Radical Green Building Takes a Giant Leap Forward as The International Living Building Institute’s New Standard Addresses Social Justice, Urban Agriculture and Community Scale Impacts

“The program introduces a new focus on urban agriculture, requiring a minimum amount of site square footage be dedicated to food production except in the densest urban environments – the more suburban a site is, the more food production is required.

“All projects must integrate opportunities for agriculture appropriate to the scale and density of the project using its Floor Area Ratio (F.A.R.) as the basis for calculation.”

This basic chart outlines mandatory agricultural allowances:

The User’s Guide defines acceptable urban agriculture practices and the formula for determining how much square footage must be given over to agriculture. Specific agricultural strategies (e.g., crops, orchards and/or husbandry) should be determined by the project team based on the surrounding location, climate, and culture.

The density of a project is inversely related to the agriculture requirement. Refer to the User’s Guide for more detailed information, including a strict interpretation of how to calculate the F.A.R. for your project and for acceptable agricultural uses on your site.

Project area is equal to the total site square meters. This figure should be uniformly applied to all Imperatives.

Projects with this F.A.R. are considered to be farm or ranch land. There is an exception for projects whose primary purpose is related to protection or interpretation of sensitive ecological habitats as defined in Imperative 01: Limits to Growth.

See Living Building Challenge Version 2.0 here.

Press Release:

Version 2.0 of the Living Building Challenge expands its focus to local food production, unrestricted access to nature, no gated communities and other equity issues

(Phoenix, AZ) Nov. 10, 2009 – The concept of Living Buildings was first introduced three years ago and quickly gained recognition as the world’s most revolutionary approach to green building. The newest iteration of the Living Building Challenge was released today at Greenbuild, the U.S. Green Building Council’s annual conference. The International Living Building Institute (ILBI), in conjunction with the Cascadia Region Green Building Council, launched version 2.0 with the ultimate goal to fundamentally change the built environment.

Most green building certification programs have focused on individual buildings, but the new Living Building Challenge program is both more comprehensive and more expansive, including small in-home remodels, community or campus-wide initiatives and infrastructure projects – including bridges, roads and parks.

The expanded breadth of version 2.0 brings more people to the table. “This standard is a unifying tool, bringing together many disciplines and players for the first time under one green building standard – architects and developers with urban planners and landscape architects, environmentalists and social activists, as well as affordable housing advocates and preservationists – to form a visionary pathway to a restorative future,” says Jason F. McLennan, CEO of the Cascadia Region Green Building Council.

The new Living Building Challenge standard is designed to address critical social and economic issues, including the collapse of domestic manufacturing, global trade imbalances, urban sprawl, the marginalization of those that can’t purchase the ‘American dream’ and the lack of community distinctiveness and culture. Version 2.0 is the first green building certification program to integrate urban agriculture, social justice and universal access issues as mandatory requirements. A new section addresses equity, examining ways to create equal access for all citizens, incorporate Universal Design considerations, promote culture and interaction, and end economic segregation of public and semi-public places. The new standards even require unrestricted access to rivers, lakes and shorelines, as well as other important natural elements – even when built on private property.

The program also introduces a new focus on urban agriculture, requiring a minimum amount of site square footage be dedicated to food production except in the densest urban environments – the more suburban a site is, the more food production is required. A new ‘car-free living’ imperative does not mandate the elimination of cars from development; rather, it is defined by the potential for a majority of people living in a neighborhood to have a productive and rich lifestyle without needing a car.

“The simple concept of green buildings has generally produced more efficient buildings and smaller footprints. But that is no longer enough,” says McLennan. “With version 2.0 addressing issues of food, transportation and social justice, we expect a considerable leap forward will happen once again.”

Version 2.0 represents the collective wisdom and feedback of the community of design professionals who have been working on Living Buildings over the last three years. Many of the changes incorporated into the new version were spurred by commentary from project teams within the Living Building Community.

