucault (1975). In Foucault’s view, the institutions of public health constructed by
nineteenth-century utilitarians were little more than the illegitimate mechanisms of the
modern bureaucratic state through which social deviancy might be eradicated. The
ethical dilemma posed by the doctrines of public health, then, is characterised by a
confrontation between two seemingly rational desires. First is the desire of those who,
like Chadwick, wish to minimise the waste of resources associated with environmental

The Development of Sustainable Construction

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Changing Government Policy
An important consultation document was issued by the UK Government in 1998.1 Part of a wider
consultation exercise on sustainability, it discussed some principles of sustainable construction and current
practices in the industry. Following the consultation process, which brought in a relatively small number of
responses, a Government strategy based on this consultation process will soon be published, though it is
likely to fall well short of the standards advocated in this volume. While the government approach is hardly
radical, recognition of the subject is a huge step forward and is to be greatly welcomed.
Other steps have also been taken, in particular the establishment of a scheme to provide one day’s free
design advice to anyone planing to build a green building over 500 square metres. The Design Advice for
Greener Buildings scheme is funded by the DETR and administered by BRECSU.2 This scheme
demonstrates recognition of the importance of an holistic approach to consider all aspects of green building
rather than simply focusing on energy efficiency which was previously the only area where financial help was
available.
The construction industry has been under a great deal of scrutiny following the publication of the
“Latham” report and more recently the “Egan” report.3 Both these reports recognise the inefficiency of the
construction sector and the need to be more competitive and better managed. It is only in this economic
sense that sustainability is usually referred to and the debate about the nature of building construction in the
future largely ignores questions of environmental impact. Indeed the word sustainability only appears once,
in the Egan report (paragraph 58) with a call for greater priority to be given in the design and planning stage
to “flexibility of use, operating and maintenance costs and sustainability.”
While the UK lags behind, in some European countries, much higher standards and working practices
have been adopted. These include the careful separation of waste on site into separate skips so that it is then
recycled, the greater use of recycled materials in place of newly quarried aggregates and the elimination of
many toxic and non environmentally friendly materials to improve building worker safety and improve
indoor air quality. Most of these measures are covered by European directives and then enforced in
particular countries by building or local regulations

Demand for green materials?
At present most of these sustainability measures are barely on the agenda of the building regulation
formulation process in the UK and there are strong industry lobbies to maintain the status quo for as long as
possible. Many environmentally friendly products are now available in Europe, but few of them are sold in
bulk in the UK. This is surprising in that many producers and distributors of building materials and products
are multi national companies. Akzo Nobel, the Swedish company (of Nobel peace prize fame) for instance
own many of the paint companies in the UK and are in the process of marketing these products under the
name Akzo Nobel but it isn’t clear whether we can look forward to the introduction of Sweden’s higher
environmental standards into the UK paint industry5
One argument that is used by building companies, designers and suppliers in the UK is that clients are
not interested in eco products and so market forces continue to dictate that we continue to use materials that
are not so environmentally friendly as they could be. There is some evidence of this in that when
“Construction Resources” was set up in Southwark in London, the UK’s first eco builders merchants,6 many
of their suppliers in Germany and Holland were unwilling to invest in the centre because their market
research had told them there was little interest in the UK. In Germany, where there is even a federation of
eco builders merchants, green materials have a significant share of the market.7
However this is something of a chicken and egg situation. Clients are frequently not told about green
materials and even when they are interested, most materials cannot be sourced in normal ways, so if
builders cannot obtain them from their normal suppliers they won’t use them. If designers promoted green
materials and builders merchants stocked them, there would undoubtedly be greater use.

The public sector could give a lead in this respect so that local authorities, hospitals trusts and central
government could adopt green specification standards and because of the bulk of materials which they
order, the market would have to change to meet this demand. The Greening Government Section of the
DETR has produced an excellent report which gives guidance on how to achieve greener buildings.8 Apart
from covering most topics, under 38 headings, including indoor air quality, it has an excellent and
comprehensive set of appendices giving sources of information and useful contacts. Needless to say, the
Green Building handbook gets mentioned throughout. This document, which contains a Green Code for
Architects (based on BREEAM),9 would be very useful to anyone trying to persuade a sceptical public
sector client that green building is not a strange and hippie activity but quite normal and sanctioned by
Government.

Indoor Air Quality— Health Issues-Green Architecture

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Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) is an important issue for architects, specifiers and building managers in the UK.
Materials manufacturers will soon have to publish data on what contribution their materials make to IAQ,
following what is now becoming standard practice in Scandinavia. It is a critical issue when considering
ventilation. This is a short note drawing attention to the issues. The subject is a huge one, justifying a full
issue of the Digest in the future.
After a great deal of interest in ‘Sick Building Syndrome’21 in the mass media in the late 1980s, public
interest appears to have declined somewhat, though the fashion for solid wooden floors instead of carpets is
a result of a partial understanding of such issues among consumers. However the problem has not gone
away. As most of us spend 90% of our lives inside buildings, certainly in colder climates, the internal air
that we breathe is laced with a huge cocktail of chemicals and ‘natural;’ pollutants that can seriously affect
our health. Good ventilation is a key factor in reducing the impact of indoor pollution, but reducing the
chemicals at source is the most effective solution for green designers. Specifying green and ‘natural’
materials with low toxicity would appear to be one of the most effective ways, when coupled with an
effective ventilation strategy, of ensuring good IAQ.
Surprisingly there is little medical research into the impact of IAQ on health. Bodies such as the Medical
Research Council and the National Asthma Campaign do not appear to have given it sufficiently high
priority. A great deal of medical opinion links allergic and respiratory problems to genetic rather than
environmental causes. When environmental causes are blamed, these are largely attributed to external
pollution such as from traffic rather than IAQ. There are also powerful vested interests in the pharmaceuticals
world to promote the sales of inhalers and anti allergy remedies, one of the most lucrative sources of profits
for the drug companies.
It is possible that the lack of sufficient medical evidence has been one of the reasons why IAQ has not
been accorded a high priority in the construction industry. However research at the University of
Strathclyde in Glasgow is investigating the links between domestic environments and the increasing
prevalence of asthma.22 They attribute many of the problems to the reduction of ventilation rates, higher
levels of humidity and the air tightness of modern constructions. Recently an American authority in the
field, Hal Levin said, at the International Indoor Air Quality Conference in Edinburgh, that the weight of
scientific evidence demonstrates clearly that indoor pollution (rather than external) is one the main
influences on our health.23 A large amount of scientific work in the IAQ field is slowly beginning to
influence building regulations and manufacturer of building products, particularly in more progressive
countries such as Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands.24 The International IAQ conference in Edinburgh
in August 1999 had over 600 scientific papers, but it was stated that there has been a failure to transfer
much of this knowledge to a wider audience. Much of the research has been pre-occupied with developing
methods of measurement and analysis (which are crucial) rather than the effects of indoor air pollution on
building occupants. This failure to communicate was recognised at IAQ 99 and a workshop specifically
discussed linking IAQ research with the wider sustainable construction movement.
The main sources of Indoor Air pollution are;
building materials, paints, varnishes etc., technical equipment (printers, photocopiers etc.), cleaning
fluids, polishes etc., common products that are used indoors, body effluents, ambient air quality, including
pollution from outside and smoking.
Standards do exist for acceptable levels of some of these pollutants but they do not always take into
account the problems of people who are allergic or hypersensitive to certain materials. However building
codes in various countries tend to focus mostly on CO2, CO and NO2 and pay less attention to the levels of volatile organic compounds.25 This can largely be attributed to pressure from commercial interests that do
not want to see further controls on toxic emissions from their products.
While levels of pollution from tobacco smoke and cleaning materials can be controlled, VOCs and other
chemicals are concentrated into the actual fabric of buildings and this means removing the use of such
materials at the specification stage. Emission levels can vary widely depending on the finishes in buildings
and at different times in the life of a building. Studies at the Building Research Establishment have
identified 254 Volatile organic compounds emitted from building materials in the first year of the life of four
newly built houses and 71 during the second year.26 Other listings show a much larger range of toxic
materials found in buildings and clearly these will vary depending on the materials used in construction.27
Paints and flooring materials are the main sources, but other products can also be significant.28 Higher
temperatures, during the summer or from winter heating, lead to higher emission levels and while the
highest release is in the early life of a building many chemicals can linger for much longer. A wide range
of chemicals which are suspected of causing health problems including Toluene, Naphthalene, Xylenes,
Formaldehyde, Lindane and many more can be detected in conventional houses. Many of these chemicals
have been referred to in past issues of the Green Building Digest, particularly the issues on Paints for
Joinery, Adhesives, Interior Decoration, timber preservatives and so on and more information on them can
be found in the relevant digest. Many people are also sensitive to natural pathogens such as pollen, dust
mites and mould. It is important to ensure that the remedies to this do not introduce new VOCs into the
indoor environment. Also many anti fungal and mould treatments use biocides which in themselves are
toxic to humans.
Many of the environmental assessment systems for buildings did not include IAQ and toxic emissions in
their categorisation though the BRE Environmental Standard, Homes for a Greener World,29 introduced
measurements of Formaldehyde, Wood preservatives and Paint with lead in 1995 and has been largely
ignored. Much tougher standards are likely to be introduced in the future when the new BRE environmental
profiling system30 is widely adopted and ventilation standards in the building regulations will eventually be
related to the effect of materials on our health.

Green Building characteristics

2009-04-28T06:58:00.000-07:00

Building characteristics
Whatever the climate, a building, such as a house, can be thought of as a mixture
of mass materials (e.g. brick wall, mud brick vault, concrete slab) and insulation
materials (e.g. fibreglass batts in the wall, thatched roof, expanded polystyrene
sandwich cladding panel). How a building performs depends upon the mixture of these materials, but it can be simply thought of in the following way. For the cave
dweller, who lived in a mass building with no insulation, the internal temperature
would settle at the annual average temperature. ForNew Zealand that was 13.1C
in 2005, the fourth highest such annual average on record1 and in the UK it is
8.5–11C2. This explains the old adage that a house with thick stone walls always
felt warm in winter and cool in summer, since that was what it was relative to the
outside temperature, even if the actual indoor air temperature around 10C or
even 13C did not represent comfort. Thus, having a lot of mass in a building
means the internal temperature will tend to be stable. The presence of insulation in
combination with mass will tend to raise the stable internal temperature above the
average annual temperature. The experience with Hockerton houses in the UK,
which have no space heating system apart from the gains from solar energy, the
occupants and the equipment inside, suggests that a 7–8C temperature rise above
the annual average can be achieved with a very high mass construction with
300mm of insulation to walls, roof and floor, and with the best available offthe-
shelf windows. The latter consisted of plantation-grown softwood frames with
triple-glazed units, along with krypton gas filling and low-emissivity coatings on
two of the glass layers (Vale and Vale 2000: pp. 187–194).
Conversely, the temperature inside a house that has minimal mass and insulation
will follow the outside temperature unless energy is put into the house in the form
of sunlight, or from the people and equipment housed in it. Temperatures over a
day are lowest in the night and highest around midday. In a lightweight house,
insulation will lift the internal temperature above the outside temperature.
However, the temperature in the house will still go up and down, following the
track of the outside temperature but a number of degrees above it. The level of
insulation will determine how much the temperature inside is lifted above that
outside. For an unheated house in New Zealand with 150mm of insulation in
walls and floor, and 200mm in the roof, the temperature was lifted about 7C
above that outside when the outside temperature was at its lowest. This meant the
minimum indoor temperature recorded in a bedroom was 14C (Vale and Vale
2001). The windows in this instance were double-glazed with one low-emissivity
coating in aluminium frames with no thermal break.
Although it is true to say that in New Zealand the majority of houses are of the
lightweight model, in many countries houses are a mixture of mass and lightweight
materials, often having masonry walls (mass), concrete slab ground floor
(mass), timber joisted upper floor (lightweight) and a timber frame roof (lightweight),
and hence their characteristic performance, if they are unheated, will
also be somewhere between the two extremes. It is important to have a basic
understanding of how buildings might behave. This is because it may fall to the
user to attempt to correct any shortcomings in the original design at points of major refurbishment in the building lifetime. During any refurbishment it is
unlikely that mass will be added to the building but it is often possible to add
insulation. However, before discussing this subject further, it is also necessary to
consider the behaviour of small buildings in hot climates and the behaviour of
large buildings.
In a hot climate, whether hot wet or hot dry, the aim is usually to keep the
building cooler than outside, although in some desert climates where the nights
are cold it is also desirable at times to try to raise the inside temperature above
that outside. From this it can be seen that in the hot dry desert climate with a
large swing in temperature between night and day, the very high mass building
is a good solution as it will maintain the annual average temperature. For
example, the mean annual temperature in Egypt is 20–25C3, which would
provide a good comfort temperature in a building. The classic high mass
building for this climate was made of mud brick, had few openings to keep
out the sun and formed part of a cluster of buildings to keep as much exterior
surface as possible shaded from exposure to direct sunlight. In a hot, humid
climate the temperature swing day and night and summer to winter is often less,
so there is less need of the tempering effect of mass, and the traditional building
was often lightweight, and open as much as possible to any cooling breezes to
help keep the occupants comfortable. In all hot climates the roof is an important
element in keeping out the sun. Often, ventilation paths would be open
under the roof in order to keep air flowing over its underside, with the aim of
channelling away any heat coming through. Roofs would also be insulated
against heat gain. In all warm climates a light-coloured roof is also an advantage
to reduce the solar gain into the building.
A small building is dominated by the performance of the surface, walls, roof and
floor, as the volume of space enclosed is relatively small. However, a large
building has less surface area for the volume enclosed, so its thermal performance
tends to be dominated by what happens in it – the gains from people and activities
– rather than by the skin, although large areas of glass cladding exposed to the
sun will have an effect on internal performance. Large buildings, with one
exception, also differ because they tend to be used during the working day and
so there is no necessity to maintain comfortable conditions during the night, the
time of lowest external temperatures in climates that need heating. The exception
is the apartment block, which, especially in Asia, is becoming the norm. The
improved performance of such buildings lies more with the designers and constructors
as the improvements to the life cycle impact that can be made by the
users are limited. Because this chapter is about the effect of the building user, the
remainder of the discussion will be centred on the home and the small-scale
building.

