The Greenest Building Is…One That Is Already Built New Uses for Existing House Museums Save the Guthrie! Again Preservation in China
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forumforum..................................journal journal The Journalof the National Trust for Historic Preservation• Summer 2007 • Volume 21 • No. 4 Periodicals Viewpoints: Postage Paid .............. Washington, D.C. Contemporary Design in 1785 Massachusetts Avenue, NW Historic Districts Washington, DC 20036 Four Strategies for Additions to Historic Settings Return Postage Guaranteed Address Correction Requested The Greenest Building Is…One That Is Already Built New Uses for Existing House Museums Save the Guthrie! Again Preservation in China Published by National Trust Forum, a program of the National Trust’s Center for Preservation Leadership be far from fUllY realiZed. new buildings are added. Can Seeking salVation throUgh sustainabilitY be achieved if green bUilding fails to accoUnt our green vision extends only The Greenest Building Is...One for the oVerWhelming Vastness to neW bUildings, ignoring the of the eXisting bUilding stock. enormoUs challenges of eXist- That Is Already Built The accumulated building ing buildings and communi- ............................. Carl Elefante, AIA, LEED AP stock is the elephant in the ties? After two decades work- room: Ignoring it, we risk ing to promote green bUilding A page has tUrned. In decades cUt in half fossil fUel consUmp- being trampled bY it. We can- within the architectural and hence, 2006 may well be tion in architect-designed not build our way to sustain- enVironmental policY sectors, regarded as the Year When the bUildings bY 2010, Yes 2010, ability; we must conserve our I believe that it is up to the national discussion about the and create carbon-neUtral WaY to it. preservation community to fUtUre of oUr cities, perhaps oUr bUildings bY 2030 (thUs the Consider the nUmbers. call attention to the elephant civilization, changed from a name). Green bUilding is The U.S. Department of EnergY in the room. debate over whether human matUring. “Green BUildings maintains a database of Amer- impacts on the environment and the Bottom Line,” pUb- ica’s nonresidential bUildings, Sustaining the Existing are leading to potentially lished bY Building Design + its Commercial BUilding EnergY Building Stock seVere problems to one focUsed Construction2 states the bUsi- Consumption Survey.3 As of on what we can do to diminish ness case for green bUilding, its latest Update in 2003, there About 6 percent of the exist- and even reverse them. Hal- docUmenting increases in pro- are some 65 billion square feet ing building stock was con- lelUiah! dUctiVitY, performance, and of nonresidential buildings structed before 1920. This EVidence for this sUpposi- profitabilitY and redUctions in in the U.S. According to eco- small slice contains America’s tion is Widespread. CertainlY, risk, insUrance premiUms, and nomic projections reported bY best-loved historic buildings, Al Gore’s Oscar-Winning film, financing costs. Green has Architect magazine in 2006,4 a the “poster children” of his- An Inconvenient Truth, has foUnd its WaY into the board- prolonged building boom of toric preservation. From a been singUlarlY important in room. historic proportions will pro- green design viewpoint, this raising pUblic aWareness and However, this growth duce an estimated 28 billion segment also includes those defining enVironmental steW- process is far from complete. sqUare feet of neW constrUction structures built before the ardship as a fUndamental trait Largely, the green building by 2030, an increase of more introdUction of climate-control of American patriotism. TodaY, movement remains blind to than 40 percent. The report and lighting systems powered preVenting climate change is its most troubling truth: We also notes (almost as an aside) with fossil fuels. There is a the rallYing call for millions, cannot build our way to sus- that during the same period, Wealth of traditional, VernacU- not jUst the enVironmental tainability. Even if, with the more than 54 billion sqUare feet lar, and indigenous structures intelligentsia. There are hUn- wave of a green wand, every of the existing nonresidential that deserve close study, by dreds of eXamples of hoW bUilding constrUcted from this building stock, about 84 per- preservationists and green deeplY oUr sense of national day hence has a vegetative cent of it, will undergo sub- bUilding professionals alike. pUrpose has transformed. MY roof, is powered only with stantial modification. Another 11 percent of profession accepted the Archi- reneWable energY soUrces, and Picture it this way: Four the nonresidential building tectUre 2030 Challenge1 laid is built entirelY of environ- oUt of eVerY fiVe eXisting bUild- stock consists of mid-20th- doWn bY Ed MaZria at the 2006 