With buildings accounting for 36-percent of global energy use, addressing a building’s environmental impact on climate change can be both a moral and business imperative. Sustainability has been at the forefront of many architectural discussions and many architects will ensure it is paramount from the beginning of a project, taking into account the entire lifecycle of a building. The central idea of sustainable design is simple and it can be applied to architecture at any scale and function.
Here are a few sustainable strategies that you can incorporate into your next project.
Site Analysis and Planning
Every site is different, so it is essential for architects and designers to analyze what they are dealing with. Ultimately, the aim is to minimize elements that might impact negatively on the environment and on those who will live or work in the building.
The layout of the site and orientation of the building is also very important. With rising energy costs, it’s becoming increasingly important for builders to orient buildings to capitalize on the Sun’s free energy and orientating the building correctly can help to save as much as 25-percent energy. To make maximum use of daylighting, the most highly populated areas of the building should face north or south, depending on which hemisphere it is in.
Energy-Efficient Systems
When possible, energy-efficient systems should be used to supplement the passive systems of heating, ventilation, cooling, water management and more. These systems can bring a variety of benefits to the design of a building like reducing greenhouse gas emissions, reducing demand for energy imports, and lowering the costs on a household and corporation. Some examples of this are the heat/energy recovery ventilation system and low flow taps. Integrating these systems into the design of the building could require experts to be roped in, in the early stage of design to ensure maximum efficiency which can be done by searching for architects and designers that have experience with LEED® standards.
Use of Local Materials
Using local materials has many advantages, like reducing the energy consumed in their transportation to a job site. It also supports local businesses and brings money into the local and regional economies. What is considered local depends on the type of material – the heavier the material, the more energy it consumes and the more pollutants emitted during transport means you should be looking closer to the job site for the material.
Waste Management Systems
For a waste management system to be sustainable, it must be environmentally effective, economically affordable and socially acceptable. It can be as simple as creating an area that allows for organic waste to be composted on-site, which can feed into green spaces as compost. Other sources of a waste management system can be recycled greywater being used in certain places, like piping it directly outside of the building to water ornamental plants or trees. This system is great to incorporate in multi-family, commercial and industrial buildings as they can treat and reuse large volumes of water and play a crucial role in water conservation.
Renewable Energy Sources
Some of the most popular sources of renewable energy are currently: solar energy, wind energy, hydro energy, tidal energy, geothermal energy, and biomass energy. One of the easiest systems to incorporate into a project is solar energy by using solar panels. As sunlight is one of our planet’s most abundant freely available energy sources, installing solar panels is a direction many choose to go when looking to be more “green.”
Sustainable design not only benefits owners and operators, but also benefits the building occupants because of the improved indoor environmental quality. Occupants of eco-friendly buildings typically experience better overall health, which often translates to better employee attendance and less absenteeism due to illness.
Contact us today if you want to minimize the environmental impact of your building. Whether or not you are looking to pursue LEED® Certification, CORE Design Group will always work within your budget and suggest ways to implement cost-effective sustainable design practices.
