Green Architecture: Building for the 21st Century

▪ 2008

Introduction

James Wines

      Green design was a pervasive topic in boardrooms and living rooms in 2007, particularly as the costs of maintaining the status quo became apparent. The building of shelter (in all its forms) consumes more than half of the world's resources—translating into 16% of the Earth's freshwater resources, 30–40% of all energy supplies, and 50% of all the raw materials withdrawn from the Earth's surface by weight. Architecture is also responsible for 40–50% of waste deposits in landfills and 20–30% of greenhouse gas emissions.

      Unfortunately, too many architects working since the post-World War II building boom have been content to erect emblematic civic and corporate icons that celebrate profligate consumption and omnivorous globalization. More recently, however, designers and users have begun to evaluate a building on its environmental integrity, as embodied in the way it is designed and operated. The green movement is changing the message of architecture from egocentric to ecocentric.

The Rise of Eco-awareness.

  Environmental advocacy, as an organized social force in the U.S., gained its first serious momentum as part of the youth movement of the 1960s. In rebellion against the perceived evils of high-rise congestion and suburban sprawl, some of the earliest and most dedicated eco-activists moved to rural communes, where they lived in tentlike structures and geodesic domes. In a certain sense, this initial wave of green architecture was based on admirable characteristics of Native Americans' lifestyle and its minimal impact on the land. At the same time, by isolating themselves from the greater community, these youthful environmentalists were ignoring one of ecology's most important principles: that interdependent elements work in harmony for the benefit of the whole.

      Influential pioneers who supported a more integrative mission during the 1960s and early '70s included architectural critic and social philosopher Lewis Mumford, landscape architect Ian McHarg, and scientist James Lovelock. They led the way in defining green design, and they contributed significantly to the popularization of environmental principles. For example, in 1973 Mumford proposed a straightforward environmental philosophy: “The solution of the energy crisis would seem simple: transform solar energy via plants and produce enough food power and manpower in forms that would eliminate the wastes and perversions of power demanded by our high-energy technology. In short, plant, eat, and work!”

      McHarg, who founded the department of landscape architecture at the University of Pennsylvania, laid the ground rules for green architecture in his seminal book Design with Nature (1969). Envisioning the role of human beings as stewards of the environment, he advocated an organizational strategy, called “cluster development,” that would concentrate living centres and leave as much natural environment as possible to flourish on its own terms. In this regard McHarg was a visionary who perceived the Earth as a self-contained and dangerously threatened entity.

      This “whole Earth” concept also became the basis of Lovelock's Gaia theory. Named after the Greek goddess of nature, his hypothesis defined the entire planet as a single unified organism, continuously maintaining itself for survival. He described this process as “a complex entity involving the Earth's biosphere, atmosphere, oceans, and soil; the totality constituting a feedback or cybernetic system which seeks an optimal physical and chemical environment for life on this planet.”

      During the 1970s Norwegian environmental philosopher Arne Naess proposed a theory of “deep ecology” (or “ecosophy”), asserting that every living creature in nature is equally important to the Earth's precisely balanced system. Working in exact opposition to this philosophical view, the destructive politics and economics of the decade accelerated the development of green awareness. The lack of business regulation in the U.S. meant that there were no limits to the consumption of fossil fuels. Meanwhile, the 1973 OPEC oil crisis brought the cost of energy into sharp focus and reminded the global community that it depended on a very small number of petroleum-producing countries for its supplies. This crisis, in turn, brought into relief the need for diversified sources of energy and spurred corporate and government investment in solar, wind, water, and geothermal sources of power.

Green Design Takes Root.

      By the mid 1980s and continuing through the '90s, the number of environmental advocacy societies radically expanded; groups such as Greenpeace, Environmental Action, the Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth, and the Nature Conservancy all experienced burgeoning memberships. For architects and builders a significant milestone was the formulation in 1994 of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards, established and administered by the U.S. Green Building Council. These standards provided measurable criteria for the design and construction of environmentally responsible buildings. The basic qualifications are as follows.

● Energy. Conserve energy, for example, by orienting buildings to take full advantage of seasonal changes in the sun's position. Use diversified and regionally appropriate sources of energy, which may, depending on geographic location, include solar, wind, geothermal, biomass, water, natural gas, and even, if necessary, petroleum and nuclear.

● Materials. Build with recycled, renewable, or low-embodied-energy materials that are locally sourced and free from harmful chemicals. Evaluate supplies on the basis of their entire production cycle—including nonpolluting raw ingredients, durability of product, and potential for recycling. Materials should be thoroughly evaluated in terms of their distance from origin, taking into account energy consumed in transport.