Green Architecture Guidelines

2009-04-28T06:48:00.000-07:00

Guidelines on dealing with the issues
This section aims to suggest guidelines and priorities for the users of buildings to
help reduce life cycle environmental impact.
1 As operating energy is the largest component of life cycle energy, its reduction
should be the priority, rather than worrying about embodied energy.

2 Insulation is generally the key to reducing operating energy and refurbishment
should see insulation as a priority. It is generally easiest to insulate the lightweight
elements of a building first and, for a heated building, this will reduce
energy use. Mass elements must also be adequately externally insulated even if
heating is used.

3 To make a comfortable building that needs no heating requires adequate mass
with adequate insulation on its external face.

4 Once the fabric of the building has been insulated, the windows should also be
upgraded. Adding layers to windows in the form of blinds, shutters and
curtains is a simple approach to improving window performance.

5 Avoid having a very ‘wet’ lifestyle, to avoid damage from moisture in the home.

6 If it is not possible to ventilate the house in the daytime by opening the
windows, some other form of deliberate ventilation system should be used to
remove moisture from the interior of the house.

7 Switching off a light when it is not needed is the simplest way to save energy.

8 Compact fluorescent lamps, although more expensive to buy, do make sense in
life cycle terms both for life cycle energy and life cycle cost.

9 Taking shorter showers is the quickest way to save the energy used to heat
water.

10 If a hot water system needs replacing, a solar water heating system with an
adequate storage tank might be an option to reduce the life cycle environmental
impact of a hot water supply.

11 Install Energy Star and European A-class rated appliances where these are
available.

12 Turn off appliances at the wall whenever possible.

13 Use natural finishes rather than those based on petroleum products.

14 Use of second-hand or antique furniture will reduce the overall life cycle
environmental impact.

Conclusion
None of the issues presented in the guidelines above should be a surprise as they
will be found in many discussions on how to make houses and other small
buildings use less energy and have less impact on the natural environment.
What life cycle analysis allows is the chance to set priorities, as it is possible to
see precisely what contributes to the making of the life cycle impact and the
relative size of the constituent parts. If there is one thing life cycle analysis
confirms, it is the importance of insulation in reducing life cycle energy use and
life cycle impact. Insulation is a boring subject, as the money spent on it is
generally not visible in the way money spent on a state-of-the-art kitchen is.
Nevertheless, at every stage of a building’s life its environmental performance
will be improved by the addition of insulation. Perhaps it is the case that building
designers as well as users have to learn to love increased levels of ‘invisible’
insulation within their homes.

Green Architecture Design Competition

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Green Building Design Competition

USGBC's Natural Talent Design Competition provides applied learning experience in the principles of integrated design, sustainability, and innovation, all of which are components of the LEED® Green Building Rating System™. Participants compete in local competitions, and the top winner of each moves on to compete for a national award at USGBC’s annual Greenbuild International Conference & Expo. Awards include green building scholarships, as well as travel and registration to Greenbuild, where finalists’ entries are displayed and final judging occurs. Now in its sixth year, the next Design Competition will take place November 11-13, 2009, at Greenbuild in Phoenix.
2009 Registration

Register for your local 2009 Design Competition and download the required Image Use Form.
2009 Local USGBC Design Competitions
Atlanta, GA
Boston, MA
Cascadia Chapter (Portland, Seattle, Vancouver)
Charlotte, NC
Chicago, IL
Cincinnati, OH
Colorado
Tampa, FL (Florida Gulf Coast)
Houston, TX
Idaho Chapter
James River Green Building Council (Virginia Beach, Norfolk, VA)
Kansas City Chapter
Los Angeles, CA
Michigan (West Michigan Chapter)
Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN
New York, NY
Philadelphia, PA (Delaware Valley Green Building Council)
Puerto Rico (Caribbean Chapter)
Raleigh/Durham, NC (NC Triangle Chapter)
Sacramento, CA
San Antonio, TX
San Diego, CA
San Francisco, CA
South Florida Chapter
Upstate New York Chapter
Washington, D.C. (National Capital Region)
Wisconsin (Wisconsin Green Building Alliance)
2008 Winners
Started six years ago by USGBC’s Emerging Green Builders, the Natural Talent Design Competition is an annual contest for students and young professionals to practice sustainable design concepts around local community projects. Each year, participating USGBC chapters, affiliates, and host committees hold local competitions which each group’s winning project team participating in the national competition. The winners are selected at Greenbuild by a jury of distinguished design professionals. The awards are presented during the closing plenary.

2008 Competition
This year, 17 chapters hosted local competitions and sent their winning project teams to Boston to compete for the national prize. This year’s jury included: Bill O’ Dell (HOK), Ralph DiNola (LEED faculty and chapter leader), Chris Klehm (LEED faculty and chapter leader), and Bahar Armaghani (LEED faculty and chapter leader). USGBC awards 1st and 2nd place prizes as well as honorable mentions.

National 1st Place Winner received $5000
National 2nd Place Winner received $2000
Honorable Mention was announced at the discretion of the design jury

2008 Honorable Mention: Boston EGB, Team Redo_Rudolph,
Project: The Erich Lindemann Building
Members: Priya Jain, Dana Ozik, Matt Morong, Marta Morais Storz, Dana Ozik

2008 National 2nd Place: National Capitol Region EGB, Team Greensmith
Project: Urban Nomadic Shelter
Members: Arnold Smith and Arvi Sardadi

2008 National 1st Place: Cascadia EGB, Team Webber Thompson
Project Name: Eco-Laboratory
Members: Myer Harrell, Dan Albert, Brian Geller, and Chris Dukehart

Click Here for Previous Design Competition Winners

SUSTAINABLE ARCHITECTURE DESIGN COMPETITION 2009

2009-04-28T04:03:00.000-07:00

2009 Design Challenge

Detailed information about the 2009 NCSBDC Design Challenge is available for download.

Please note: When you click on some of these links a dialogue box will open. It will ask, "Do you want to open or save this file?" Click on save. By not saving this file, you may lose your work. These files must be submitted with your team's design entry on the day of your school's local competition. Please read the Requirements document for official guidelines.

Required Files

Design Challenge
Requirements [download document]
Summary Sheet for Binder [download document]
Return on Investment template [download document]

Additional Files

Frequently Asked Questions for 2009 [download pdf]

Competition site

The lot at 1725 Poole Road, is 0.96 acres and borders an existing CASA development project, Hope Crest.

Photo of the lot at 1725 Poole
Road with neighboring building, Hope Crest.

Site plan for 1725 Poole Road

You can also view a site plan here.

Visiting the site
Design Competition students are strongly encouraged to visit the site. There will be several opportunities to tour the site with Griff Gatewood, Housing Developer at CASA during the semester. Two tours have been scheduled for January 21st and February 7th. To participate in these tours, please contact Griff Gatewood via email (ggatewood@casanc.com) or by phone (919-754-9960). If you are unable to make the scheduled tours, you are welcome to visit the site at your convenience.

Upcoming Event about Green Architecture

2009-04-28T00:11:00.000-07:00

Upcoming events

April

April 27 - 29, 2009 - Paris, . France
Energy Efficiency Global Forum & Exposition (EE Global 2009)

April 27 - May 01, 2009 - Kansas City, MO
ACI Home Performance Conference 2009
The national ACHI Home Performance Conference returns to Kansas City, Missouri (Hyatt Regency Crown Center)

April 28 - 30, 2009 - Chicago , Illinois United States
Decon '09- The BMRA Biannual Conference
The National Conference of the Building Materials Reuse Association

April 28 - 29, 2009 - Phoenix, AZ
2009 National Apartment Association Green Conference & Exposition
At the The Phoenix Convention Center – LEED Certified.

April 28 - 30, 2009 - Shanghai, . China
EPTEE 2009 - The 10th China EPTEE Show for Water, Air, Waste, Energy and Recycling
The 10th China EPTEE Show for Water, Air, Waste, Energy and Recycling

April 30, 2009 - Boston, MA
An Evening Fundraiser in Support of Alternative Grad School
Please join us on Thursday, April 30 (6:00 - 8:00 pm) at the NEXUS Green Building Resource Center

April 30 - May 02, 2009 - San Francisco, CA
AIA 2009 NATIONAL CONVENTION AND DESIGN EXPOSITION
THE POWER OF DIVERSITY: PRACTICE IN A COMPLEX WORLD

May

May 03 - 07, 2009 - Houston, TX USA
Clean Technology Conference & Trade Show 2009

May 05, 2009 - Washington, DC
Living Green ˆ A Conference on Sustainable Urban Planning and Green Building
Swedish and U.S. experts will share their experiences and views from both countries on developing greener living spaces.

May 05 - 08, 2009 - Salt Lake City, Utah USA
2009 Natl. Mitigation & Ecosystem Banking Conference
Learn how the New Rule on Mitigation Banking is impacting the industry

May 06 - 08, 2009 - Portland, Oregon USA
Living Future '09: Cultivating Leadership
The Cascadia Region Green Building Council’s annual signature event focused on cutting-edge green design solutions. This year’s theme is “Cultivating Leadership.”

May 07, 2009 - Chapel Hill, North Carolina USA
Integrated Interiors Design & Product Selection
Maximize LEED points using the latest sustainable interior products and materials

May 08 - 09, 2009 - Santa Monica, California
Alternative Building Materials and Design Expo 09
Presented by the City of Santa Monica, this event features over 150 exhibitors displaying the latest in green building technologies and practices, landscape and water conservation products and interior design products and furnishings.

May 08 - 10, 2009 - Dallas, TX
NAHB National Green Building Conference
This year's conference is focused on how to "make green by going green." Attendees will learn how a shift to a greener business can lead to more profits in the long run and get perspectives on Green's future.

May 09 - 10, 2009 - Dayton, OH
Straw Bale Construction Workshop

May 10 - 15, 2009 - Warren, VT
Strawbale Design/Build
Learn to build a strawbale structure from start to finish!

May 11 - 16, 2009 - East Charleston, Vermont USA
Solar-Electric System Design and Installation Course
A complete overview of solar-electric systems that provides participants with the skills needed to site, design, and install a PV system.

May 17 - 22, 2009 - Warren, VT
Natural Plasters & Finishes
Learn to mix and apply beautiful, non-toxic paints, plasters and finishes from natural materials and pigments!

May 18 - 20, 2009 - Boston, MA
Alternative Energy & Building Efficiency Conference & Exhibition

May 18 - 20, 2009 - Chicago, Illinois USA
CleanMed 2009

May 18 - 20, 2009 - Washington, DC
2009 Building Opportunities Conference
Join us for three days of practical tools to create successful nonprofit shared space and services.

