The Taiwan Tower Twin Syscraper

Old Buildings, New Life

The shift from building new commercial spaces was bound to turn from erecting sparkling new mega-buildings on greenfields to retrofitting run-down but still valuable older buildings in good locations close to transportation or other amenities.

No one knows this better than the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). Its LEED green building certification is often called upon to rate these buildings. To date, more than 40,000 projects participate in the commercial and institutional rating systems of USGBC, which represents 7.9 billion square feet of construction space.

Ashley Katz, communications manager for USGBC notes that many of these commercial ratings are for existing buildings. “LEED for Existing Buildings: Operations & Maintenance has seen explosive growth since 2008. More certifications are awarded under [the existing buildings program] on a square-footage basis than any other LEED rating system. And this is important because existing buildings make up the vast majority of the U.S. building stock.”

As a result of this growth, LEED projects are predominately existing buildings that have received certification based on verified energy performance. “We believe that the rapid uptake of this tool signals that the market is becoming increasingly aware of energy performance and is ready to move further toward even higher levels of performance,” Katz says.

USGBC’s experience is backed up by research. The McKinsey & Company report, “Unlocking Energy Efficiency in the U.S. Economy,” which addresses reducing U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, states that existing buildings will make money and will meet 85% of our new energy demand through 2030.

And the 2009 McGraw Hill Construction’s “SmartMarket Report” estimated that the green building retrofit and renovation market was 5%–9% by value, or a $2–$4 billion marketplace for major retrofit projects. By 2014, that share is expected to increase to 20%–30%, representing a $10–$15 billion market for major projects.

Katz points out the Adobe Systems project in Northern California as particularly representative of the retrofit commercial projects and why they are growing and will continue to grow: Adobe spent $1.4 million on 64 separate projects and received $389,000 in rebates, $1.2 million in annual savings, reported a 10-month payback, and 121% ROI.

These kinds of numbers are valuable for companies that need to see a strong ROI and must defend spending in a still-recovering economy.

Another example of a retrofit with a solid bottom line is the Armstrong World Industries’ corporate headquarters in Lancaster, Pa. Originally constructed in 1998, the glass and steel building was recently rehabbed for $138,000. Company leadership believes it will recoup that money in three years. For its outlay of money, the company got:

• waterless urinals, dual-flush toilets, and water sensors for the faucets so the company could greatly reduce its water footprint. Those changes and a fix to the humidification process reduced the annual use of water from 800,000 to 420,000 gallons
• occupancy sensors
• the purchase of 2 million kWh of wind power, which provides 75% of the project’s electricity use
• landscape with low-maintenance plants, no irrigation, and a catch basin that slows stormwater release.

Another project, the Joe Serna Jr. California EPA Headquarters Building in Sacramento, Calif., studied its investment in LEED Platinum certification and found it had increased its asset value by $12 million (for a $500,000 investment), while diverting 200+ tons of waste from the landfill and enjoying a building that was better than a third more energy efficient than California’s 1998 energy code.

The team for that project actually took on some untraditional methods, such as a vermicomposting program (worm composting), which diverts more than 10 tons of waste from landfills, and saves $10,000 annually. Plus, by eliminating garbage can liners and using reusable cloth bags in centrally located recycling bins, the headquarters saves $80,000 per year.

While success stories abound in the retrofit of existing buildings, some pundits warn of the potential “post-fossil-fuel age,” where many commercial buildings, high-rise buildings in particular, will be hard to maintain and may be abandoned for easier to maintain buildings.

In an interview with with Grist.com’s Kerry Trueman, James Howard Kuntsler, author of The Long Emergency, among many other books, warns of the impact of a capital scarce, energy-scarce future on mega-structures, which serves as a reminder that builders and owners must consider how buildings will weather an uncertain future where materials or energy might be scarce or expensive.

“The skyscraper is obsolete,” Kuntsler claims. “The main reason we’re done with skyscrapers is not because of the electric issues or heating-cooling issues per se, but because they will never be renovated! They are one-generation buildings. We will not have the capital to renovate them—and all buildings eventually require renovation. We likely won’t have the fabricated modular materials they require, either—everything from the manufactured sheet-rock to the silicon gaskets and sealers needed to keep the glass curtain walls attached.

