What’s the Deal With Big Green Homes?
Source: EcoManor.comFirst, you have the National Association of Home Builders sponsoring a 4,700+ sf urban loft home, the 2007 New American Home, for their annual International Builders Show in Orlando, Florida. The New American Home is certified green by the Florida Green Building Coalition and uses 73% less energy for heating and cooling and 54% less energy for water heating, compared to a comparable house in a similar climate. Did I mention it's 4,700+ sf with a 576 sf, unattached two-car garage and loft? Occupancy = 3 in America, 13 in Japan.
Second, you have Ted Turner's daughter, Laura Turner Seydel, and her husband, Rutherford Seydel, who just received LEED certification for what appears to be the largest LEED home in the world. 6,000+ sf. Laura sits on the board of more than a dozen non-profit, environmental organizations, and Rutherford is an environmental attorney. Must be green. Rutherford is using his green, lawyer cred to lobby the USGBC to be more lenient with bigger homes saying, "People who can afford to build stately homes tend to adopt revolutionary technologies early. These are the people who can make a huge impact." Environmental impact, that is. The LEED system favors smaller homes, so the rich that live large think the system is designed against them.
To Laura and Rutherford's credit, their big, LEED-certified home, also known as EcoManor, is pretty incredible: rainwater reclamation; geothermal system; low-flow, dual-flush toilets; drought tolerant lawn; formaldehyde-free wheat-board doors; sustainable and reclaimed wood floors; cellulose and soy-based foam attic insulation; electronic energy-usage monitoring; hemp pillows and jute draperies; 27 solar panels and extensive use of the solar tube for natural lighting; and low-VOC paints, varnishes, and sealants.
So the argument goes, if you're going to go big, you might as well go green in the process. The 2007 New American Home and EcoManor both have the trademarks of green homes. They both have that certified piece of paper, too. But here's the thing. That big home may use a lot less energy and water than similar-sized monster homes, or a non-green 2,000 sf home for that matter, but it is not a responsible endeavor. Think about all the materials that went into such a behemoth. In many ways, big homes represent the unsustainability of gross commercialization and over-consumption. Good old fashioned American waste. If you're the Cheaper by the Dozen family, a big house might be necessary. Otherwise, big does not equal green.
According to the National Association of Home Builders, the average size of the American home has more than doubled since 1950. Average size is 2,414 sf. EcoManor is about 2.5 times bigger than the average American home. Let's make sure to standardize big green homes such as EcoManor so in about 2050, we can say we quadrupled the average size of the American home.
See also:
EcoManor: A Certifiably Green, Eco-Friendly Mansion [Fortune]
2007 New American Home Goes Green in a Big Way [Jetson Green]
Tags: Conservation, Energy Conservation, Environment, Frugal Living, geothermal, green building, LEED, NAHB, Renewable Power, Solar, solar power, Water Reclamation
- Uncategorized
March 22nd, 2007 at 8:02 pm
I am soooooooooo right there with you, Preston! I love the idea of designing eco-friendly homes with new technologies that actually add convenience to our lives AND are nice to the environment. "Speed is irrelevant if you're going in the wrong direction" I forget who said that, but I agree! I think the people who build these huge "eco-friendly" homes are just missing the point. Why have a house with 8 more rooms than you can be in? And don't get me started on bathrooms! This is definitly a topic that needs to be discussed, because the majority of green homes that are being featured in magazines and displayed for the public at large are these big homes. It sends a mixed message and is definitly not the right direction. It's like making an electric Hummer and passing it off as green. It's kind of obvious, isn't it?
March 22nd, 2007 at 8:40 pm
Building a big “green” mansion is like making yourself not feel so bad while you splurge–it’s being popular with the green crowds without losing your status with the wealthy. Yeah, missing the point completely, but I guess it’s better than nothing?
March 22nd, 2007 at 9:55 pm
Well… I guess it’s better than a huge non-green house but definitely not the right idea.
It seems like a lot of people who talk green still want to live the consumerist lifestyle, with some green concessions to feel good. Most of us probably do it to some degree, but it’s hard seeing it in the people who are theoretically setting the example.
March 23rd, 2007 at 12:56 am
Clearly it’s a house that’s meant to be shown off. The website — whose regular house, no matter how extravagant, has a website? — has all these sponsoring companies with logos and links at the bottoms of a lot of the pages. Obviously they’re looking to sell their appliances and insulation and flooring and stuff.
The first step for people, including the super-rich, ought to be doing away with your totally gratuitous extra consumption, and then to decide what you like but can live without, but for some people, I think it’s useful to have proved the point that luxury and greenery don’t have to be in conflict.
March 23rd, 2007 at 4:19 am
OK, so I'm going to defend Big Ass Green Houses.
As long as there are rich people, there will be Big Ass Houses. Shouldn't those Big Ass Houses be Green?
The average American lives what, 150X better than people in slum towns in developing countries? The average American with their average 2,000-ish two car garage that takes up 500x as many resources as the slum livin' shanty house. It's all a matter of perspective, glass houses and all.