● Water. Conserve and monitor water usage and supplies. Gray water (i.e., previously used, as for laundry) should be cleansed and recycled, and building-by-building catchments for rainwater should be installed.

● Context. Whenever possible, reuse existing buildings and preserve the surrounding environment. Incorporate earth shelters, roof gardens, and extensive planting throughout and around buildings.

      The 1980s and early '90s brought a new surge of interest in the environmental movement and the rise to prominence of a group of more socially responsive and philosophically oriented green architects. American architect Malcolm Wells opposed the legacy of architectural ostentation and aggressive assaults on the land in favour of the gentle impact of underground and earth-sheltered buildings—exemplified by his Brewster, Mass., house of 1980. The low impact, in both energy use and visual effect, of a structure that is surrounded by earth creates an almost invisible architecture and a green ideal. As Wells explained, this kind of underground building is “sunny, dry, and pleasant” and “offers huge fuel savings and a silent, green alternative to the asphalt society.”

      American physicist Amory Lovins and his wife, Hunter Lovins, founded the Rocky Mountain Institute in 1982 as a research centre for the study and promotion of the “whole system” approach favoured by McHarg and Lovelock. Years before the LEED standards were published, the institute, which was housed in an energy-efficient and aesthetically appealing building, formulated the fundamental principle of authentic green architecture: to use the largest possible proportion of regional resources and materials. In contrast to the conventional, inefficient practice of drawing materials and energy from distant, centralized sources, the Lovins team chose to follow the “soft energy path” for architecture—i.e., drawing from the now-familiar list of alternative energy sources: wind, solar, water, geothermal, etc.

      In 1975 American architect Pliny Fisk III launched the Center for Maximum Potential Building Systems (Max Pot) in Austin, Texas. In the late 1980s the centre joined with others to support an experimental agricultural community called Blueprint Farm, in Laredo, Texas. Its broader mission—with applications to any geographic location—was to study the correlations between living conditions, botanical life, the growing of food, and the economic-ecological imperatives of construction. This facility was built as an integrative prototype, recognizing that nature thrives on diversity; Fisk concluded that single-enterprise and one-crop territories were environmentally dysfunctional—meaning, for example, that all of the crop's predators converge, natural defenses are overwhelmed, and chemical spraying to eliminate insects and weeds becomes mandatory. In every respect Blueprint Farm stood for diversified and unpredictable community development. The crops were varied, and the buildings were constructed of steel gathered from abandoned oil rigs and combined with such enhancements as earth berms, sod roofs, and straw bales. Photovoltaic panels, evaporative cooling, and wind power were incorporated in this utopian demonstration of the symbiotic relationships between farming and green community standards.

 American architect William McDonough rose to green-design fame in 1985 with his Environmental Defense Fund Building in New York City. That structure was one of the first civic icons for energy conservation resulting from the architect's close scrutiny of all of its interior products, construction technology, and air-handling systems. Since then, McDonough's firm has established valuable planning strategies and built numerous green buildings—most significantly, the Herman Miller factory and offices (Holland, Mich., 1995), the corporate offices of Gap, Inc. (San Bruno, Calif., 1997), and Oberlin College's Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies (Oberlin, Ohio, 2001).

      McDonough's main contribution to the evolution of sustainable design was his commitment to what he has called “ecologically intelligent design,” a process that involves the cooperation of the architect, corporate leaders, and scientists. This design principle takes into account the “biography” of every aspect of manufacture, use, and disposal: the choice of raw ingredients, transport of materials to the factory, fabrication process, durability of goods produced, usability of products, and recycling potential. McDonough's latest version of the principle—referred to as “cradle-to-cradle” design—is modeled after nature's own waste-free economy and makes a strong case for the goal of reprocessing, in which every element that is used in or that results from the manufacturing process has its own built-in recycling value.

Principles of Building Green.

      The advances in research and in building techniques achieved by the above-mentioned green-design luminaries have been compiled into a reliable database of environmental construction methods and sustainable materials—some of which have been in use for thousands of years yet remain the basis for contemporary advances in environmental technology. The following list includes the essential green-design principles for private residences in the new millennium.

● Energy sources. Whenever feasible, build homes and communities that supply their own power; such buildings may operate entirely off the regional power grid, or they may be able to feed excess energy back onto the grid. Wind and solar power are the usual alternatives. The quality of solar collectors and photovoltaic panels improves almost daily; practical considerations for choosing one supplier over another include price, durability, availability, delivery method, technology, and warranty support.