May 20 - 21, 2009 - Santa Barbara, California United States
Santa Barbara Summit on Energy Efficiency

May 21, 2009 - San Francisco, CA USA
Brightworks LEED-NC 2.2 Exam Training Workshop!
Sign up to pass the LEED-NC 2.2 Accredited Professional Exam.

May 23 - 29, 2009 - Philo, Ohio USA
The Complete Straw Bale Building Workshop
The Complete Straw Bale Building Workshop and more

May 24 - June 12, 2009 - Warren, VT
Ecological Design in the Built Environment Certificate Course
Yestermorrow's Core Class in Home-Scale Whole Systems Design, Ecological Planning, Design and Construction

May 27 - 29, 2009 - Las Vegas, NV
National Green Builders Products Expo
Join the National Green Builders Products Expo in the #1 trade show destination city in the world...LAS VEGAS!

May 28 - 29, 2009 - Austin, Texas
Corporate Sustainability Summit
Learn How Sustainability is Revitalizing Financial Performance from The Best Minds in Business

May 30 - June 03, 2009 - Gerald, Missouri
Green Building - A Systems Approach

June

June 01 - August 14, 2009 - Warren, VT
Natural Building Intensive Course
Learn to design and build a complete, handcrafted structure of natural stone, straw, timber, and clay from start to finish!

June 03 - 05, 2009 - Seattle, Washington
17th National Conference on Building Commissioning

June 04 - 05, 2009 - Gerald, Missouri
Passive Solar Heating and Cooling

June 06, 2009 - Gerald, Missouri
Straw Bale Design and Construction

June 07, 2009 - Gerald, Missouri
Natural Plasters

June 07 - 12, 2009 - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania USA
34th IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists Conference
Highly technical conference for the solar industry organized by the IEEE.

June 09 - 11, 2009 - Montreal, QC CANADA
Shifting Into The Mainstream: CaGBC National Summit 2009
Shifting Into the Mainstream

June 10, 2009 - Long Beach, CA
27th West Coast Energy Management Congress
AEE is your source on energy efficiency, renewable energy, and carbon reduction strategies and offers certification, seminars, conferences, books, journals, and tradeshows.

June 13 - 14, 2009 - Gerald, Missouri
Natural Building

June 16 - 17, 2009 - New York , NY
Green BuildingsNY
Greener Buildings. Greener Planet. Greener Future.

June 17 - 19, 2009 - San Francisco, CA
PCBC 2009 - PCBC at 50 + the Multifamily Trends Conference

June 17 - 19, 2009 - Warren, VT
Course in Green Development Best Practices
A practical, step-by-step tour through the world of green planning, design, construction, sales and operations.

June 18 - 20, 2009 - Beijing, . China
The International Green Building Expo

June 21 - 26, 2009 - Vancouver, WA United States
The Summer Sustainability Series - Sustainability in the Urban Built Environment
Summer Sustainability Series - fast paced , 5-day, mobile symposium

June 27 - 28, 2009 - Warren, VT
Green Home Design Course

June 28 - July 03, 2009 - Warren, VT
Regenerative Home Design Course
Learn the principles of regenerative design thinking, and gain an understanding of how to design buildings that function like living organisms.

July

July 05 - 10, 2009 - Warren, VT
Course in Designing Ecological Intentional Communities
Learn how to organize and plan your own ecological intentional community.

July 16 - 19, 2009 - Indianapolis, IN
CONSTRUCT2009/The TFM Show/CSI Annual Convention
Comprehensive Educational and Trade Show for Building Professionals

July 18, 2009 - Berkeley, CA USA
Which Shade of Green?
Select the right products and projects for an energy-efficient and sustainable remodel.

July 19 - 24, 2009 - Warren, VT
Deconstruction and Materials Re-use Class
Learn how to salvage building materials safely and effectively for whole-house deconstruction projects for fun or profit.

July 26 - August 01, 2009 - Warren, VT
Reuse: Recycle Art & Architecture Class
Look at, discuss and explore hands-on examples of materials re-use and recycling in both art and architecture as ways to work creatively with materials.

August

August 01 - 02, 2009 - Warren, VT
Green Remodeling

August 08 - 09, 2009 - Warren, VT
Efficiency by Design Course
An introduction to the principles of heat loss, heat gain, insulation and health and energy effects of materials in building envelopes.

August 09 - 14, 2009 - Warren, VT
Green Roof Design and Installation Course
Learn how to design and build green roof systems!

August 15 - 16, 2009 - Warren, VT
Green Building Materials
Learn about environmental impact, life cycle assessment, and indoor air quality ramifications for materials used in nearly all aspects of the home.

August 23 - 28, 2009 - Warren, VT
Permaculture for Home and Garden
Learn about Permaculture ideas that can improve quality of life, simplify needs, and increase family time by cooperating with ecological processes to create abundance and diversity.

August 30 - September 18, 2009 - Warren, VT
Ecological Design in the Built Environment Class
Yestermorrow's Core Class in Home-Scale Whole Systems Design, Ecological Planning, Design and Construction

September

September 06 - 12, 2009 - Warren, VT
Introduction to Cob Building Class
Learn to build an affordable earthen home out of cob!

September 13 - 17, 2009 - Syracuse, New York USA
Healthy Buildings 2009

September 14 - 18, 2009 - Washington, DC
GREAT Expo 2009: Global Renewal Energy Advanced Technologies Expo & Summit

September 20 - October 02, 2009 - Warren, VT
Permaculture Design Certification
This course covers the core Permaculture Design curriculum including applications of Permaculture in diverse settings, and techniques for meeting human needs that harmonize with ecological patterns.

September 20 - 23, 2009 - Indianapolis, IN USA
Greening of the Campus Conference VIII: Embracing Change
Bridging the culture and practices that support the commitment of colleges and universities to education for sustainability.

September 22 - 24, 2009 - Indianapolis, IN USA
Laboratories for the 21st Century (Labs21®) 2009 Annual Conference
A gathering of leaders in sustainable laboratory design and operation

October

October 05 - 09, 2009 - Las, Vegas
WaterSmart '09 Convention
Five core workshops, enabling attendees to become fully Accredited GreenPlumbers in just one workweek.

October 22 - 25, 2009 - New Bedford, MA
Bioneers by the Bay: Connecting for Change
Fourth Annual Bioneers by the Bay Conference Tackles Environmental Sustainability Crisis with Global and Local Solutions

October 31 - November 03, 2009 - Orlando, FL United States
HEALTHCARE DESIGN.08
The HEALTHCARE DESIGN conference is devoted to how the DESIGN of responsibly built environments directly impacts the safety, operation, clinical outcomes, and financial success of healthcare facilities now and into the future.

November

November 08 - 09, 2009 - Warren, VT
Trees & Wood
We will look at the global distribution of forests and their importance, the physiology of trees and wood, and the habitat and nature of trees commonly utilized in construction, cabinetry, and furnituremaking.

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Green Architecture Event calendar

2009-04-28T00:07:00.000-07:00

NYC Green Building Events

Tour: Bronx Library Center LEED NC Silver

When: Tuesday, April 28 2009 05:00 PM - Tuesday, April 28 2009 07:00 PM
(today, 13:55 hours.)
Where: 310 East Kingsbridge Road (at Briggs Avenue) New York, NY 10458 Directions: Travel time from Union Square is 53 minutes. D, B train to Fordham Rd.; follow signs indicating exit to Grand Concourse and 188th St. On Grand Concourse walk north one bl
Duration: 02:00 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: USGBC
More information: More information »
The Bronx Library Center is the first publicly funded building in the five boroughs of New York City to receive LEED certification, and the first branch in the New York Public Library System to be LEED certified. Thus the Center builds on the rich architectural tradition of The New York Public Library, while setting a standard for the future. Join us to learn more about a public client’s perspective on benefits and challenges of sustainable design for public construction. Sustainable design was integral to developing an environmentally responsible, healthy building that is welcoming to the community and technologically advanced. Features include a high-performance curtain wall, high-efficiency lighting with stepped daylight dimming controls as well as occupancy and CO2 sensors. Learn how sustainable features are integrated in public buildings, how the building’s energy costs were reduced from those of a standard code compliant building by more than 20%, and about the operational and regulatory issues specific to sustainable public projects. Tickets: $20 USGBC New York Members* $30 Non-Members

Transitioning into the Green Building Industry

When: Tuesday, April 28 2009 06:00 PM - Tuesday, April 28 2009 07:30 PM
(today, 14:55 hours.)
Where: 217 Grand Street No 802 b/w Mott and Elizabeth St
Duration: 01:30 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: YRG sustainability
More information:
A panel discussion featuring representatives from: GreenOrder • Ateiler Ten • Studio Mapos • YRG Designed to help those interested in transitioning into the Green Building Industry understand the industry and what expertise is most valuable to local firms. The panel will answer questions as well as direct participants to the best ways to prepare for entering the industry. This event is free and open to the first 25 people who rsvp to lbenson@yrgsustainability.com

Master Class in Sustainable Design: Carolyn Steel

When: Friday, May 01 2009 11:45 AM - Friday, May 01 2009 01:30 PM
(in 3 days and 08:40 hours.)
Where: Haworth Showroom 125 Park Avenue (please enter on 42nd street) New York, NY 10017
Duration: 01:45 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: USGBC, Hosted by Haworth Showroom
More information: More information »
Join us for a presentation of the career of London-based Architect Carolyn Steel, including the recent publication of her groundbreaking book, Hungry City: How Food Shapes Our Lives. Carolyn is an architect, lecturer and writer whose 20 years experience combines practice with teaching and research in urban design, breaking down traditional barriers between disciplines. A director of Cullum and Nightingale Architects, she was a Rome Scholar, has written for the architectural press, and has presented on the BBC’s “One Foot in the Past”. Her lecture course at Cambridge University, “Food and the City” is an established part of the Architecture degree program. Carolyn’s book, Hungry City, examines the development of cities through food. The book describes the organic life-cycles of cities, following food's journey from farm to table to waste and back, and asks how a new approach to the urban food network can improve the design of urban places. Carolyn examines the way in which modern food production has damaged the balance of human ecology, and reveals that we have yet to resolve a centuries-old dilemma one which holds the key to a host of current problems, from obesity and the inexorable rise of the supermarkets, to the destruction of the natural world. She shows how our lives and our environment are being impacted by contemporary food systems but explains how we can change things for the better. Carolyn will explore the impact sustainability has had on her multi-faceted career and what the future holds for those committed to greener, healthier communities. Tickets: $10 AIA HSW/SD: 1.0 Registration: 11:45am Lunch: 12:00pm Presentation 12:30 - 1:30pm

Weathering the Storm: Design firms are invited to a brainstorming session on sharing resources and cutting costs

When: Tuesday, May 05 2009 08:30 AM - Tuesday, May 05 2009 10:00 AM
(in 7 days and 05:25 hours.)
Where: 200 Park Avenue New York, NY 10166 United States
Duration: 01:30 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: USGBC, Bovis Lend lease
More information: More information »
During this period of economic turmoil, “sustainability” has taken on new meaning. Many in the design community are looking for ways to share information, pool resources, and cut costs. One new resource is Exchange Point, a website where design firms can post and search for temporary staffing, desk space, collaboration opportunities, and more. We invite representatives of design firms to an open forum to further explore these and other ways to sustain and strengthen the green building community. Co-sponsored by USGBC New York, AIA NY, ASHRAE New York Chapter, and The Architect’s Newspaper. Attendance is limited to one representative from each design firm. Space is limited, please RSVP

Green Roofs, Alternative Energy, and Your Business

When: Tuesday, May 05 2009 05:00 PM - Tuesday, May 05 2009 06:30 PM
(in 7 days and 13:55 hours.)
Where: Sustainable NYC, 139 Avenue A (between 8th & 9th)
Duration: 01:30 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: Sustainable NYC
More information: More information »
If your business wants save on energy costs, increase marketability of your building, gain aesthetic appeal, increase roof life span, insulate your building from sound, reduce storm water runoff and more then come to this introductory workshop on Green Roofs and alternative energy. This workshop will teach you about what a Green Roof is and how your business and your community can benefit from it (including economic benefits and incentives). Green Roof experts will show you examples of Green Roofs and discuss how they are installed. Furthermore, experts on alternative energy option in NYC will help you reduce energy bills and your businesses overall emissions.