“From now on, we need desperately to tone down our grandiosity. … Our cities have attained a scale that is inconsistent with the economic and energy realities of the future. The optimum building height, we will re-discover, is the number of stories most healthy people can comfortably walk up.”

LEEDing States

USGBC just released its list of top ten states in the United States for LEED-certified projects in 2010.

The top LEED states per capita, including the District of Columbia:

• District of Columbia: 25.15 square feet
• Nevada: 10.92 square feet
• New Mexico: 6.35 square feet
• New Hampshire: 4.49 square feet
• Oregon: 4.07 square feet
• South Carolina: 3.19 square feet
• Washington: 3.16 square feet
• Illinois: 3.09 square feet
• Arkansas: 2.9 square feet
• Colorado: 2.85 square feet
• Minnesota: 2.77 square feet

Of the projects represented on the list, the most-common project type was commercial office and the most-common owner type was for-profit organization. The cities most represented in the list were Chicago and Washington, D.C.

Photo credit: As a certified LEED Platinum facility, Armstrong’s corporate headquarters became only the sixth existing building (and the first outside of California) to achieve LEED’s highest level of certification.

Via GreenBuilder Mag

The Better Way to Know if a Building Is Green

An exhibit at the American Institute of Architects headquarters shows off the LEED for Neighborhood Development rating system

The architecture firm Farr Associates, the Chicago Architecture Foundation, and the U.S. Green Building Council have produced a fantastic exhibit on how to create green neighborhoods. It opened in Chicago last year and is now on display at the American Institute of Architects headquarters in Washington.

This carries some symbolism. When it comes to sustainable communities, the architecture profession has been both hero and villain. It has been a hero because many of the early (and continuing) leaders of smart growth and sustainability in our built environment have been architects, from William McDonough to Peter Calthorpe, from Andres Duany to David Dixon. Frankly, in my opinion, architects were way ahead of the environmental community in forging solutions to sprawl. And it’s a good thing that they were, because they gave us environmentalists something positive to advocate.

Continue with article via The Atlantic

Winners of the 2011 Skyscraper Competition

eVolo magazine has run a tidy little competition for the last five years, inviting architects to innovative new skyscraper typologies. Today, the winners of the 2011 Skyscraper Competition were announced and we’ve got a recycling wind turbine, an energy- and water-harvesting horizontal tower, and a re-imagining of the Hoover Dam.

Jury members included SOFTlab principals Jose Gonzalez and Michael Svizos, architecture critic John Hill, Mitchell Joachim of Terreform One, CarloMaria Ciampoli of Live Architecture Network, and a host of other working and teaching architects (see the full list here).

FIRST PLACE: ‘LO2P Recycling Skyscraper’ by Atelier CMJN (Julien Combes, Gaël Brulé)

“The idea behind this skyscraper is to recycle the old cars and use them as building material for the new structure. The building is designed as a giant lung that would clean New Delhi’s air through a series of large-scale greenhouses that serve as filters. Another set of rotating filters capture the suspended particles in the air while the waste heat and carbon dioxide from the recycling center are used to grow plants that in turn produce bio-fuels.”

“The idea behind this skyscraper is to recycle the old cars and use them as building material for the new structure. The building is designed as a giant lung that would clean New Delhi’s air through a series of large-scale greenhouses that serve as filters. Another set of rotating filters capture the suspended particles in the air while the waste heat and carbon dioxide from the recycling center are used to grow plants that in turn produce bio-fuels.”

SECOND PLACE: ‘Flat Tower’ by Yoann Mescam, Paul-Eric Schirr-Bonnans, and Xavier Schirr-Bonnans

Imagined for medium-size cities where vertical skyscrapers do not fit the skyline, the flat tower is a “new high-density typology that deviates from the traditional skyscraper. The medium-height dome structure is perforated with cell-like skylights that provide direct sunlight to the agricultural fields and to the interior spaces. The dome’s large surface area is perfect to harvest solar energy and rainwater collection.”

THIRD PLACE: ‘Reimagining the Hoover Dam’ by Yheu-Shen Chua, United Kingdom

This project merges the programs at the current Hoover Dam — viewing platform, a bridge, and a gallery – into a “single vertical super structure.”

