Kim Davis
Sun
To Jason McLennan, the chief executive officer of the two-country Cascadia Green Building Council, and Robert Berkebile, a pioneering advocate of sustainable architecture and construction, flowers offer compelling models and metaphors for the architecture of our future.
Imagine structures . . . rooted to places, responsive to their region’s unique characteristics . . . generating their own energy with renewable resources . . . capturing and treating all water on site . . . promoting the health and well-being of their inhabitants . . . and using resources efficiently to create beauty and inspiration.
While much of the development and building sectors, particularly on the residential side, are still working to embrace the LEED rating system, or other green building guidelines, the Cascadia Green Building Council is attempting to raise the bar on sustainable design by challenging professionals to envision an even higher standard: the living building.
NOT YOUR AVERAGE GARDEN VARIETY
According to the Living Building Challenge (LBC), while a living building is by definition difficult to obtain, “all facets of this tool have been attained in numerous projects around the world — just not all together.” At first glance, the standard looks deceptively simple. Uncomplicated in both structure and documentation, especially as compared to LEED, the LBC requires buildings to meet 16 prerequisites related to six issues: site design, energy, materials, water, indoor air quality, and beauty and inspiration. Because the LBC is performance based, rather than prescriptive, and allows design teams to determine how compliance is achieved, it can be applied to any building type — single-family residential, commercial, etc. There are no credits to count, models to create, or volumes of documentation to compile. As McLennan notes, “the intention is to get people to invest in the project not the paperwork.” As the LBC aims to reflect not what a building may do, but rather what it did do, projects are not eligible to apply for certification until they have been completed and in operation for at least one year.
“LBC is like a tree,” says McLennan, “strong but flexible.” “It moves with the wind, but stays firmly rooted.” These firm roots come in the way of rigorous performance benchmarks. While the LBC is said to be based on the pragmatic experience of what has been built in the marketplace, and many of the prerequisites do include “exceptions” to acknowledge current market realities, meeting one, let alone the 16 standards required, can be extremely challenging. For example, buildings must prove both net-zero energy and water usage. This means that all of the building’s energy must be supplied by on-site renewable energy sources, and that all water must come from either captured precipitation or reused water.
The program also strives to address such highly subjective issues as aesthetics by having projects incorporate features “intended solely for human delight and the celebration of culture, spirit and place.” Building impacts that cannot be avoided through an integrated design process are required to be counterbalanced through such programs as habitat exchange and carbon offsetting.
AN EARLY SPRING?
While the program’s announcement received a standing ovation at the GreenBuild Conference in Denver this past November, there are ‘green-minded’ professionals who feel that the LBC pushes the bar to something almost imaginary at a time when a majority of the industry still doesn’t quite get green buildings. McLennan is quick to respond to such criticism. “This is where we have to go, we don’t have a choice,” he says. “The environment can’t wait for us to get comfortable.” “This is not a crazy idea. Like LEED Platinum, if the will is there it can be done. We have all the technology today to completely transform the built environment.” He points to the growing number of LEED Platinum buildings being constructed across North America, as well as the zero energy and wastewater buildings already beginning to emerge. He also notes that the LBC is not meant to compete with LEED, but rather support the USGBC and Canada GBC’s goals by offering a higher bar to which professionals can aspire.
Joe Van Belleghem, a partner in the Windmill Development Group, the company behind Dockside Green in Victoria, is one of the developers supportive and encouraged by the program’s development. “It is the next evolution in the approach to a rating system,” he says. “Regardless of whether or not you take it on, its principles continue to raise the bar.” While Belleghem is quick to point out that the LBC still needs work and many details ironed out, he does not see the standard as unrealistic. Dockside Green, which is currently pursuing LEED Platinum, already fairs well against many of the program’s prerequisites.
FIRST BLOOMS
McLennan expects to see the first living buildings, which will likely be smaller projects, starting to emerge within about a year and a half. In the meantime, the Cascadia GBC is working to produce The Living Building User’s Guide and other educational materials, including courses, for the program. As the concept behind living buildings is not limited to individual structures, they also hope to add a ‘living communities’ tool, which will address neighborhood and mixed-use developments.
RESOURCES
www.cascadiagbc.org
© The Vancouver Sun 2007