1st Wednesday Technical Roundtable: Building Integrated Wind Power

When: Wednesday, May 06 2009 08:00 AM - Wednesday, May 06 2009 09:00 AM
(in 8 days and 04:55 hours.)
Where: 200 Park Avenue, 9th Floor (Met Life Building; enter through Grand Central Terminal's main concourse) New York, NY 10166
Duration: 01:00 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: USGBC
More information: More information »
AIA Continuing Education Credit: HSW/SD 1.0 Join us for an up-to-date discussion of wind energy theory, wind resources, turbine types and sizes, siting and other practical considerations. Attendees will leave with a solid understanding of the benefits and constraints of wind energy in an urban environment. In cities where space for photovoltaic systems is limited, wind power is often a more feasible, effective option. The presentation will focus on systems currently entering the market, and on the widespread uncertainty regarding their performance. The conditions of building mounted turbines as distinct from those of stand-alone turbines will also be discussed. Fluctuations in fossil fuel prices, and planning pressure to provide on-site renewable energy are key incentives to explore the potential of building integrated wind power. New York's quest to produce clean power, highlighted by Mayor Bloomberg at the Las Vegas Clean Energy Summit last August, is a prime example of this. Panelists will explore all these issues and more, and field audience questions. Speakers: Adam Friedberg, Arup (Please check link for updates on speakers) Tickets: $15 USGBC New York Members* $25 Non-Members

Sustainability: The Exit Strategy-Small, local, open and connected An Evening with Ezio Manzini

When: Wednesday, May 06 2009 06:00 PM - Wednesday, May 06 2009 08:00 PM
(in 8 days and 14:55 hours.)
Where: The Cherry Lane Theater 38 Commerce Street West Village, NY City
Duration: 02:00 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: o2 NYC
More information: More information »
Whether you've been tirelessly working away on sustainable design strategies for years, or have only recently joined the movement, you must be wondering, what do we do NOW? Design for positive social and environmental impact - let's admit it - it is easier said than done, even when the economy was booming, and the demand for shiny green things was on the rise. The more we seemed to dig deeper and learn about the environmental and social consequences of design, the more we struggled with the moral quandaries built into our systems of production and consumption. Sure, we could do better, but would better get us to where we need to go? Now that the global economy is on the precipice, can we rethink and reframe our goals? What IS our exit strategy? Ezio Manzini, author of Sustainable Everyday, Professor in Industrial Design at the Politecnico di Milano, and founder of o2 Italy, will join us for an evening conversation. Ezio has been on the journey towards sustainable design for over 20 years, and has noticed a growing trend to move beyond first measures of eco-efficiency, to seek larger vision of sustainability. Ezio will share his current vision for sustainability, to define our exit strategy as a community of designers: "Research on eco-efficiency has been successful, but has not improved the overall picture. Current products and services, taken one by one, use far less energy and materials than those of some decades ago. However, no indicator of aggregate consumption indicates a decrease: even in countries where research on eco-efficiency has been most successful. Overall consumption of environmental resources continues to grow. This clearly tells us that increasing improvements in the current system are not enough. The transition towards sustainability requires a systemic change. It is not a question of doing what we already do better. It is a question of doing different things in completely different ways. There is an emerging demand for visions of sustainability. This requires scenarios to show that is possible to move form the “less of the same” perspective to the “better and different” one. That is, the one where is proved that there are feasible, socially acceptable, even attractive, alternatives on different scales for various aspects of people’s lives. Where will this vision come from? The emerging features, as the cases of socio-technical innovation on which they are based, are characterized by four keywords: small, local, open and connected. We know that these same keywords are characterizing the contemporary society, when we look at it as a network society. To do that the role of the design community (can be crucial to feed the social learning process with the needed design knowledge: new scenarios (on sustainable ways of being and doing) and specific design contributions (to the development of viable solutions)." - Ezio Manzini

Brooklyn Green Buildings Tour by bike

When: Saturday, May 09 2009 09:00 AM - Saturday, May 09 2009 04:00 PM
(in 11 days and 05:55 hours.)
Where: Details and exact times will be sent after you register.
Duration: 07:00 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: GreenHomeNYC
More information: More information »
In its seventh annual tour, GreenHomeNYC offers the public a unique glimpse at the inner workings and design details comprising exemplar Green buildings in Brooklyn and the Bronx. Guests on the tours will be hosted by the dedicated sustainability practitioners of these buildings, such as their expert architects, LEED APs, developers, engineers and owners. Learn about the challenges and accomplishments that were faced by the professionals involved with these commercial and residential buildings. Tour #1: Brooklyn Bicycle Tour Eco Brooklyn Show House - 22 2nd Street, Brooklyn Poly Prep Lower School - 50 Prospect Park West, Brooklyn Green on Dean - 357 Dean Street, Brooklyn 3rd and Bond - 111 3rd Street, Brooklyn Registration coming soon.

Bronx Green Buildings Tour

When: Saturday, May 09 2009 09:00 AM - Saturday, May 09 2009 04:00 PM
(in 11 days and 05:55 hours.)
Where: Details will be sent after you register.
Duration: 07:00 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: GreenHomeNYC
More information: More information »
In its seventh annual tour, GreenHomeNYC offers the public a unique glimpse at the inner workings and design details comprising exemplar Green buildings in Brooklyn and the Bronx. Guests on the tours will be hosted by the dedicated sustainability practitioners of these buildings, such as their expert architects, LEED APs, developers, engineers and owners. Learn about the challenges and accomplishments that were faced by the professionals involved with these commercial and residential buildings. Tour #3: Bronx Bus Tour El Jardin – 754 Melrose Ave, The Bronx Rebuilder’s Source – 461 Timpson Place, The Bronx Globus Cork – 741 E. 136th Street, The Bronx Green Decatur - 2668 Decatur Ave, The Bronx Bronx Library Center – 310 East Kingsbridge Road, The Bronx

Brooklyn Green Buildings Tour

When: Saturday, May 09 2009 09:00 AM - Saturday, May 09 2009 04:00 PM
(in 11 days and 05:55 hours.)
Where: Details will be sent after you register.
Duration: 07:00 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: GreenHomeNYC
More information: More information »
In its seventh annual tour, GreenHomeNYC offers the public a unique glimpse at the inner workings and design details comprising exemplar Green buildings in Brooklyn and the Bronx. Guests on the tours will be hosted by the dedicated sustainability practitioners of these buildings, such as their expert architects, LEED APs, developers, engineers and owners. Learn about the challenges and accomplishments that were faced by the professionals involved with these commercial and residential buildings. Tour #2: Brooklyn Bus Tour Atlantic Terrace – 669 Atlantic Ave, Brooklyn 439 Metropolitan Ave – 429 Metropolitan Ave, Brooklyn Queen’s Botanical Gardens Visitor Center – 43-50 Main Street, Queens Sterling Green – 580 Sterling Place, Brooklyn

High Performance Green Building Salon: Designing the Wind

When: Thursday, May 14 2009 06:00 PM - Thursday, May 14 2009 08:00 PM
(in 16 days and 14:55 hours.)
Where: 76 Ninth Avenue, 11th Floor New York, NY 10111
Duration: 02:00 hours.
Sponsoring Organization: USGBC
More information: More information »
Just think of all those New York spring days when you’d love to open a window and get some fresh air. Maybe it will be a little noisy, maybe some papers will fly, maybe some dust will come in, but you will feel the warm breeze and be glad winter is over. Natural ventilation is an essential element to green buildings. But good airflow design doesn’t just come from having functional windows. Buildings need to be designed with careful consideration to ceiling heights, façade details, thermal mass, and opportunities for cross-ventilation. As architects and designers, we know how difficult it is to properly facilitate this simple, age old tradition, but how easy it is to enjoy. Join us for a wide-ranging discussion about designing buildings based on airflow and natural ventilation. Drinks and presentation followed by Q&A. Presenters: Matt Herman, Buro-Happold Engineers (Please check link for additional speakers) 6:00pm: Drinks 6:30 to 7:30pm: Presentation 7:30 to 8:00pm: Q&A Tickets $10 USGBC New York Members* $15 Non-members

GreenBuildingsNY

When: Tuesday, June 16 2009 12:00 AM - Wednesday, June 17 2009 12:00 AM
(All-day event!)
Where: Jacob K Javits Convention Center
Duration: All-day event!
Sponsoring Organization: Reed Exhibits
More information: More information »
Green is red hot. GreenBuildingsNY, the only New York Metro area event focused on green and sustainable products for the building and design community, provides the best tools, resources and education to green up your buildings and your business. An easy-to-access and competitive source for local and national green building products and services, GreenBuildingsNY is an architects, developers engineers and builders best one-stop-shop for:
```
    * Low-impact building materials
 * Architectural salvage and reclaimed materials
 * Structural
 * HVAC
 * Energy conservation and regeneration
```

The Amazing Green Race of NYC

When: Sunday, October 18 2009 12:00 AM -
(in 172 days and 20:55 hours.)
Where: Lower Manhattan
Duration: No duration!
Sponsoring Organization: TBA
More information:
Coming Soon

USING WATER WISELY

2009-04-27T22:07:00.000-07:00

WHY SHOULD WE USE WATER WISELY?
Four things are conspiring to make fresh water one of the most
valuable commodities in the twenty-first century:
1 increasing world populations;
2 climate change;
3 man’s ever increasing interference with the natural flow of
water;
4 pollution.
In 1990 the World Health Organization estimated that 1230 million
people did not have access to adequate drinking water. By 2000
this figure was estimated to have risen by 900 million people. Add
to this already chronic problem the devastating impacts of climate
change and the results can be catastrophic, even in the most
developed countries in the world. On top of these issues comes
another: the increasing household demand for water around the
world. In England and Wales alone household water use is
predicted to increase by 10–20 per cent between 1990 and 2021
under a medium-growth scenario without climate change. Per
capita demand for domestic water is predicted to rise owing to
the projected increase in use of dishwashers and other domestic
appliances, with a further increase of 4 per cent with climate
change owing to higher use of personal showers and garden
watering. Demand for spray irrigation of crops in Britain is
predicted to rise by 115 per cent with climate change between
1990 and 2021, with most irrigation water taken from rivers and
groundwater.
This increasing demand for water can be met either by increasing
the capacity of supply (e.g. by building new reservoirs), by
reducing the consumption of water or by re-using water where we
can.
WATER CONSERVATION
Water conservation becomes increasingly important as demand for
water increases and shortfalls in supply occur. A number of water
conservation measures can be used in the home with little impact
on the every day lives of householders. These can involve the
following.
Flow restrictors
Flow restrictors are readily available and can be fitted to many
appliances, but their use has to be appropriate. Where taps can be
left open by careless users and where items are washed under
running water they are a cheap way of reducing water wastage.
However, a more effective but more expensive solution would be
to install taps operated by proximity sensors.
Showers
The average amount of water used by a conventional shower is
approximately 30 l, whilst a bath requires about 80 l. Initially, it
appears that showering is more energy and water efficient, but the
fact is that households with showers use them more frequently
than households without showers use their baths. Also, pumped
and multihead showers are not so water efficient as conventional
showers. Real savings can be made if you choose your products
wisely.
Conventional showerheads can discharge water at between 0.3
and 0.5 l s–1. Low-flow showerheads can reduce this to below
0.2 l s–1 depending on the supply pressure. Research conducted in
the USA has shown that the use of low-flow showerheads can
save approximately 27 l per day per person (for a person who
mainly showers rather than takes baths). This equates to an energy
saving in hot water of 444 kWh per person per year for water
heated by gas (or 388 kWh for water heated by electricity). The
cheaper alternative to low-flow showerheads is to fit a flow restrictor
to the supply to an existing showerhead, although this may
increase the showering time.
WCs
WC cistern water displacement devices are available in all
countries, albeit only a stone or brick in some cases. More imaginative
in the UK, with a typical flush of 6–9 l, is the use of the
plastic bags, ‘Hippo’ and yellow sponges, ‘Soggy Doggy’, thathave been distributed free by water companies to encourage
their customers to conserve water. These devices either
displace or retain water within the WC cistern to reduce the
volume of water that is flushed. Water displacement devices
such as dams and bags are very popular in the USA where
cisterns are generally much larger and less cluttered than UK
cisterns. This is because American cisterns have traditionally
flushed over 15 l of water using compact cistern outlet valves:
‘flappers’. Unfortunately it has been found that some displacement
devices may actually increase the flushing volume if they
are fitted such that they obstruct the flush volume limiting
aperture in a siphon. If the entire volume of water in the cistern
is necessary to clear the WC pan, a reduced flush volume may
not be effective, resulting in the repeated flushing of the cistern
and hence an increase in the amount of water used, rather than
a decrease.
WCs can be flushed with water using compressed air assistance.
Some such cisterns use the pressure of the mains water
supply to compress a volume of air above the stored water. When
the water is released into the bowl it has a much greater velocity
than from a conventional gravity-operated cistern. These products
are used in parts of France and the USA. To be used efficiently
these cisterns need to be matched to WC pans that can use the
higher velocity water effectively. Another type of water and
compressed air toilet uses water to rinse the bowl and
compressed air to evacuate the contents. This type is used in
many types of building in the USA.
Composting toilets
Composting toilets use no water for flushing. In its domestic
form this toilet is usually electrically powered, heating the waste
material to enable composting action to occur. The major
problem with this type of toilet is its size; the smallest domestic
model is about twice the size of a conventional WC suite.
Large (greater than 15 m3) composting toilets do not usually
require the external input of energy for the process, as the
aerobic decomposition is sufficiently exothermic to be selfsustaining.
Large composting toilets may be environmentally
acceptable as they consume only a small volume of water,
require no drainage pipe work and produce compost that can be
used in the garden. However, the questions of adequate hand
washing facilities if there is no available water supply and the
safety of children using toilets with open chutes needs to be
considered.