There a long list of honorable mentions, and we’ve highlighted below some especial favorites (clockwise from top left):

‘Sports Tower’ by Sergiy Prokofyev and Olga Prokofyeva, Ukraine

‘RE:pH Coastscraper’ by Gary Kellett, United Kingdom

‘White Cloud Skyscraper‘ by Adrian Vincent Kumar and Yun Kong Sung, New Zealand

‘Seeds of Life Skyscraper’ by Mekano (Osama Mohamed Elghannam, Karim Mohamed Elnabawy, Mohamed Ahmed Khamis, Nesma Mohamed Abobakr), Egypt

‘Waste Collector Skyscraper’ by Agata Sander and Tomek Kujawski, Poland

‘Hopetel: Transitional High-Rise Housing’ by Asaf Dali, United States

Via Architizer.com

Send in the Clouds – MIT in bubbly bid for London Olympic Tower

Thanks to writer Julie V. Iovine and the folks at The Architects Newspaper, I came across this project.  It looks fantastic and I would love to see it built.  Although I admit I am not so sure I would ever reach the top to put my head in the “clouds”.  My fear of heights and intended airy and light feel of the structure might stand in my way. This of course assumes I ever travel to London.

A proposal spearheaded by MIT's Senseable City Lab envisions an inhabitable sculpture for London's 2012 Olympics.

All Photos Courtesy Raise the Cloud

In early November, British architects discovered with dismay that Mayor Boris Johnson of London was conducting a secret competition to select a designer for a $33 million beacon for the 2012 Olympics. Brushing aside the standard procurement process—which involves publishing a notice in The Official Journal of the European Communities—Johnson invited 30 firms to submit proposals for a prominent addition to the city’s skyline.

A Guggenheim-like spiral wrapped in cable netting will support the clouds, with much of the structure open to the public.

Called “the Cloud,” the structure starts with a slender spire that is ringed by a spiraling ramp, stabilized with a cable net, and sturdy enough for strollers and bicyclists to mount to a sky full of bubbly spheres. This upper aerie would host three types and sizes of spheres: The largest and most structural are Buckminster Fuller–type geodesic domes; next, cable-net bubbles would cluster around observation decks; and then, blurring the edge, bunches of hot-air-filled balloons create that head-in-the-clouds feeling.

The EFTE inflatables would be covered in a new type of distributed LED that is readable from any direction and could provide a constant stream of information, including game statistics, weather forecasts, traffic advisories, alien greetings, and presumably, advertisements.

Olympic visitors at play in "the Clouds."

Intended to stand 400 feet tall, the Cloud will barely have a footprint, sustainability-wise. Photovoltaic film, whose effect will be magnified by mirrors, is spread over the spheres. And while visitors can only ascend the one-kilometer ramp on foot or by bicycle, they can descend by means of a “regenerative lift” that uses the same braking system as a Prius to recoup electricity, as will water-wheels embedded in the column through rain collection.

The exact size of the Cloud remains to be determined. Taking a page from the grassroots innovations of the Obama campaign, the team has organized a structure that can expand or contract depending on donations. The density of the cloud cover—the number of spires and individual clouds, in fact—will depend on how many people sign on to contribute.

London Mayor Boris Johnson envisions a beacon for the Olympics, and mit's is only one of several proposals thought to be under consideration.

While the contenders—said to include Foreign Office Architecture—have yet to be named, one team is already spreading the word about their entry on Facebook. Carlo Ratti, architect and director of MIT’s SENSEable City Lab, joined forces with German engineer Joerg Schlaich, Arup, artist Tomas Saraceno, corporate sponsor Google UK, and others to create what Ratti described as “not a building for London but a symbol of global ownership.”

The Facebook page Raise the Cloud was launched on November 11 with 1,000 fans and counting, according to Ratti, who would like to see as many as three spires covered in clouds at the as-yet-unselected site. “We can build our Cloud with five million pounds or 50 million,” he said. “The flexibility of the structural system will allow us to tune the size of the Cloud to the level of funding that is reached.” Whether or not selected by Mayor Johnson to be the official 2012 Olympic Tower, the Cloud is certain to attract plenty of air time.

Pixel building, Melbourne by Studio 505

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