Thinking your way to sustainable design
Sustainable design is becoming the phrase of the decade as we scramble to turn back the clock on climate change and make an effort to lower our collective footprint on the planet. Designers are finding themselves at the forefront of this change, as sustainable design becomes expected and required to be considered the top of our field. And while this is a valuable place in history, it also leads to the question “How do I accomplish this?” Sustainability has a long and complicated history that has led to a widely accepted phenomenon that is rarely understood. In order to truly design sustainably you cannot just follow the LEED guidelines and put a few recycled materials in. You need to understand the primary principles of sustainability, the philosophy that leads to real “green” lifestyles, the information needed to make informed decisions and present your case to uneasy clients. Sustainable design is a living and breathing machine that requires knowledge and creative thinking in order to truly use all of the tools at our disposal in the most effective way possible.
Sustainability as we view it today is an offshoot of the term sustainable,defined as (adj). able to be maintained at a certain rate or level. In the environmentalist terminology it is typically used to mean something along the lines of “Behaving as a community in a way that allows all living things to survive in perpetuity.” (Elaine Gallagher, SCAD). In layman's terms, in order for an option to be sustainable it needs to work for as long as can be planned. A choice that is only sustainable for 200 years (ex. Unregulated hunting of a species or high methane production) is not a viable option. A sustainable alternative is not truly sustainable if it comes with an expiration date.
One of the key philosophies of sustainability is the concept of the Triple Bottom Line, the idea that sustainability comes when a solution is ecologically, economically, and socially feasible. If a solution is great for the environment but economically impossible and harms users or surrounding communities, it will never last and is therefore unsustainable. We have lived by the economy since the industrial revolution, but as we switch to living by the environment we need to beware of doing what we’ve done in the past and ignore the other pillars of the problem. We need to work to design a solution that is supported by all three factors.
This ties into the idea of thinking of how we live as a system, a machine that functions a certain way with set inflows and outflows. Currently we live in a Stock and Flow system without a true stabilizing loop, where we use resources or produce waste and it just becomes a useless thing at the end of it all. Using oil as an example, the resource depletes from the stock, flows through the oil rig and refinery process, and then gets used, but not replenished. In the case of something like a polyester upholstery fabric; the polyester is made using fossil fuels (Stock), installed into a project (valve) and then tossed into the landfill with the next renovation. Instead of depleting resources it contributes to the growing problem of more waste than we can handle. While this all sounds rather grim and disturbing, all hope is not lost. By pushing to function in a Closed Loop System we can at least minimize the amount of stock that ends up as unusable waste. A Closed Loop System is used to describe a process that employs waste to create more product, rather than just send it to a landfill. A popular example is the idea of Aquaponics. In this unconventional farming style plants are grown with their roots in a large fish tank (usually holding tilapia or carp); the fish produce waste which feed the plants, and the plants in turn purify the water for the fish. There is little to no waste, and the system keeps reinforcing itself to allow for a never ending cycle. This has been applied to urban planning, with cities striving to contain all the necessary utilities within their own borders and structure them in such a way that waste never ends up in a landfill or manure pond, but rather helping the city continue to grow and prosper.
But how does all of this information apply to the building arts? Once you’ve begun to understand the basic philosophies of sustainability, it becomes almost impossible not to think about. But rather than see this as a burden, use it to expand your reality. When you think about sustainability as an opportunity to create a more efficient and enjoyable space it becomes a brain teaser, not a economic money and time hole. View every choice as an option with a sustainable and unsustainable alternative. Often this happens in ways you wouldn’t expect using methods and philosophies described above: using dark colors to absorb heat in cool environments or designing an office building in a hot climate with residential units on each floor to keep the building cool at all hours so that the AC doesn’t have to work as hard during the day. Think outside the box, every tiny choice has the potential to make the building more effective, efficient and therefore sustainable. It may not be worth a LEED or Well Building credit but it will typically save your client money and increase their well being in the long run. But most importantly; constantly think about the problems and solutions. When you think sustainably and live sustainably it becomes easier to problem solve sustainably.
Often our biggest hurdle as designers comes in the shape of our clients. They shy away from words like sustainability because they see it as an unnecessary expense in an already pricey operation. It is our job to advise, inform and remind our clients that sustainability is sexy, not just good for future generations. Sustainability is quickly becoming an advertising technique in a generation that wants corporations to be responsible to their communities, not just their shareholders. This can, however, lead to the potential for greenwashing or the process of advertising your product as more “green” than it truly is. Avoid this by doing your research into truly sustainable options, real sustainability that you can back up with facts is sexier than saying “but it says it’s green”. Even with the promise of more business and a marketing strategy to capitalize on, clients will shy away from sustainability due to a perception that it costs more. That fear is thankfully a relic of the past, often times sustainability can not only be achieved for exactly the same price, but it offers huge long term energy savings and creates a healthier building overall. Offering your clients the information to change their minds is often an uphill battle but a rewarding one for their project and your portfolio in the end.
As a designer we have an amazing opportunity and responsibility like no other group on the planet. We can control our clients’ and users’ sustainability without them really needing to try to, or even be aware that they are. By designing a building that is not only sustainably built, but encourages subconscious sustainable behavior you are effectively lowering the footprint of every user to come into contact with it. Scientists might have all the data in the world but they often have no way to make everyone else understand or create change without great backlash. Designers need to bridge that gap because we are people’s window into understanding something new. We have the potential to take information and make it readily accessible to anyone who wants to understand it, to subconsciously encourage lifestyle change, and turn a career that is typically an environmental calamity into a gateway for sustainable living.
For more information or resources check out:
https://www.nasa.gov/ames/facilities/sustainabilitybase
https://www.wellcertified.com/
https://living-future.org/lbc/