 "Photo: Richard Payson")
The U could become more famous for its green than its red.
The College of Architecture and Planning’s new environmental sustainability plans are intended to make both state and national history. With the support of Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker, the college is investigating the possibility of renovating the 40-year-old Architecture Building to have it become the nation’s first institutional facility to meet “net-zero” standards.
Net-zero state of operations implies that a facility produces as much energy as it consumes, effectively eliminating its carbon footprint.
The college, in conjunction with the mayor’s office, held a press conference in the Architecture Building on Monday to spread the word about the project. Becker, as well as Brenda Scheer, the dean of architecture and planning, spoke in support of the program and its potential groundbreaking effects. The press conference was a preview to build up momentum toward the Salt Lake Sustainable Building Conference on April 8, in which college representatives will present the historical project’s benefits and how other buildings should follow suit.
“It really means that in terms of the carbon footprint, we achieve equilibrium,” Becker said. “For Salt Lake City, this is a terrific model for what we need to be doing with our older buildings. These older buildings are an important part of the fabric of this city. What we can learn from the college of architecture and what they’re doing...is really is going to serve us well for a lot of city buildings we have as we go forth.”
The hope of the college is to upgrade the energy-saving ability of the architecture facilities and to ultimately phase in ways to produce enough of its own energy to be removed from the campus’ energy grid.
“We must reduce the energy used in this building by 80 percent,” Scheer said. Plans for reducing the energy expenditures include revamping internal aspects of the building such as the air duct structures, lighting and installing energy-monitoring systems. Potential plans also include applying barriers to the outside of building to increase insulation.
“Once we have reduced our energy needs, we will then need to generate from renewable sources the remaining power that we will need,” Scheer said.
What those energy sources will be and the timetable for completion remain the largest questions of the proposal.
“Right now we’re trying to get grants so we can start doing this,” said Jen Lindley, a graduate student in the college and an active participant in the sustainability efforts. “We need to calculate how much energy we’re actually using before we can even start to do anything. They’ve done some energy studies, but as far as completion, that’s several years away.”
As for potential ideas for energy creation, Lindley seems optimistic.
“There has been a lot of talk,” she said. “There have been some crazy ideas. We’ve talked about underground geothermal production, wind turbines and solar panels. If it takes a few years, that’s OK. We’re going to work towards it every day.”
Lindley’s efforts are mirrored by other students in the college. Cortland Wilson, also a graduate student, said she was excited about the project.
“It seems like it’s moving more and more forward every day,” he said. “It’s a great project here at the U that we can be actively involved with.”
Projects such as the one Scheer envisions are beginning to give the U national attention for its ecological sustainability. Greenreportcard.org, a website that grades the “greenness” of 332 colleges and universities in the United States and Canada, has awarded the U a “B” grade for its green practices for each of the past two years. BYU, by comparison, received grades of “F” and “D-” for 2009 and 2010, respectively. The grades are determined from surveys completed by each school and submitted to the website.
The U’s Office of Sustainability is largely responsible for such high marks. An overhauled recycling program, water conservation efforts, energy-retrofitting projects and the purchase of clean energy shares—wind power—have greatly improved the campus’ sustainability practices. According to the office’s website, annual water consumption has dropped nearly 15 percent—156 million gallons—in the past five years, and statistics taken from www.recyclemania.com, a website devoted to tracking the recycling practices of more than 600 colleges and universities, shows that the U recycled more than 215,000 pounds of material during a 10-week sample period in early 2010.
The overhaul of the architecture building, though based in environmental sustainability, has a much deeper significance to Scheer than just “going green.”
“This project is truly about so much more than physical renovation,” she said. “It is our obligation to train the next generation of students. This project is meant to be an example, so that others can learn from our bold efforts and our experience.”
Video outlining further details of the net-zero project can be found online at www.arch.utah.edu/?netzero.
j.lowe@chronicle.utah.edu
1 comments
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