Notes from NARI Greenbuilding seminar:
Another stroke of fortune, I recently attended a seminar hosted by the National Association of the Remodeling Industry (NARI) Metro DC chapter on the topic of green building. The seminar instructor was David Johnston, president of What’s Working: Visionary Solutions for Green Building and renowned consultant, speaker and author.
Culled from my notes, here are some of the points he made during the seminar:
The Green movement is gathering momentum, moving from the West coast to the East, moving from the North East to the South and from the Upper Mid-West to the South. Boulder, CO was the first city in the country to develop a green building code based on a point system (called Green Points) to add incentive to build in a sustainable and healthy way. In general, California, Washington and Oregon lead the green wave. The remodeling industry has jumped on board.
A primary problem in today’s building industry is that we are not effectively budgeting our resources and distributing them properly; consumption has overcome production. There are two major components to our lives that are changing: the weather and the population. People are more stable today than ever before; therefore, today’s projects will last longer and be exposed to environmental conditions that previously did not exist.
Current anticipations are based on the assumption that we will have plenty of cheap oil and a never ending supply of drinkable water. Water is in a sleeping crisis; Northern China and India are using fossil, or paleowater, which is groundwater that has remained in an aquifer for millennia. A lot of agriculture will not be sustainable, food production will decline significantly.
How do we engage in our culture? How do we shift our perspective?
What we lack is will. Crisis = opportunity. We can save ourselves.
Current conventional practices are creating a degenerating system. Common green building practices are doing “less bad” but are not wholly regenerative yet.
“Sustainability” is not the answer. “Flourishability” is. We need to begin to practice building techniques that are restorative and regenerative.
How good is good enough?
Common misconception: “It is too expensive to build green”.
Consider some of the environmental impacts of traditional construction:
-Traditional construction techniques use 30-40% of wood and materials, 25% of water, 20-30% of municipal waste stream and are responsible for 48% of greenhouse gas emissions.
-Indoor air pollution is one of the most serious environmental risks to human health according to the EPA, air in the home can be 10X worse than the air outside on the smoggiest day. If that doesn’t hit home how about this: 40% of kids today will develop some form of respiratory disease because of the chemicals in the home. Only 2 chemicals that meet the EPA monitors are more prevalent outside than inside.
Where do we go from here?
The earlier we think about “going green” the less it will cost not only in environmental impact but also in dollars and cents.
Architecture 2030 has issued the 2030 Challenge that requests the architecture and building community to adopt the following targets:
-All new buildings, developments and major renovations shall be designed to meet a fossil fuel, GHG-emitting, energy consumption performance standard of 50% of the regional (or county) average for that building type.
-At a minimum, an equal amount of existing building area shall be renovated annually to meet a fossil fuel, GHG-emitting, energy consumption performance standard of 50% of the regional (or county) average for that building type.
-The fossil fuel reduction standard for all new buildings shall be increased to:
60% in 2010
70% in 2015
80% in 2010
90% in 2025
Carbon-neutral in 2030 (using no fossil fuel GHG emitting energy to operate
These targets may be accomplished by implementing innovative sustainable design strategies, generating on-site renewable power and/or purchasing (20% maximum) renewable energy and/or certified renewable energy credits.
My overall impression of our environmental future after attending this seminar is that I heard some things I knew, but hadn’t internalized. I learned that the situation is already dire; we all have a responsibility to not only halt the damage that we continue to reap but also to reverse it. However, we certainly are not powerless; we have the ability to begin to restore and regenerate our environment to “flourishability”, one person, one project at a time.