SUSTAINABLE & ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN SERVICES FOR RESIDENTIAL, COMMERCIAL, INDUSTRIAL & LIGHT MEDICAL FACILITIES IN FLORIDA & SOUTHEASTERN U.S. Since 2004, this office has offered a blend of sustainable-architectural design services in Florida that are based upon an extensive professional knowledge and experience that dates to the mid-1970’s.
Can green strategies be put to work for you? YES, for any type of construction you’re considering. Most clients need to know what can be saved with these systems, or, 'What's the return and how soon can it pay for itself?' The link provided offers an independent analysis that's a good starting point for finding an honest answer.
Of course, initial costs depend upon the size and system type employed. Follow any of the three links listed here - U.S. Green Building Council, Leeds Standards, and Energy Star Standards, for a brief overview of current approaches. These programs offer excellent advice to help reduce your current energy use, landfill waste, and damage to the planet. Some steps are as simple as changing light bulb types and go forward from there. These are the standards that most folks have in mind when they’d like to improve an existing structure.
An approach for enthusiasts or off the grid types who are considering new construction can be found with the “Living Building Standards: A Visionary Path to a Restorative Future”. This approach not only seeks to minimize our impact on the earth, but to improve environmental conditions by modifying our daily habits. “The Living Building Challenge is a certification program that defines the most advanced measure of sustainability in the built environment and acts to diminish the gap between current limits and ideal solutions”.
Ground breaking residential efforts demonstrated in full scale test buildings can be found among the entries of the Solar Decathlon, a global competition hosted every three years by the U.S. Government Department of Energy. “The U.S. Department of Energy Solar Decathlon challenges collegiate teams to design, build, and operate solar-powered houses that are cost-effective, energy-efficient, and attractive. The winner of the competition is the team that best blends affordability, consumer appeal, and design excellence with optimal energy production and maximum efficiency.”Dr. Randy Swanson is a Faculty Alumni of this effort having served in the first competition of 2002 for the College of Architecture @ UNC Charlotte.
RESPONSIBLE & SUSTAINABLE ARCHITECTURE
Dr. Randy Swanson Published, Oct, 2007, Living Organic News.
'Green’ strategies accept the current means, methods, and effects of industrialization and strive for greater efficiencies to be less harmful to the environment. Green buildings improve energy efficiency and reduce environmental impacts while being connected to the grid. The object is to minimize a building’s demand for energy and reduce the building’s life-long maintenance demands, minimize construction waste, and increase the building’s life to further minimize landfill waste.
'Sustainable' practices employ renewable energy sources to minimize environmental degradation. These sources of energy are immediately available in unending quantities (sunlight, wind, geothermal, tidal, etc.). For society to adopt sustainable practices at this time would require a substantial change in our habits and expectations. We’re headed in this direction - whether we want to or not on a global scale. An overview of these techniques and others can be found on the web at the United States Green Building Council, http://www.usgbc.org/ and at the American Institute of Architects, http://www.aia.org/susn_default. Buildings can be made to be sustainable but require careful thought and modest changes of life style. Both approaches work.
‘Stewardship’ is a more radical point of view promoting the possibility of a making the earth a better place for our having been here. This view was more common in our 19th century agricultural society and was a casualty to the rise of industrialization. Numerous utopian communities here in the United States such as the Quaker and Amana Colonies have kept this notion alive and can offer a starting point for the continued evolution of our search for a gentler way to live on earth. It is a view now struggling for rebirth and is embraced by the Living Building Standards 2.0.