There are approximately 70 projects pursuing certification under previous versions of the Living Building Challenge throughout North America, as well as one registered project in France. The Challenge is gaining international interest, with program ambassadors emerging in additional countries, including Australia, New Zealand, England, Ireland, India, Colombia and Mexico. Three projects have completed construction and have entered their verification phase: Tyson Living Learning Center in Eureka, MO; Omega Center for Sustainable Living in Rhinebeck, NY; and Eco-Sense, a private residence in Victoria, British Columbia. The Living Building Challenge is primarily performance-based, requiring a minimum of twelve months of operation prior to certification.

Visit the ILBI website to download the new version.

Eco Pod: Pre Cycled Modular Bioreactor For Downtown Crossing

Taking advantage of the stalled Filene’s construction site at Downtown Crossing, Eco Pod is a proposal to immediately stimulate the economy, and the ecology, of downtown Boston. Eco Pod (Gen1) is a temporary vertical algae bio reactor and new public Commons, built with custom prefabricated modules. The pods will serve as bio fuel sources and as micro incubators for flexible research and development programs. As an open and reconfigurable structure, the voids between pods form a network of vertical public parks/botanical gardens housing unique plant species a new Uncommon for the Commons.

Micro algae is one of the most promising bio fuel crops of today, yielding over thirty times more energy per acre than any other fuel crop. Unlike other crops, algae can grow vertically and on non arable land, is biodegradable, and may be the only viable method by which we can produce enough automotive fuel to replace the world’s current diesel usage. Algae farming uses sugar and cellulose to create bio fuels and simultaneously helps reduce Carbon Dioxide emissions, since it replaces CO2 with Oxygen during photosynthesis. While the bio reactor process is currently in an experimental phase, recent advances in single step algae oil extraction and low energy high efficiency LEDs make the algae bio reactor an extremely promising prospect on the renewable energy technology horizon.

In addition to being an active bio reactor and local source of renewable energy, the Eco Pod is also a research incubator in which scientists can test algae species and methods of fuel extraction, including new techniques of using low energy LED lighting for regulating the algae growth cycles. The central location of the Eco Pod and the public and visible nature of the research, allows the public to experience the algae growth and energy production processes. As a productive botanical garden, it also functions as a pilot project, a public information center and catalyst for ecological awareness.

An on site robotic armature (powered by the algae bio fuel) is designed to reconfigure the modules to maximize algae growth conditions and to accommodate evolving spatial and programmatic conditions in real time. The reconfigurable modular units allow the structure to transform to meet changing programmatic and economic needs, while the continuous construction on the site will broadcast a subtle semaphore of constructional activity and economic recovery. This is anticipatory architecture, capable of generating a new micro urbanism that is local, agile, and carbon net positive.

This proposal envisions the immediate deployment of a “crane ready” modular temporary structure to house experimental and research based programs. Once funding is in place for the original architectural proposal, the modules can be easily disassembled and redistributed to various neighborhoods around Boston, infilling other empty sites, testing new proposals, and developing initiatives with other communities. Designed with flexibility and reconfigurability in mind, the modularity of the units anticipates future deployments on other sites. An instant architecture, designed with an intention towards its afterlife(s), this is a pre cycled architecture. In our ongoing, synergistic scenario, the growth of the algae propels, and is propelled by, technologically enabled developments that literally and metaphorically “grow the economy.”

Höweler + Yoon Architecture is a multidisciplinary practice specializing in the integration of architecture, new technologies and public space. Their work has been widely published, exhibited, and awarded. Their recent books include: Expanded Practice, a monograph published by Princeton Architectural Press; and Public Works: Unsolicited Small Projects for the Big Dig published by Map Books. Eric Höweler is a Design Critic in Architecture at Harvard Design School. Meejin Yoon is an Associate Professor in the Department of Architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Squared is a digital design laboratory producing work across the fields of architecture, industrial design, online interactivity, and film. Among a variety of projects, they have been serving as design and visualization consultants for the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York City since 2003. Co founders Josh Barandon and Franco Vairani graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with degrees in Architecture, Design, and Computation.

See Höweler and Yoon Architecture website here.

Gardens across the UK are changing for the better, with more people planting fruit and veg and returning to traditional trends that benefit wildlife. But are gardeners as green as they think they are?