Beyond creating a law restricting the square footage of a house (which is completely ridiculous), what do you all propose people who want Big Ass Houses do?
It's easy to rip on rich people, but I for one applaud people like Laura Turner Seydel for showing square-footage-hungry cash-flush folks that they can build their dream palace without totally raping the earth.
I say, if it's Green, go as Big as you can and want.
For the record, The GO Home will be right around 2,000 square feet.
Shea Gunther
Publisher & Director of Marketing @ Green Options
shea@greenoptions.com
March 23rd, 2007 at 5:39 am
Lots of responses…this is good debate and conversation. Shea seems to take the classic position enunciated in my paragraph 4 "if you're going to go big, you might as well go green in the process." I understand that position.
Is the problem one of excess? I'm not an advocate for regulating house sizes. It's not going to happen and it shouldn't. And I'm not advocating for some type of sharing of wealth either. The blog post above is misunderstood if it's perceived to be an attack on the rich. Rich people are cool. I plan to be one, too, but that's beside the point. What we have here with the Seydels is extravagant, ostensible, excessive living. BUT everyone has their prerogative.
The issue here is that they had a hard time with the LEED folks because bigger houses have a tougher time getting certified. Why? Because bigger houses aren't green. Big a** houses have badges of greenness, but they lack the true soul of green. So what do they do? They're trying to get the system changed to conform to their ideals of green. Change the definition and have the world come to you.
In the end, you gotta do what you feel is right and what's consistent with your own values. That's what drives the USA. That and some good ole' fashioned generosity. Not forced allocations.
PDK
Lame Duck Blogger @ Green Options
jetsongreen@yahoo.com
March 23rd, 2007 at 6:06 am
This is a great post!
I didn't mean to infer that you were ripping on rich people Preston, just that's where a lot of the anti-big-ass-house arguments sometimes stray to.
Here's a hypothetical: Rich Guy A wants to build a Big Ass Green Home. He hires William McDonough + Partners to construct a 100% Cradle to Cradle green home. It's energy neutral, uses natural materials from the land it's built on, uses water wisely, and does all the other "right things" to be green, but it just so happens to be 5,000 square feet.
Is that not ok? If not, how about 4,000? 3,000? What's the cutoff? What about if his 5,000 square foot house is better for the environment than your 2,000 conventional house? What if he and his wife both work in the house? What if he also has a few other family members and staff living there as well? Where is the line? Who decides what qualifies as the "Soul of Green"?
Shea Gunther
Publisher & Director of Marketing @ Green Options
shea@greenoptions.com
March 23rd, 2007 at 1:26 pm
The early adopters, of any technology, the ones who bring it down in cost, like it or not, are typically the upper classes.
Airbags, cell phones, solar power, geothermal ground loops, whatever it is, you need to pitch it to the rich first, and they need to invest in the systems or it doesn’t become low enough in cost to become a mass market item. High profile green projects also attract the builders to the marketplace.
Don’t complain too much about big ego-green green homes, but do give credit for smaller, more durable footprints. Besides, if the public see their idols going green, maybe they will too. It is hard enough just to get regular people to upgrade to a better water heater.
March 23rd, 2007 at 8:37 pm
Because of the costs of other materials used in these more opulent homes, it is easier to absorb the incremental up-front costs associated with their greener choices because in these cases, it isn’t that much more. And most of these choices are being made because they are cost savings measures for the owners.
People who build big-box houses aren’t stupid (generally); they are smart with their money, and they are willing to invest in things that will make money for them or lower their costs in the long run. Look at Preston’s list of the features in the EcoManor and see how many of them contribute to lowering utility costs; it’s well over half.
The problem (to argue with Shea for a minute) is that green choices become perceived as unaffordable upgrades, rather than essentials of good building (which is what they really need to become). People who want to build moderate homes can’t find good examples, and the perception that green costs more continues to be propagated.
There’s also an issue of not meeting the spirit of conserving resources because these are still large, opulent houses. As Preston said, these houses “represent the unsustainability of gross commercialization and over-consumption.”
It’s entirely possible, to extend Shea’s hypothetical, that Rich Guy A originally intended to build a 10,000 square foot house, and, in the course of getting a green education, in addition to choosing all the green amenities that are listed, it got pared down to 5,000 square feet. But we don’t know that.
Building smaller, and using fewer resources is another part of a green philosophy. I think there ought to be a square footage cutoff for LEED for homes, after which, you would instead have to go through full-blown, commercial LEED in order to get certification, but that’s just my personal opinion.
June 26th, 2007 at 6:55 pm
I’m posting this months after the original post, but I hope it will be picked up by intereated folks. The first Platinum LEED rating in Canada has been given to an attached townhouse in the center of Montreal. Buses pass every 5 to 10 minutes from 5 a.m.to 1 a.m. and the house is in walking distance of downtown Montreal, parks, shopping and everything else the urban experience offers. For more info see my blog today: http://marysoderstrom.blogspot.com
It maybe easier to build “green” in the country, but the best way to make an enviornmental statement is to build (or renovate) green in a dense urban context. That’s what’s going to make a real change in our impact on the world.