Waterless toilets
Waterless toilets that do not compost the waste usually require
electricity to operate. Packaging toilets seal the waste into continuous
plastic sacks that require subsequent disposal. Incinerating
toilets burn the waste to produce a sterile ash that can be disposed
of in a garden.
Urinal flushing cistern controllers
Urinal flushing cistern controllers have been widely used in the UK
for some time. Water Byelaws for such appliances have to be
checked for each area. In the UK such Byelaws state the maximum
rate at which cisterns may be filled. Since 1989 new cisterns are
required to be refilled only when the urinal is in use. There are
various methods of sensing use and operation. Some use changes
in water pressure to identify operation of taps and therefore, by
association, the use of urinals; others use passive infrared (PIR)
detectors to detect movement of persons in the room; some
sense the temperature of urine in the urinal traps; and many use
various forms of proximity detector. The essence of these devices
is they all obviate the flushing of urinals when the premises are
not being used and are usually an improvement over the use of
the traditional ‘pet-cock’ that has to be set to drip water at the
required rate into the cistern.
Waterless urinals
Waterless urinals are being increasingly used in the UK. Most
modern designs feature some form of odour suppressant that
requires regular renewal. Claims for large water and maintenance
savings are made about these devices but the pipe work must be
installed and maintained correctly if prolonged service life is to be
achieved. An incinerating urinal is available from the USA, which
produces small volumes of ash. However, at a cost of over £1000
considerable water has to be saved to make it economically viable.
Controls
The use of an occupancy detector to isolate the water supply to a
washroom when unoccupied is another application of PIR technology.
This can minimize the waste in urinal flushing and that caused
by taps being left open. Automatic leak detectors are becoming
increasingly available in the UK. These devices are fitted into the
incoming mains and close when a leak is detected, preventing boththe waste of water and damage to property. Some operate by
sensing a high flow rate and others use conductivity detectors to
activate valves. Automatic closure taps can produce water savings
in commercial and public buildings where there is a risk of taps
being left open accidentally.
Domestic appliances
Presently, 85 per cent of households in the UK possess a washing
machine and 10 per cent a dishwasher. Together, these consume
about 12 per cent of domestic drinking water. The ownership of
these previously luxury goods is increasing. Water Byelaws govern
the maximum permissible volume of water used for a wash:
between 150 and 180 l for a washing machine (depending on drum
size) and about 196 l for an average dishwasher. Modern highefficiency
washing machines use far less water than this and an
AEG washing machine uses as little as 68 l of water for a 5 kg fill
and only 1.4 kWh for a hot and cold fill. This is around one-third of
the water used in a conventional machine. The Oxford Ecohouse
dishwasher is another AEG machine that uses only 15 l of water
and 1.2 kWh electricity for a 50°C biowash cycle. That is less than
one-tenth of a conventional machine.
WASTEWATER SYSTEMS
Wastewater is used water. Wastewater may contain substances
such as human waste, food scraps, oils, soaps and chemicals. In
houses, wastewater can include the water from sinks, showers,
bathtubs, toilets, washing machines and dishwashers.
Businesses and industries also use water for a wide variety of
other purposes.
Wastewater can include stormwater (rainfall) runoff. Although
many people assume that stormwater runoff is clean, it isn’t.
Contaminants such as hydrocarbons wash off urban surfaces such
as roadways, parking lots and rooftops and can harm our rivers,
lakes and marine waters.
We also waste water when we don’t use it wisely. For instance,
when we fill a glass of water to drink, we may run the water to
make sure it’s cold. It is perfectly clean but once it disappears
down the drain it mixes with sewage and polluted water from other
households, businesses and industries.
When we pull the plug in the bathtub or flush the toilet, few of
us give much thought to where the wastewater is going but wastewater
doesn’t just disappear when it leaves our homes and
businesses. There are three types of sewer systems:
1 sanitary sewers carry wastewater from sinks, toilets, tubs and
industry;
2 storm sewers carry runoff from rainfall, called stormwater;
3 combined sewers carry wastewater and stormwater through the
same pipe.
Together, these form our wastewater collection system.
• In the USA each day, the average person produces about
220–450 l of wastewater. That’s enough to completely fill a
bathtub two times.
• We all produce sludge. An adult is responsible for about 32 kg
per year.
• If everyone installed water-saving toilets and showerheads, we
could substantially reduce domestic water consumption.
• Each day, in the USA the average person uses 260 l of water
for domestic purposes. That’s about 7 million l of water in a
lifetime.
• A leaky tap will waste in excess of 90 l of water each day.
KEY DIFFERENCES BETWEEN GREY WATER AND BLACK WATER
1 Grey water contains only one-tenth of the nitrogen of black
water. Nitrogen (as nitrite and nitrate) is the most serious and
difficult-to-remove pollutant affecting our potential drinking water.
As grey water contains far less nitrogen, it is unnecessary for it
to undergo the same treatment process as black water.
2 The medical and health professionals view black water as the
most significant source of human pathogens. Organisms that
threaten human health do not grow outside of the body (unless
incubated) but are capable of surviving especially if hosted in
human faeces. Separating grey water from black water
dramatically reduces the danger posed by such pathogens
because, in grey water the faeces that carry (and may
encapsulate) them are largely absent. However, other bacteria
are present in grey water and can cause rapid growth of any
faecal contamination present in pipes and septic systems. Care
must be taken to ensure that both grey and black water travel
rapidly through the pipes in buildings and that there are no
points in the system where they can stagnate.
3 The organic content typical of grey water decomposes much
faster than the content typical of black water. The amount of
oxygen required for the decomposition of the organic content in
grey water during the first 5 days (Biological Oxygen Demand
over 5 days or BOD5) constitutes 90 per cent of the total or
Ultimate Oxygen Demand (UOD) required for complete
decomposition. BOD5 for black water is only 40 per cent of the
oxygen required. BOD1 for grey water is around 40 per cent ofthe UOD; BOD1 for black water is only 8 per cent of the UOD.
This means that the decomposing matter in black water will
continue to consume oxygen far longer and further away from
the point of discharge than it will in grey water. This faster rate
of stabilization for grey water is advantageous for the prevention
of water pollution as the impact of grey-water discharge generally
does not travel as far from the point of discharge when
combined with wastewaters. This is especially true for sand and
soil infiltration systems. As grey and black waters are so different
it is better to separate them and, more specifically, to keep urine
and faeces out of the water altogether and to treat them
separately for the best protection of health and the environment.
Doing so also has significant savings for homeowners.

Natural Green Materials

2009-04-27T09:02:00.000-07:00

Green Architecture spirit-
environmental classification systems can often be
conceived within a closed loop which accepts current levels of consumption of synthetic materials.
Economic growth requires more and more buildings and raw materials but this can be challenged by the
development of interest in the use of natural materials that are fully renewable with only limited amounts of
manufacturing and processing. A good example of such a natural material is Hemp.23 Hemp is a fibrous
material which can be grown in the fields with a minimal amount of fertiliser and no need for pesticides. It
grows very quickly to enormous heights and the resulting crop can be used in many ways. Oil can be
extracted which has a variety of therapeutic uses, even ice cream can be made from hemp. The fibre can be
spun into material for high quality clothes and at one time was the principle material for rope making. The
left over hurds or straw can be used in building construction and fibres combined with cement or lime. Such
a natural material is infinitely renewable and has no known toxic or polluting effect on the environment.
There is no waste and the energy consumed in planting and harvesting is minimal. If we could makebuildings using such materials we can significantly reduce the use of synthetic materials such as cement and
plastics and metals.
Of course the ubiquitous renewable material is timber, but it takes a long time to grow and thus requires
careful management. Hemp and other forms of straw and reeds grow much more quickly. Bamboo is
another material which has similar properties and uses to timber but regenerates and grows much more
quickly. Innovative buildings from bamboo have been developed in various parts of the world.24 It is also
possible to use earth as a building material, but unlike fired bricks or tiles, which require a lot of energy and
processing, earth can be used as it is dug up on site. We can thus imagine the possibility of creating
buildings which are largely composed of materials which are both natural in origin, locally sourced and
resulting in zero or nearly zero emissions. While the use of such materials may seem impractical at present,
the idea has to be seen as a challenge to anyone interested in green building.25
How can we argue that a building is green and environmentally friendly when it is still composed of
materials which have required a lot of energy, processing, waste disposal and transportation to get it into
place? Thus in the future we are likely to see far more discussion of the use of zero emission and natural
materials or at least their incorporation into more conventional buildings. The use of such materials,
particularly hemp and lime, bamboo and earth construction are likely to be subjects for future issues of the
Green Building Digest. Strawbale construction is dealt with in this book and is the best known example of
using a zero emission, fully renewable, virtually waste product as a replacement for materials such as
concrete blocks, giving very high levels of insulation.

What is Straw?
It is a natural raw material, the by-product of the harvesting of wheat, rice, barley, oats and rye. Straw also
comes from maize, millet, sorghum and hemp and other forms of crop such as sugar. Over 750 million
tonnes of straw are produced worldwide annually. About 60% of straw is baled with the rest ploughed in.
Of 17,000,000 hectares of farmland, 3,353,108 are devoted to cereal crops in the UK with nearly 2 million
devoted to wheat (1996). Between 2.75 and 3.5 tonnes of straw are produced per hectare, suggesting 10
million tonnes of straw are produced in the UK annually.6
At one stage straw came to be regarded as little more than an embarrassing companion to the grain crop.7
However straw is not necessarily a waste material. In organic farming straw is very important and it is the
emphasis on petrochemicals and artificial fertilisers that have reduced the need for straw. One authority
argues that the energy contained in straw is twice as great as the farm’s fossil fuel consumption,8 so it is
clearly important to make good use of this embodied energy. Straw has many uses; as a fuel for heating, for
paper and packaging, as a food, though it needs a lot of treatment for this. It was used in straw boards
(Stramit) and traditional mixed with earth for cob and pise construction.9
It is not right, therefore to call straw a waste material and as there are moves towards more organic
farming it will be used more as animal litter and thus as part of compost making. It can be ploughed back
into the soil. A great deal of straw is also used in mushroom farming. However the use of straw bales for
building in the short term is not likely to make a big dent in the supply.

Different kinds of straw?
Most forms of crop straw are suitable for building when baled. There are different strengths of stem, with
wheat possibly being stronger, but there can be great variations depending on weather, soil, levels of
fertiliser, growing time etc. As standards of straw bale building are established, such issues may become
important, but, the density and moisture content of the bales is more important than the type of straw used.
However not all straw is necessarily suitable, for instance there has been some experimentation with the use
ofHemp straw, but anecdotal evidence suggests that hemp is very tough and difficult to use with bale wall
techniques.10
Normally two string straw bales cost around £1–£2, but larger three string bales cost more. The large
round bales which are increasingly seen are of no use, but straw bale enthusiasts might consider acquiring,
borrowing or hiring a baling machine and re-baling straw obtained from whatever source. Often bales which
are normally produced by farmers in the field are not ideal for construction as they are too loosely baled. It is essential that straw is used for construction and not hay. Hay bales are made from plant material that
is green/ alive and not suitable for this application.11 However there are apparently buildings made of hay
bales in the USA and many people confuse the two referring to hay when they mean straw.