By Paul Evans
The Guardian, July 9 2008

– gardens plays a crucial role in the environment debate. They account for 15%-25% of the land area in Britain’s towns and cities, and their importance in offsetting some of the effects of climate change – through plants absorbing CO2, cooling urban micro-climates and supporting wildlife, and soils absorbing rainwater run-off and reducing flooding – is a message that is beginning to create trends in gardening.

But the big changes in gardening in recent years have more to do with a return to traditional values. Andrew Maxted, commercial director for HTA, says: “Society has been through a substantial materialistic expansion in the last 10 to 15 years, but consumers now are more discriminating. In the same way that more people are looking to experience new cultures and taste real food when they go on holiday, rather than going on package holidays, this search for the authentic is feeding into lifestyles at home and transforming gardens. Having fresh fruit and vegetables, tasting the difference, and growing them yourself has financial benefits, but it’s [also] authentic, and gardening for the table is producing a massive demand.”

Last year, the sales of fruit trees and plants went up by 43%, seeds of edible plants were up 13%, and herbs up 6%, while the average spend by gardeners was £291 per household. There is also a massive rise in allotment gardening. “The demand for allotments has risen logarithmically over the last few years,” says Bryn Pugh, legal adviser to the National Society of Allotment and Leisure Gardeners. “The decline in allotment gardening between the 1950s and 1990s has reversed, and we now represent a third of a million allotment holders. The average size allotment is the 10 pole plot – 300 sq yards.”

See complete Guardian article here.

Photo: Jac Smit standing in blue shirt on far left. (photo taken in New York, 2001, at a meeting of the Support Group For Urban Agriculture. Beside Jac standing, Luc Mougeot IDRC, Yves Cabanne UNCHS/UNDP, Gordon Prain CGIAR, sitting l to r, Michael Levenston City Farmer, Olivia Argenti FAO.

Jac Smit is one of the world’s leading thinkers on the subject of urban agriculture. His seminal book “Urban Agriculture: Food, Jobs and Sustainable Cities” is a classic.

The Climate-Neutral Post-Carbon City
May 30 2008

A decade ago, late 1990s, we engaged in the establishment of the urban agriculture industry. A visit to Google tomorrow will find 1,740,000 entries. It was then targeted at food security and building community. Since then we have added farming the city as an economic generator and as an element of Urban Greening.

The next step is to add carbon farming as a core or foundational element of this industry. Another turn of phrase, we are adding a core commodity to those we are familiar with such as vegetables, poultry, herbs, fruit and flowers.

The fourth IPCC report on climate change has convinced the world’s governments and corporations that our urban civilization needs urgently to reduce our generation of greenhouse gases. There is a plethora of responses already being applied.

Carbon farming is in its infancy. Basically it refers to establishing as a commodity carbon in the soil. The carbon farmer will be paid for each milliliter of carbon [CO2] taken from the air and placed in the soil. This may be a bit easier than raising raspberries. It will also be a bit more difficult to measure the product [it's not by the quart].

Many studies have been done since the 1980s of how much different plants return carbon to the soil under a variety of climate conditions. The establishment of a carbon commodity marketplace is, to my knowledge, not yet complete.

The establishment of methods of carbon farming is underway but, to my knowledge, has not yet been applied to the urban/metropolitan sphere.

Conceptually if I choose to take carbon from the atmosphere and transfer it to the soil, I will be looking for green leaves and rich organic soil. Root characteristics will be significant also. I will be considering a mix of deep and shallow roots with lots of hairy rootlings. Obviously I will prefer moist soil to dry. A warm climate will be preferable to chilly.

The environmental and climate characteristics of the global metropolitan landscape at a quick glance may be particularly well suited to carbon farming. Our cities are commonly located on well watered good soils. With the heat island effect urban space is warmer.

An optimistic outlook sees the possibility of municipalities, districts, states and nations setting up markets to encourage the start-up of this new agricultural industry. Measuring the carbon in soil is well established. Measuring it in the air is equally so. To apply it square meter by square meter and acre by acre on a season by season basis will take a little time.

Let’s speculate about a small urban farmer. She is targeting both the food and ornamental markets [vegetable, micro-livestock and potted flowers]. If she can gear up to be paid on a regular basis for her
carbon sequestering, she will have a base cash flow. She will then select her crops partially based on their government certified carbon return capacity and the seasonal measurement of her soil’s carbon content.