● Energy conservation. Weatherize buildings for maximum protection against the loss of warm or cool air. Major chemical companies have developed responsibly manufactured, extremely dependable moisture-resistant insulating materials that do not cause indoor humidity problems. Laminated glass has also been radically improved in recent years; some windows provide the same insulation value as traditional stone, masonry, and wood construction. In regions that experience extreme heat, straw-bale or mud-brick construction—used since ancient times—is a good way to save money and energy.

● Reuse of materials. Do the research to find recycled building materials. Although such products were scarce in the early 1990s, today numerous companies, which can be easily located on the Internet, specialize in salvaging refuse from demolition sites.

● Safety of materials. Thoroughly research the chemical composition and off-gassing characteristics of all products to be used in construction. The online service of the U.S. Department of Energy is one of the most reliable sources of information on this subject.

● Siting. Consider using underground or earth-sheltered architecture, which can be ideal for domestic living. Starting at a depth of about 1.5 m (5 ft) below the surface, the temperature is a constant 52 degrees—which makes the earth itself a dependable source of climate control.

      Individual, corporate, and governmental efforts to comply with or enforce LEED standards, engage in recycling at the household and community level, construct smaller and more efficient buildings, and encourage off-the-grid energy supplies are all potentially valuable contributions to a sustainable future. Such efforts alone cannot preserve the global ecosystem, however. On the most basic level, the ultimate success of any globally sanctioned environmental movement will depend as much on its social, psychological, and aesthetic appeal as on its use of advanced technologies.

      The environmental movement in the 21st century will meet resistance to the extent that proponents appear to ask populations to scale back the benefits of industrialization. The ultimate success of green architecture is likely to require that advocates achieve a broad-based philosophical accord and provide the same kind of persuasive catalyst for change that the Industrial Revolution offered in the 19th century. This means shaping a truly global (as well as optimistic and persuasive) philosophy of the environment. The architecture profession will have to abandon the past century's specialization and reliance on technology. Integrative thinking in the building arts can produce a productive checklist of grass-roots-originated, community-oriented, and globally unifying objectives. In the words of Earth Day founder Gaylord Nelson, “The ultimate test of man's conscience may be his willingness to sacrifice something today for future generations whose words of thanks will not be heard.”

Challenges to Architecture.

      If architecture is to become truly green, then a revolution of form and content—including radical changes in the entire look of architecture—will have to occur. The building arts need an infusion of new ideas that can be translated into a more contextually integrative, socially responsive, functionally ethical, and visually germane architectural language.

      Designers in the 21st century can make better use of ideas from larger fields of environmental science and technology. Already there exists a rich reservoir of ideas from science and nature—cybernetics, virtual reality, biochemistry, hydrology, geology, and cosmology, to mention a few. Furthermore, as the Industrial Revolution was a generator of change in many fields in the 19th century, so can the information revolution, with its model of integrated systems, serve as a conceptual model in the 21st century for a new, fully integrated approach to architecture and design in the broader environment.

 Context has meaning well beyond the siting of individual structures. Once community governments have used their legislative power to insist on state-of-the-art green standards, they should do everything possible to encourage appropriate artistic responses to such regional attributes as surrounding topography, indigenous vegetation, cultural history, and territorial idiosyncrasy. The most progressive approach to the goal of contextual green design would require new modes of integrative thinking. For instance, communities might encourage innovative fusions of architecture with landscape—where trees and plants become as much a part of architectural design as construction materials—so that buildings and their adjacent landscapes essentially merge. In such thinking, buildings are not interpreted as isolated objects. Perhaps it is time to challenge traditional barriers between inside and outside and between structure and site.

      Green architecture in the 21st century has similar obligations to the psychological and physical needs of its inhabitants. Buildings are most successful when they respond to multiple senses—meaning that truly green design engages touch, smell, and sound as well as sight in the design of buildings and public spaces.

      Continuing advances in environmental technology have significantly strengthened the goals of sustainable architecture and city planning over the last decade, but there is still a tendency for many people to feel that the environmental crisis is far beyond their comprehension and control. At the same time, if the message of the gurus of green technology encourages the public to transfer all responsibility to engineering and science, then the social and psychological commitment needed for philosophical unity is threatened as well. Technological solutions must be viewed as only one contributive factor in the green crusade.

      Increasing numbers of people are seeking new symbiotic relationships between their shelter and the broader ecology. This growing motivation is one of the most promising signs of hope in the development of a consensus philosophy of the environment. If successful, it will confirm anthropologist Margaret Mead's optimistic observation: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

James Wines is a Professor of Architecture at Pennsylvania State University, President of SITE (an architecture and environmental arts organization), and the author of Green Architecture (2000).

* * *