by Anya Meekins
Anya is a local writer covering the intersection of architecture and sustainability. She hopes that one day all architecture will be green architecture.
Buildings – the homes in which we live, the restaurants in which we eat, the spaces in which we work – are a leading cause of global warming. Exhaust from ventilation ducts, chemicals used in building materials, and the energy needed to heat and cool interior spaces are all contributors to a building’s negative environmental impact. According to data generated by the Energy Information Administration (EIA), buildings alone generate approximately 36% of carbon emissions in the United States. These practices have historically been left unchecked.
Thankfully, much is being done today to ameliorate the negative effects of architecture. The U.S Green Building Council (USGBC) has been working since 1993 to erase the boundary between “green” architecture and, simply, architecture.
The most well known of the USGBC’s efforts is the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System, which consists of a set of standards by which the sustainability of any building can be measured. These standards cover all phases and aspects of a building, from the amount of waste generated on a construction site, to the quality of a building’s indoor air, to the proximity to public transportation. Buildings are given points for each sustainable measure they employ and then rated based on the number of points achieved. Ratings range from LEED Certified - buildings that meet a minimum number of sustainable requirements, to LEED Platinum - buildings that are exceptional examples of sustainable design. LEED Silver and LEED Gold represent the intermediary ratings.
Although critics of LEED claim that the certification process is not comprehensive enough to accurately determine the sustainability of a building, the rating system continues to be adopted by architects, city planners, and engineers worldwide. LEED presents sustainability as an achievable goal and, while not every LEED certified building is perfect, buildings that meet LEED standards achieve noticeable energy savings and actively contribute to the fight against global warming. A recent study of buildings certified under the LEED for New Construction metric shows that these buildings generate energy savings of, on average, 35-40% when compared to their non-certified counterparts.
It is this potential for improved energy efficiency and, correlatively, a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions that is catching the attention of local government officials seeking to improve the environment within their constituencies. Boston Mayor Tom Menino is among those forward-thinking officials. A strong proponent of sustainable practices, Mayor Menino has fully embraced the concept that energy efficient buildings lead to a cleaner environment and has implemented legislation to ensure that Boston’s buildings are no longer leading contributors to global warming.
Mayor Menino first began his quest to green Boston’s buildings in 2003 when he created the Mayor’s Green Building Task Force (GBTF), a public/private partnership that oversees the implementation of sustainable building practices within Boston. Inspired by the success of the George Robert White Environmental Conservation Center in Mattapan, which opened in October 2002 as the first building in Boston to incorporate green technologies in a meaningful way, Menino pledged to make all of Boston’s buildings models of sustainability. As he said when announcing his creation of the task force, “these buildings are the wave of the future, and I'm proud that Boston is leading the way for other cities across the nation."
In 2007, following the recommendations of the GBTF Report, Boston became the first city in the United States to rewrite its zoning laws so that all large scale construction projects (over 50,000 sq. ft) must conform to the LEED Certified standard. Additionally, per an executive order released in 2007, Mayor Menino requires that all new construction and major renovation of city facilities be designated as LEED Silver; this rating results in an average energy savings of 14% for new construction and 7% for major renovations. As a testament to the economic benefits of adopting sustainable measures in design and construction, Boston’s Department of Neighborhood Development (DND) has recently adopted design standards that require new development of affordable housing to meet the level LEED Silver, exceeding the minimum requirements (LEED Certified) mandated by the new city zoning laws.
Mayor Menino’s actions have already yielded impressive results. In 2008, Popular Science placed Boston third in their list of fifty green American communities, and in the same year, SustainLane, a website that promotes sustainable living, ranked Boston as the sixth greenest city in their annual survey. Both sources cite Boston’s progressive green building strategies as key reasons for the city’s success.
Boston has, in only a few short years, already asserted its authority on the topic of sustainability. As the city continues to design buildings that are symbiotic with, instead of aggressive toward, the natural environment, it will see marked improvements in energy bills, air quality, and carbon emissions. These improvements will further solidify Boston’s role as a green leader.
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