MEIR HOUSE ECO FRIENDLY HOUSE DESIGN by Isaac Meir.

2009-04-27T02:26:00.000-07:00

ECOFEATURES
• Orientation and plan • Thermal mass • Winter solar heating • Summer cooling
• xeriscape
DESCRIPTION/BRIEF/CONCEPT
The Meir House is located in the first solar neighbourhood in Israel, Newe Zin, and
was designed as a prototype towards creating an energy-conserving urban buildingcode. It combines external insulation and internal thermal mass with open plan.
Through QUICK simulation prior to construction and monitoring post-construction,
the Meir House proves the success of an integrative approach to the design of a bioclimatic
desert house.
ECOFEATURES EXPLAINED
Orientation and plan
Considering the site’s geometry and climatic constraints, among them solar angles, air
temperatures and wind directions, the log axis of the house is east–West, with four
bedrooms and the living room to the south. The ground floor is exposed in all fourdirections. The kitchen, baths and laundry room are located at the northern part of the
plan and the garage serves as a western buffer. All spaces, excluding the garage, are a
single thermal zone. The house also includes a number of verandas and balconies
facing in different directions. Main fenestration is placed to the south, with smaller
openings to the north for cross-ventilation. However, all rooms have openings in two
directions to ensure appropriate ventilation. There are only a few, small, recessed
openings in the west façade. The second floor is exposed in all four directions.
Winds are north and northwesterly in the early noon and evening hours, whereas
at night and early morning they may turn northeast by southeast. Average maximum
windspeeds range between 40kmh1 in winter and 30kmh1 in summer. The environmentally
responsive open plan layout proved to be successful as far as heat transfer
and circulation are concerned.
Another advantage that the Meir House integrates with its form is weatherprotected
adjacent open spaces. The south and north verandas and the southeastern
balcony are protected from wind by the mass of the building to the north and west
and by the garden wall to the west. These spaces are shaded partly by overhangs,
partly by deciduous plants (such as vines and Prosopis), and partly by pergolas with
agricultural shading fabric that has a 75 per cent shading coefficient.
Thermal mass
The wide diurnal temperature fluctuations characteristics of the Negev Desert climate
dictate the use of thermal mass, both for internal temperature damping and for
energy storage. Based on simulation results, the construction optimises thermal performance
by using medium-weight exterior walls and heavy-weight interior vertical
and horizontal partitions. The exterior walls are 250 mm cellular concrete (YTONG)
blocks, painted with a high reflectivity ochre-coloured paint. The low conductivity
(0.2Wm1 C) of the YTONG blocks eliminates the need for traditional sandwich wall
sections or external insulation that demands precise construction. Floors are reinforced
concrete poured in place. The roof is cast reinforced concrete, covered by extruded
polystyrene, aerated sloped cement and waterproofing.

Climatic conditions and termites exclude the option of
wooden frames for windows and doors. Aluminium
frames encase double glazing for acoustical considerations
and are fitted with mosquito screens. To further
reduce solar gains in the summer, external aluminium
rolling shutters filled with insulation (expanded
polyurethane) and interior venetian horizontal and vertical
blinds are fitted.
Winter solar heating and solar water heating
Approximately 24m2 (30 per cent of the south façade or
approximately 14.5 per cent of the total floor area) and
8m2 of the east façada is glass, achieving a passive
approach to heating the house. The addition of a collapsible
greenhouse (2.25m2) on the balcony, made of
polycarbonate sheeting recovered from a dismantled
agricultural greenhouse, yielded winter temperatures of
35–36°C during the afternoon (while the ambient temperature
was 14–15°C) increasing the room temperatures
by 1–2°C with the help of a small fan that pushes
the air into the living spaces. Through passive designs,
orientation, thermal mass and the collapsible greenhouse, savings of almost 90 per
cent on electric back-up bought from the utility company were realised, compared
with a typical electrically heated house in the Negev Desert climate. The Meir House
includes solar water heating using a high-efficiency solar collector (7000 kcal for a
1.5m2 collection area) and 150 litre water heater.

Type Heat only, excluding Unit cost (NIS) Cost of electric (NIS)
bathrooms (kWh m2 a1)
Meir House 5.5 0.25kWh 250.00
Typical house 72.2 0.25kWh 3250.00
Savings 66.7 3000.00
Savings are US$750.

Summer cooling and stack ventilation
Although the higher windows provide solar access to the
northern parts of the plan (necessary in the winter), the different
height of spaces and operability enhance stack ventilation
and exhaust hot air from the upper strata (during the summer).
North- and south-facing windows enable cross-ventilation during
summer nights, when outside temperatures are below
thermal comfort. Mesh screens play a definitive role by cutting
windspeed down to 20–25 per cent of external windspeeds,
but these screens are a necessity, keeping out pests and
insects.
Xeriscape
An intense post-occupancy project was carried out to reduce
by landscaping the amount of wind-driven dust. By laying
stone paving, pebble ground covering, and planting drought
and salinity-resistant plants, airborne dust is trapped and kept on the ground. Plants are drip-irrigated by a computer, providing a relative humidity
sensor by-pass to the automatic operation mode.
LESSONS LEARNED/PITFALLS
Initially a ceiling fan installed over the two-storey living area was thought adequate to
create air movement when windows remained sealed at times when ambient temperatures
were greater than interior temperatures. This proved insufficient owing to
the large volume and complex geometry of the space. To correct this, a smaller fan
was added on the ground floor to supplement circulation. The open plan has proved
very efficient as a strategy for the creation of a thermally uniform house, but has
drawbacks regarding acoustics, privacy and smells transferred from the kitchen.

Architect:
Isaac A. Meir, 1992–1994
Owners:
Orna and Isaac Meir with their three
children
Location:
Sede Boqer Campus, Negev Desert
Highlands, Israel; 30°N, 34°E; 470m
above sea level
Climate:
Arid, with hot and dry summers; cold
winters; 1017 degree days per year
Area:
208m2

PHOTOVOLTAICS

2009-04-27T00:17:00.000-07:00

WHAT ARE PHOTOVOLTAICS?
Photovoltaic cells convert sunlight directly into electrical energy. The electricity
they produce is DC (direct current) and can either be:
• used directly as DC power
• converted to AC (alternating current) power, or
• stored for later use.
The basic element of a photovoltaic system is the solar cell that is made of a
semiconductor material, typically silicon. There are no moving parts in a solar
cell, its operation is environmentally benign and, if the device is correctly
encapsulated against the environment, there is nothing that will wear out.
Because sunlight is universally available, photovoltaic devices can provide
electricity wherever it is needed. Since the power source will last for hundreds
of thousands of years, and it is very hard to interfere with its delivery,
photovoltaic (PV) is widely expected to become a major source of power
worldwide in the long term.
Photovoltaic systems are modular and so their electrical power output can
be engineered for virtually any application, from low-powered wristwatches,
calculators, remote telecommunications systems and small battery-chargers
to huge centralised power stations generating energy only from the sun. PV
systems can be incrementally built up with successive additions of panels
easily accommodated, unlike more conventional approaches to generating
energy such as fossil or nuclear fuel stations, which must be multimegawatt
plants to be economically feasible.

PHOTOVOLTAICS
HOW PV CELLS WORK
Although PV cells come in a variety of forms, the most common structure is a
sandwich of semiconductor materials into which a large-area diode, or p-n junction,
has been formed. In the presence of light an electric charge is generated across
the junction between the two materials to create a charge similar to that between
an anode and a cathode. The fabrication processes for making the cells tend to be
traditional semiconductor processes, the same as those used to make microchips, by ‘doping’ the silicon with different elements using diffusion and ion implantation
of the elements into the silicon. The electrical current is transferred from the cell
through a grid of metal contacts on the front of the cell that does not impede the
sunlight from entering the silicon of the cell. A contact on the back of the cell completes
the circuit and an anti-reflection coating minimises the amount of sunlight
reflected back out from the silicon, so maximising the light used to generate electricity,
as shown in Figure 8.1. See 21ADPV for a more detailed account of how a
cell works.

Photovoltaic panels have been commercially available since the mid-
1970s and were initially used to power some early demonstration buildings,
such as those that are still working at the Centre for Alternative Technology
in Wales. However, it was the 1990s that saw the first great boom in PV
buildings around the world. Germany and Japan lead the way with Japan
installing 110 MWp in 2001, Germany installing 77 MWp and USA installing
18 MWp. These three programmes accounted for over half the world PV production
in 2001. The Netherlands and Spain came next in the table of installations.
Some countries are way behind in the solar race. Britain installed
around 300 KWp in 2001.

WHAT IS A PV SYSTEM?
PV cells are typically grouped together in a module for ease of use. A PV
system consists of one or more PV modules, which convert sunlight directly
into electricity, and a range of other system components that may include an
AC/DC inverter, back-up source of energy, battery to store the electricity until
it is needed, battery charger, control centre, mounting structures and miscellaneous
wires and fuses.

WARNING
Direct current (DC) electricity is much more dangerous to handle than alternating
current (AC) electricity, which is typically used for all household appliances. This is
because there is no break in the flow of a DC current and, if you grab hold of an
exposed DC wire, the muscles contract and it is very difficult to let the wire go
again. Great care should always be taken when dealing with DC electricity.

WHY PV IN BUILDINGS?
Even in cloudy, northern latitudes, PV panels can generate sufficient power to
meet all, or part of, the electricity demand of a building. The Oxford Ecohouse
(see page 330), for example, incorporates 48 PV panels on the roof that generate
enough energy to lower the household electricity bills by 70 per cent.
The flexibility of PV enables its use in many building products, such as solar
roof tiles, curtain walls and decorative screens, which can directly replace conventional
materials in the building fabric. These products serve the same structural
and weather protection purposes as their traditional alternatives but offer
the additional benefit of generating the power to run the house.