So, she might chose to grow a root and vine and shrub crop mixture rather than only one of them; thereby creating a diverse roots and foliage capacity.

This may be not only low risk but generate a reduction in risk.

The other side of the urban carbon farming inquiry; is there a benefit in carbon farming where we live rather than where we do not live?

1. Our urban areas are where we generate the most greenhouse gases.

2. Our urban areas are where the greenhouse gases have the most negative health impacts.

3. Cleaning the air in our urban areas has more positive impacts than doing so in rural areas in our quality of life.

4. Urban areas will return a better return per square meter in carbon farming than in rural areas in the same climate zone.

5. Our urban areas are loaded with idle land well adapted to carbon farming.

Overall it can be read as a slam dunk or no-brainer. Of course we have to do it! It is the natural next sequel in the urban agriculture adventure.

City Farmer publishes “From the Desk of Jac Smit” here.

Contact Jac Smit: URBANAG2@cs.com

Jac Smit bio

Jac Smit grew up on the edge of town. At age 20 he had worked in five branches of agriculture. He took a junior college degree with a concentration in ornamental horticulture. After a short successful entrepreneurial venture as a landscape designer he was accepted in the Harvard Graduate School of Design and graduated as president of the Harvard Organization of Student Planners.

As the senior Ford Foundation planning advisor to the Calcutta Metropolitan Planning Authority he generated an urban agriculture plan for the new port of Haldia and established a self-help urban agriculture project for East Pakistani refugees.

During the next 20 years Jac consulted in half a dozen countries in South Asia, East Africa and the Middle East. He was project manger and chief planner for the largest regional planning projects in each of these regions. All urban regional projects that Jac directed had urban agriculture as a significant component.

In 1991 he was contracted by UNDP and the World Bank to carry out a global survey of urban agriculture which foundationed his best-selling book Urban Agriculture: Food, Jobs and Sustainable Cities, which was launched at the Habitat II Summit in 1996.

In 1992 Jac was the senior founder of The Urban Agriculture Network. This small not-for-profit service organization has the world’s largest urban agriculture library. It is a founding member of the global Support Group for Urban Agriculture [SGUA] and [RUAF] Resource Center for Urban Agriculture and Forestry which has eight information centers on all five continents.

Food gardening is back in fashion and Michael Pollan brings it to a new audience … readers of the New York Times. Read his well-written article especially the concluding five paragraphs about urban agriculture.

THE WAY WE LIVE NOW – Why Bother?
By MICHAEL POLLAN
Published: April 20, 2008
Photo credit: Alia Malley

“A great many things happen when you plant a vegetable garden, some of them directly related to climate change, others indirect but related nevertheless. Growing food, we forget, comprises the original solar technology: calories produced by means of photosynthesis. Years ago the cheap-energy mind discovered that more food could be produced with less effort by replacing sunlight with fossil-fuel fertilizers and pesticides, with a result that the typical calorie of food energy in your diet now requires about 10 calories of fossil-fuel energy to produce. It’s estimated that the way we feed ourselves (or rather, allow ourselves to be fed) accounts for about a fifth of the greenhouse gas for which each of us is responsible.”

“But there are sweeter reasons to plant that garden, to bother. At least in this one corner of your yard and life, you will have begun to heal the split between what you think and what you do, to commingle your identities as consumer and producer and citizen. Chances are, your garden will re-engage you with your neighbors, for you will have produce to give away and the need to borrow their tools. You will have reduced the power of the cheap-energy mind by personally overcoming its most debilitating weakness: its helplessness and the fact that it can’t do much of anything that doesn’t involve division or subtraction. The garden’s season-long transit from seed to ripe fruit — will you get a load of that zucchini?! — suggests that the operations of addition and multiplication still obtain, that the abundance of nature is not exhausted. The single greatest lesson the garden teaches is that our relationship to the planet need not be zero-sum, and that as long as the sun still shines and people still can plan and plant, think and do, we can, if we bother to try, find ways to provide for ourselves without diminishing the world.”

Complete article here.