mentally appropriate materi- ings will be renovated over centUrY bUildings constrUcted AIA National ConVention to als, sustainability would still the neXt generation While tWo up to the close of World 26 ....................................................................... ...............................................................................................................27 F ORUM J OURNAL S UMMER 2 0 0 7 document, and report the building stock in the United effectiVeness of preserVation as States, a whopping 36 billion a green bUilding strategY based square feet. In part, the post- on the work we have accom- war building boom was made plished with these core ele- possible by new design atti- ments of the historic bUilding tudes, ones that emphasized stock. the new building forms and HoWeVer, it mUst also be the application of new tech- acknowledged that the build- nologY oVer traditional bUild- ings preserVationists most ing tYpes and craft. freqUentlY address represent Modern-era architecture a VerY small percentage of is markedlY different aestheti- the entire stock. Preservation callY from its traditional pred- Will become more releVant to ecessors and generallY per- sUstainabilitY bY eXpanding forms VerY differentlY as Well. requires that we find efficient the scope of the bUildings We Both preserVation and green Yet effectiVe WaYs to transform Preservationists too often conserVe. In mY VieW, this bUilding adVocates readilY them, eleVating their perform- assume that renewable War II. Building technology eXpanded role shoUld be par- agree that modern-era bUild- ance to sUstainable leVels. energy technologies can’t began to change rapidlY dUring alleled bY a shift in priorities ings present greater chal- The need to transform the be added comfortably to this period, turning away among preserVationists toWard lenges to both disciplines. modern-era building stock is historic buildings. But from traditional construction neighborhood reVitaliZation PreserVation professionals an important point deserving ground-coupled heating materials and methods and models, Where ordinarY bUild- haVe begUn to Wrestle With more elaboration. Quite fre- and cooling systems, dramatically increasing the ings are embraced for their the problems of modern-era qUentlY, With the preserVation requiring minimal compleXitY of mechanical and contribUtion to a larger con- strUctUres, inclUding their of 18th-, 19th-, and early electricity to operate, have electrical sYstems. teXt. I see it as emphasiZing constrUction Using materials 20th-century buildings, we been installed successfully The buildings that make more of oUr Main Street and assemblies that often lack endeavor to retain or restore at two National Historic up these two, older segments preservation culture. dUrabilitY and their absolUte their original function as Sites,The Monroe School of the building stock garner reliance on eqUipment that Well as fabric. Repairing opera- (above) inTopeka, Kans., bY far the most attention from The Modern-era consumes fossil fuels. ble windows, shutters, and and the Ulysses S. Grant preserVationists. OVer the past Building Stock This large and problem- aWnings on a Victorian house National Historic Site four decades, tried-and-true atic segment of the building in a historic neighborhood (page 28) in St. Louis, conserVation treatments haVe BY the sheer force of nUmbers, stock is going to require new oVerarched With 100-Year-old Mo. Photos courtesy of been developed that employ preservation will have to thinking aboUt both preserVa- trees is so obviously a win-win QUINN / EVANS remarkably efficient methods address a mUch larger bUilding tion and green building. I for both preserVation and sUs- ARCHITECTS. to sustain these traditional stock When modern-era bUild- see it as both a challenge and tainabilitY. The character of a strUctUres. PreserVationists are ings become more fully the an opportunity. In practical historic resource is preserved justified in heralding these stuff of preservation. The terms, the quantity of the and effective weather- and achievements as sustainable buildings of the 1950s, ’60s, modern-era bUilding stock dic- climate-responsiVe deVices are in their oWn right. Indeed, We ’70s, and ’80s constitUte more tates that we find ways to use returned to their intended need to make a much more than half, aboUt 55 percent, of these buildings far into the function. But it is hard to methodical effort to measure, the existing nonresidential future. Their (lack of) quality discoVer sUch Win-Win scenar- 28 ....................................................................... ...............................................................................................................29 F ORUM J OURNAL S UMMER 2 0 0 7 ios with many, if not most, the issues we must tackle ValUe materials are cYcled toWard sUstainabilitY?