WHAT’S GREEN ABOUT PV?
The electricity produced by every square metre of PV can effectively displace
emissions of more than two tonnes of CO2 to the atmosphere over its
lifetime. Few now dispute that CO2 emissions can continue to increase at
current rates without dire consequences, such as global warming. Wider use
of PV power in buildings can help to reduce such environmental impacts of
buildings that are responsible for generating over 50 per cent of all emissions
of greenhouse gases globally.
Let us use the Oxford Ecohouse as an example. In order to calculate the
environmental impacts of the PV system it is necessary to know the UK
energy generation conversion values, the amount of CO2 released into the
atmosphere for every unit of energy delivered to a house. It has been estimated
that an average energy conversion efficiency for thermal electricity
generation plants in the UK is around 37 per cent. This results from an electricity
mix generated from 65 per cent coal, 15 per cent gas, 22 per cent
nuclear and 9 per cent oil. For the PV manufacture assumptions see Energy
Technology Support Unit (1996).
Based on the monitored data, the PV system produces 3093 kWh per
year, that is around 77 000 kWh in its 25-year life cycle.
The Oxford Ecohouse PV system avoids the release of 1.84 tonnes CO2 per
year. These values can be extrapolated to give the avoided emissions in the case
of a massive programme of installing PV on residential building. A system oneeighth
of the size of the Oxford Ecohouse would avoid 230 kg CO2 per annum.
WHAT WILL IT COST TO USE PV IN BUILDINGS?
Solar electric PV systems are now an economic and viable technology in many
parts of the world. More than that, they are a sensible economic investment for
ordinary householders who want to begin to protect themselves from future
changes related to energy and the climate. They should begin to consider
the following:
• Climate change is driving the move towards carbon taxes that will make
energy more expensive.
• Fossil fuel depletion will push up oil and gas prices. We have around 40
years of conventional oil reserves left and around 60 years of gas left. By
2020 oil and gas scarcity will make future energy prices very unpredictable.
• Climate change may well make heating and cooling our houses more
expensive in energy terms as the climate gets warmer or colder.
• Security of energy supply. PV systems can provide electricity during conventionally
produced electricity blackouts resulting from poor supply conditions
or bad weather. There is already a range of uses for which a secure
energy supply should be essential; these include, water pumping, electric
garage doors and gates, lift safety systems, smoke and fire alarms, emergency
lighting and security systems, computer UPS systems and communications
systems.
Investment by people now in their high-earning years in energy efficiency
and renewable energy will pay dividends in, say, 10 years when they retire
and must inevitably face higher energy bills they are less able to afford.
Anyone with a £500-a-year electricity bill would be wise to envisage at least
a doubling of electricity costs in 10–15 years time. Will your pension cover
£1000 a year for one bill?
Costs of installing PV systems today vary significantly according to the
technology used and the application and the efficiency of the system.
Capital costs of PV panels are broadly similar to prestige cladding materials,
ranging from £350 to £750 per m2 depending on the technology and its
detail. Prices are expected to fall significantly over the next decade as
demand grows and the PV industry achieves economies of scale in production.
In parts of Germany and the USA (Sacramento municipality) the cost of
installing one watt of PV power into a home has already fallen to around
£2.75 per watt, which is very low compared with current UK estimates of £6
per watt for an installed system. In those countries, the impact of early
investment in the technology by national and local government bodies has
paid dividends for consumers while people in countries such as the UK have
to suffer because of short-sighted investment policies in this, one of the
most important technologies of the twenty-first century.
Your own investment decision should also take account of the marginal cost
of the PV system (capital cost minus the cost of the alternative material) and
power output. PV systems are not difficult to install and, if maintained properly
(annual washing), have an expected lifetime of around 25 years.
What is certain is that today PVs should be an essential feature of a real
ecohouse, because ecohouses are setting the agenda for building in a changing
climate and helping to prepare society for the ‘post-fossil fuel age’. PVs
have a very important role to play, like solar hot water systems, in the new
agenda for buildings; the earliest PV ‘pioneers’ in the twentieth century often
installed PV systems for ecological reasons rather than economic ones.
However, in some farsighted cities, such as Aachen in Germany, a green tariffon every electricity bill enabled the local utility company to pay every householder
with a PV roof DM2 per kW exported. This enables householders to
pay back the installation costs in around 10 years for systems that will last
for 20 years.
But it is no use placing a PV system on an energy-profligate building and
expecting it to solve the problems wrought by the building designer. This is
just throwing good money after bad. Forget PV for air-conditioned buildings
for the foreseeable future. PVs will work well with low-speed fan-assisted
passive cooling systems, such as earth-coupling and the night cooling of
buildings (see Chapter 5 on ventilation).
To use PVs properly the building electricity loads should be as low as possible,
and only then should the system be designed to meet part or all of
those loads to give you a magic building that generates its own energy.

ADVANTAGES OF PHOTOVOLTAICS AS A DOMESTIC
SOURCE OF ENERGY
• It is a clean green energy source. It does not produce CO2, NOx or SO2
emissions.
• The silicon PV panels are non-toxic in production.
• The energy payback (the time for the PV to produce as much energy as is
required for manufacture) is 2–5 years, while the working life of a PV
panel can be well over 20 years.
• Energy is generated on site so there are very few losses in transport,
unlike remotely generated supplies relying on long supply lines.
• It is reliable. You just put them on the roof and they work. Panel warranties
are now typically for 20 years.
• They are silent.
• They are low maintenance. Once installed they will simply require their
surfaces to be cleaned, especially in dusty environments.
• They can provide power in locations remote from the grid.
• PVs are a transportable technology and can be moved between buildings.
• They can provide power during blackouts.

Green Building Ventilation - DIRECT COMFORT VENTILATION

2009-04-26T22:21:00.002-07:00

WHY VENTILATE A BUILDING?
For each room of a house you should ask: why is ventilation needed in this
space? Three possible reasons are:
• for fresh air supply
• for direct comfort ventilation to cool or heat the occupants of the space
by convection
• for indirect comfort ventilation, for heating and cooling the actual structure
of a building to indirectly enhance the comfort of the room’s occupants
and to use ‘free energy’ more efficiently. In this way, day-time solar
warmth can be stored in the structure and used at night, or coolth from
night air can be stored to cool the people indoors during the day.
FRESH AIR
The need for fresh air ranges from the nominal amounts needed for breathing
(2 litres s1) to the much higher ventilation rates necessary to control odours
(up to 16–32 litre s1 is a commonly quoted figure for fresh air needed to mitigate
the effects of smoking smells). In houses, care can be taken to provide
zones for smokers where the smell of a cigarette can be dealt with by opening
a window. This may be more easily said than done. Studies have shown that
homes with smokers use significantly more energy to heat or cool because the
windows are continually opened to get rid of the smell. This should be taken
into account and the problem designed out by sensible zoning of spaces.
How the room is furnished will affect lingering odours, with smells collecting
more easily in the soft fabrics of curtains and carpets. Different activities
in the house may be associated with different smell levels, so finishes can
be chosen appropriately. The need for fresh air can be influenced very much
by the chosen room finishes. It should be noted that building regulations are
typically not designed to mitigate against the impact of smells or the transmission
of diseases. It is not possible to regulate against air-borne diseases,
although many indoor air quality regulations have evolved to deal with condensation
risks in buildings that do have indirect health implications.
Fresh air is also needed to prevent the build up of moisture in a room. This
is obvious for kitchens, bathrooms and utility rooms but there can be a real
build-up of moisture in bedrooms as well. There are six ways to design out
moisture as a problem in housing.
1 Provide wet zones in the house outside the main envelope of living rooms.
Build a front porch/lobby/air lock in which the temperature of the outside
air can be modified to be warmer or cooler before it enters the house. All
wet clothing, coats and shoes can be left there, so keeping a great deal of
moisture outside the house on wet days.
2 Build an outdoor drying space where clothes and bath towels can be left
outside the main body of the house in winter. Wet clothes are a main
source of excessive moisture in winter.
3 Build a high-level vent window above the kitchen stove that can be easily
opened to immediately remove the hot, wet air generated by cooking. A
good, non-cold-bridging window is much better than a mechanical vent
above the stove as metal vents across a wall act as one large cold bridge
and will cause condensation to collect in the wall at one of the wettest
points in the house.
4 Bathrooms should either have a window that can be opened after a bath or
shower or a very good passive stack outlet that will carry the moist air out
of the room, which may, or may not, have a small fan to assist its draw.
5 Design out cold bridges from the walls of the house.
6 The wall-surface finishes of rooms should be chosen to be capable of
absorbing some moisture. Where possible use an organic water-based
paint on walls. These can range from the traditional white-washed walls
and natural wood products to the use of modern, sophisticated, waterbased
paint products. The room finishes can play a significant part in controlling
moisture build-up in the room as well as smell.

A common-sense approach is needed to estimate the best ventilation strategy
for a particular building. For example, a high-volume low-occupancy house
with all the above features and wet-plastered high-mass walls or exposed
timber walls with a natural finish could, on some days, get all the fresh air
necessary from people intermittently opening doors.
However, a low-mass, small-volume, high-occupancy room with hard finishes
may need significantly more. For a well-designed house, even with low mass,
hard finishes and normal occupancy but where the moisture problem has
been removed from the interior of the house to a wet zone, most problems
of air quality will disappear when the air change (ac) rate is 0.2 ac h1. That
means that one-fifth of the air of a room is changed every hour. Humidity
control can be achieved with a rate of 0.3 ac h1 or more (Marshall and Argue,
1981). Actually, this level of air change can be achieved almost with dooropening
air intake only. In many houses the air leakage rate through the
structure will be of this order. Robert and Brenda Vale recommend an air
change rate of around 0.45 ac h1 as acceptable but, again, there is little reason
not to design to the lower levels (Vale and Vale, 2000). Attention should
be paid to houses where radon or carbon monoxide problems from open
fires may exist, see Chapter 6.

DIRECT COMFORT VENTILATION
The comfort and thermal delight of the occupant is what makes a great
house (Herschong, 1979). Issues of comfort should certainly dictate how to
ventilate a building. If you think about times when you have been blissfully
comfortable in a house, the feeling is probably either associated in winter
with being near a warm radiant heat source, perhaps a fire, or in summer
being in a cooling breeze. Sue Roaf remembers a summer’s evening in
Baghdad, coming out onto the freshly watered veranda at around 7 p.m. with
an iced drink, wearing a cool cotton dress, sitting chatting in the early evening
breeze and thinking that ‘this is bliss’. Only on looking at the thermometer
was it seen to be 42°C! It had been almost 50°C all that day.
People acclimatise to ambient temperatures. How warm or cold they feel
depends on what the temperature has been over the last three or four days.
It can take two to three weeks to adapt to a whole new climate.
If it is too hot or cold people do something about it. They may put on
or take off clothes, they may change places within a room or move from
one room to another. They may open a window, close a door or take a cold
or hot drink. In extremes they may change buildings or even move to a
different region with a more pleasing climate. They adapt their circumstances.
It is only at the very extremes that people die of heat or cold. One
of the key strategies they adopt in adapting the building to improve the
indoor climate is to open a window to let in warm or cool air, another is to
go to sleep.
Passive building design is driven by the relationship between the outside
and the inside air temperatures. Michael Humphreys demonstrated this over
20 years ago with his classic diagram (Figure 5.6) showing that people wholive in hotter climates are comfortable at higher temperatures. In this book Lim).
we adopt his simple, but effective, equation to show, very roughly, at what
temperatures locally adapted people are comfortable:
Tc 0.534 (Tmean) 11.9
Where Tmean (Tmax Tmin)/2 and is monthly mean outdoor temperature; Tc is
comfort temperature; Tmax is monthly mean daily outdoor maximum temperature;
and Tmin is monthly mean daily outdoor minimum temperature. Tmin and
Tmax are usually available from Meteorological Office data.
This equation, strictly speaking, applies to summer conditions in freerunning
buildings (not air-conditioned ones) but gives a general idea of the
comfort conditions required indoors by locally adapted populations.
Where the comfort temperature lies somewhere between Tmax and Tmin in
a well-designed passive building with good levels of thermal mass and no
excessive solar gain it should be possible to open windows for comfort cooling
where Tmax is 35°C or below. Comfort warming from the window breeze
should be achievable in a good passive building when Tmax is over 22°C and
Tmin is over 15°C.

THE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT OF BUILDING MATERIALS

2009-04-26T21:28:00.000-07:00

THE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT OF GREEN BUILDING
MATERIALS
Since the publication of the first edition of Ecohouse many of the concepts relating to environmental impact have become more widely known and the
availability of commercial environmental impact assessment services has
increased. Despite this increase in the availability of information, many architects
and designers still have to rely on common sense and deal with constrains
of budget and location when specifying materials. This chapter aims to
introduce basic concepts and ideas that will help designers develop strategies
for specifying materials which minimize negative environmental impact. A reading
list at the end of the chapter lists more detailed sources of information
about the environmental impact of building materials.

Green Building materials require processing before they are incorporated into a
building; this inevitably requires the use of energy and results in waste generation.
The choice of materials therefore affects the environmental impact of
a building. The processing may be minimal, as in the case of a traditional cottage
constructed from materials found locally, or it may be extensive, as in
the case of prefabricated construction.
Even basic materials have an environmental impact. It is estimated, for
example, that the production of cement accounts for 5 per cent of global
human-made CO2 emissions, about half of which arise from chemical reactions
in the cement-making process and half from the energy consumed in
producing cement (Kruse, 2004).
We can calculate the overall environmental impact of a house if we know
the impacts that result from its day-to-day use and the manufacture and
delivery of its construction materials and components. We can, with this
information, see how the choice of materials affects its impact on the
environment.
It will become clear that calculations to determine the exact impact of
each and every dwelling are, at present, not feasible. This chapter will therefore
refer to a very detailed study of the Oxford Ecohouse, which took
account of the impact of materials selection. It will also refer to other
research in this field and will aim to draw some practical conclusions of use
to the prospective house designer, builder or renovator.

CHILDREN'S ACTIVITY CENTRE + Green Eco Building

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The exploration of various types of recyclable materials and building components has been a favourite topic among architects interested in sustainability Green Architecture. Among these recyclables, the shipping container has found itself to be a reliable favourite. In this built project, four former shipping containers are utilised to be a low-cost play centre. ,

Many architects before PHOOEY Architects have exploited the shipping container's modularity, transformability and durability to suit their design intentions. Shigeru Ban transformed numerous containers into an art gallery while LOT-EK called their modular functional space Mobile Dwelling Unit or MDU, signifying the multiple usability/reusability of the shipping container. For the Children's Activity Centre, PHOOEY Architects staggered four reused containers to form intimate and private spaces for various kids activities such as studying, painting, dancing and lounging.

The project was not initially briefed to be a sustainable building with quantitative outcomes or benchmark standards; the local council and community had simply wanted a low-cost, low maintenance and durable centre at Skinners Playground for the children. Nonetheless, the architects decided that they could turn it into a more sustainable project.

Besides leveraging on the containers' reusable nature, the architects focused on the operational energy required for the centre. The building is only open for two hours a day, thus, limiting the operational energy required. Even so, the designers decided to reduce the operational energy further by self-shading the containers with a timber deck, staircase, overhangs and awnings. Other passive features include ceiling vents to remove excess heat, and bulk insulation that fills both containers upstairs and downstairs to reduce the need for mechanical heating during cold days. The upstairs windows are oriented to the winter sun, allowing passive heating. In the summer, cool summer breeze from the nearby Port Phillip Bay flows through the strategically oriented openings. Energy-efficient reverse cycle air-conditioning and panel heating provide immediate climate control when needed. As a result, the embodied energy is comparable to the limited operational energy required for the total life-cycle energy of the building, which aids in prolonging-if not maintaining-the lifespan of this project.

Approximately 90 percent of the materials in the building are recycled: the windows, joineries, carpet tiles, timber and steel were salvaged from site demolition and local council facilities including the town hall. Even the smallest pieces of materials are not wasted. Timber off-cuts from the deck are reused for soffit linings and edging. The entire body of the Corten steel containers is used; the pieces cut out to make openings were re-fashioned into functional balustrades, sunshading and decoration to cover the adjoining dilapidated shed. The skins of the containers bearing their shipping companies' names were 'cannibalised' or shredded and rearranged into the final building design. Rainwater runoff from the corrugated roofs are channelled into a pond and reed bed.

The architects described this project as a visual catalogue of waste materials, educating not only the children but also the community at large that low cost does not just mean economically sustainable, it could also mean environmentally sustainable.

Bottle House + Green Architecture concept

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this Green Building is obvious at first glance why the residence of Ridwan Kamil-the principal of architecture firm Urbane Indonesia-is called the 'Bottle House'. Sixty percent of the total surface area is covered by recycled bottles.
Located in northern Bandung, Indonesia, the split-level courtyard house occupies a site area of 373 square metres. The residence is divided into three zones: Zone 1 features the guest pavilion; Zone 2 comprises the living and the children's bedrooms; and Zone 3 includes the garage, kitchen, dining room and library area. With a gross floor area of 320 square metres, the house has an open layout with minimal wall partitions to promote spatial flow in the interior. The aim of the entire design was to reprise a resort atmosphere, which was achieved by recreating a tropical landscape and utilising the building setback for a water feature and swimming pool.

RECYCLED BOTTLES
Collected from a six-month period from the dumping ground, 30,000 recycled bottles were used innovatively in different parts of the house. They were used to form part of the exterior skin of the perimeter wall surrounding the house. Inside the residence, the guest pavilion wall is also made entirely of recycled bottles. The 'bottle wall' enables natural breeze to penetrate, allowing fresh air to circulate in the living room. Every private area such as the bedrooms gets full daylighting becauseo full glass exposure. However, this also means getting 'bad sun' in terms of gain from the west. To reduce the impact, the bottles were also used to fo exterior skin for the walls of the children's bedrooms, dining room and lib area, which was done by alternating panels of bottles and glass in a chess pattern with a 60-centimetre gap in between. The glass panels can be pu open to allow for ventilation.

Not only do the recycled bottles function as passive green elements, th also serve aesthetic purposes. The 'bottle walls' create an eye-catching f and in the interior, they also become pieces of artwork. The early morning evening rays that filter in through the bottles also create interesting patter and shades in the interior spaces, creating a special ambience. The warm of the recycled bottles also matches the timber flooring, further enhancing 'resort' feel.

GREEN SPACES

Green spaces have been specifically allocated in the residence. Ridwan home is peppered with at least five small areas that are dedicated to growing plants and flowers. Part of the 13-metre long perimeter wall bordering the swimming pool is made up of stacks of gardening pots containing flowers and vegetation. The bale-a rectangular-shaped small pavilion by the swimming pool-has a green roof. There are also plans to turn the flat concrete roof above the guest area into a green roof.

ENERGY & LIGHTING

the Green Concept is No air-conditioning is used in the house as natural ventilation concepts have been applied throughout the house. Sliding and folding doors as well as windows are designed to be fully opened when needed, and, together with the presence of three courtyards (a main courtyard and two small courtyards), fresh air is allowed to circulate, ensuring well-ventilated spaces. The water feature and the swimming pool situated at the periphery of the house also provide relief to the courtyard area, bringing cool air into the interior space. The courtyards also allow ample natural lighting into the house, minimising the need for artificial lighting during the day.

Green Building (Architecture) History

2009-04-25T22:00:00.001-07:00

In the late 1980s, the American Institute of Architects (AIA) created the
Committee on the Environment (COTE), which has outlets today in just
about every AIA chapter across the country.All across the US and Canada,
architects have led the charge toward sustainable design, working through
local COTE chapters, as well as the US Green Building Council chapters.
Created in 1993, the US Green Building Council (USGBC) aims to
transform the building industry into a more environmentally responsible
activity. Beginning in the mid-1990s, the USGBC undertook, with Šnancial
assistance from the US Department of Energy, the development of a
rating and evaluation system to deŠne what a green building represented.
The Šrst system, dubbed Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design
or LEED, for new construction and major renovations, was piloted or
beta-tested in 1998 and 1999 on about 50 projects in the US. In March
2000, version 2.0 of LEED was introduced as an updated, revised and expanded
version of the original LEEDversion 1.0. Since then version 2.0 has
had two major changes; LEED for New Construction (LEED-NC) version
2.2, eªective since late 2005, is the current standard.
The USGBC enjoyed rapid growth from 1998, when it had only about
100 members, to the beginning of 2007, when membership stood at more
than 7,700 corporate, institutional, governmental and nonproŠt organizations
(it does not have individualmembers).1 Representing all segments of
the building industry and environmental community, the USGBC has
been able to craft a consensus standard for evaluating the environmental
attributes of buildings and developments, by drawing on the resources of
this large ($1 trillion annual construction value) and diverse industry.
Established in 2004, the Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC)
now has more than 1,300 member organizations, with chapters in many provinces.2 The CaGBC uses the LEED evaluation system but has adapted
it for Canadian conditions. By 2007 the CaGBC had more than 225 projects
registered for certiŠcation under the Canadian LEED standard.Green
building in Canada is a fast-growing movement, with a special focus on
energy e‹ciency and indoor air quality suitable for a more northerly and
colder climate.

Current Situation

Owners and developers of residential, commercial and institutional properties
acrossNorthAmerica are discovering that it is often possible to build
green buildings on conventional budgets.Many developers, building owners
and facility managers are advancing the state of the art in commercial
and large residential buildings through new modeling tools, design techniques
and creative use of Šnancial and regulatory incentives. For the past
ten years, in ever-increasing numbers, we have begun to see development
of commercial structures using green building techniques and technologies.
With more than 1,200 corporations issuing sustainability reports of
some formin 2006, it is clear that thismarket will not be a short-lived fad.
Companies want to locate in a space that rešects their values, and a highperformance
building goes a longway toward satisfying that requirement.3
Most long-time participants in the real estate, architectural design
and building construction industries realize that sustainable design is the
biggest sea change in their business careers. The urgency of global warming
and the increasing US dependence on imported fuels have led architects
to urge more concerted action to reduce energy use in buildings. In
late 2005 the American Institute of Architects (AIA), representing more
than 70,000 architects, released amajor policy statement that sets a goal of
reducing the fossil fuel consumption of new buildings by 50% by the year
2010, with additional 10% reductions every Šve years thereafter, to reach
90% reduction from 2005 levels by 2030. While this declaration has no
legal force, it does add pressure to incorporate superior energy performance
into the goals for each project.4 As architect EdwardMazria observes,
one can achieve a 50% reduction with existing building technology at no
extra cost by simply using the right design strategies, such as proper orientation
and form, daylighting, solar control and passive heating and cooling
techniques.
Understanding Green Buildings
What do wemean when we speak of green Architecture or high-performance
buildings? According to the USGBC, these buildings incorporate design
and construction practices that signiŠcantly reduce or eliminate the negative impact of buildings on the environment and occupants in Šve broad
areas:
• Sustainable site planning.
• Safeguarding water and water e‹ciency.
• Energy e‹ciency and renewable energy.
• Conservation of materials and resources.
• Indoor environmental quality.5
Typically, green buildings are measured against code buildings — structures
that qualify for a building permit but do not exceed the minimum
requirements of the building code for health and safety. In addition, green
buildings are often measured according to a system such as the LEED rating
system (usgbc.org), the Collaborative for High-Performance Schools
(CHPS) ratings (chps.net), the Advanced Building™ guidelines (power
yourdesign.com),Green Guide for Healthcare (GGHC)6 or, in some cases,
local utility or city guidelines (a number of utilities have rating systems for
residential buildings). Such buildings must score a minimum number of
points above “standard building” performance thresholds to qualify for a
certiŠcation, or a rating as “green” or high-performance.

Since the introduction of LEED in 2000, it has become essentially the
US national standard for commercial and institutional buildings. LEED is
primarily a performance standard; in other words, it generally allows a developer,
architect or building owner to choose how tomeet certain benchmark
numbers — saving 20% on energy use versus current building
codes, for example — without prescribing speciŠc measures. In this way,
LEED is a šexible tool for new construction or major renovations in almost
all commercial and institutional buildings throughout the US.
Canada has an almost identical version of LEED,7 which has achieved signiŠcant
popularity. Since its inception, LEED has proven to be a valuable
design tool for architectural teams tasked with creating green buildings, as
well as a way to evaluate the Šnal result.
LEED provides for four levels of certiŠcation, in ascending order of
achievement: CertiŠed, Silver, Gold and Platinum. In 2003 and 2004 three
projects in southern California achieved the Platinum rating: one project
for a local utility, another for a county park (in cooperation with the local
Audubon Society) and another for the Natural Resources Defense Council.
By early 2007 the largest LEED Platinum project was the Center for
Health and Healing at Oregon Health & Science University, in Portland, at
412,000 square feet. At the same time, more than 500 projects had completed
the certiŠcation process under LEED for New Construction
(LEED-NC). Platinum-seeking projects that are under construction in
2007 promise to extend the size of the top-rated buildings to more than
onemillion square feet.
Who Is Using LEED?
By the end of 2006, LEED-NC had captured about 4% to 5% of the total
new building market, with nearly 4,000 registered projects encompassing
more than 477 million square feet of new and renovated space. At the beginning
of 2007, more than 100 new projects each month were registered
for evaluation under LEED-NC. Since a project can only be LEED-certiŠed
after it is ready for occupancy, many projects are just nearing completion
of their documentation to qualify for a LEED rating. Given that it
often takes two years ormore for projects tomove fromdesign to completion
(and certiŠcation can only take place after substantial completion of a
project), growth in the number of certiŠed projects will be rapid. Many
Fortune 500 Šrms, universities, government agencies and non-proŠt organizations
are beginning to participate signiŠcantly in the development
of LEED projects.
Just about every conceivable project type has been LEED-registered,
including amostly undergroundOregon winemaking (barrel-aging) facility! For example, the Šrst 150 LEED Gold project certiŠcations (through
the end of 2006) included 10 non-US projects (7 in Canada) and such varied
building types as:
• Renovation of a 100-year-old warehouse into a modern o‹ce building
in Portland,Oregon.
• A developer-driven technology park conversion of an old hospital in
Victoria, British Columbia.
• An o‹ce-warehouse building for a major auto company in Gresham,
Oregon.
• An elementary school in Statesville,North Carolina.
• Two high-rise apartment buildings in NewYork City.
• A new o‹ce building and an o‹ce building renovation for Herman
Miller, Inc., in Zeeland, Michigan. (Commenting on this project, architect
William McDonough observed that moving from a windowless
building to a daylit building increased annual revenues 40% and
that the increase in proŠts paid for the building in about four
months.)8
• Apublic o‹ce building leased to theCommonwealth of Pennsylvania.
• An environmental learning center near Seattle,Washington.
• A city hall in Austin, Texas.
• An aªordable housing complex in SantaMonica, California.
• A new convention center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Green Building (Architecture) History

2009-04-25T22:00:00.000-07:00