Seattle is a green city. It is, after all, the Emerald City. And by green, we mean striving to tread ever more lightly to survive in style on our only space ship earth.
America is #1 in many areas. We are #1 in water consumption per capita, #1 in municipal waste production per capita. We have huge numbers of office buildings and they are not as energy efficient as they can be. If you look at those office buildings, you can run the heating and air conditioning very inexpensively if you try just a little bit. Same for lighting.
We are not trying hard enough. And every new building we build is going to be around for many, many years.
Seattle has a new entrant for doing the right thing, on the border of South Capitol Hill and the Central District, in the Bullitt Center building.
The Bullitt Center is a medium size office building with a solar panel roof that also catches rainwater and stores it. It is one of a few handfuls of buildings in the world striving for certification by the Living Building Institute.
The Living Building Institute is today's leading certification standard for building sustainability. They are more rigorous than the LEED certification of the Green Building Council.
Think about a flower. That plant gathers energy from the sun. It gathers water that falls in its immediate area. It relates to the land and environment surrounding it. It is beautiful and gives us pleasure. Flowers are as good as it gets.
The Living Building Institute measures buildings against that standard - site integration, water & energy use, health, use-reuse of materials, equity and beauty. The certification is tough, buildings have to operate for a year to prove themselves. The Bullitt Center just opened, so check back in a year, but visit now.
The Bullitt Center offers tours, booked in advance and free. http://bullittcenter.org/news/blog/tours-at-the-bullitt-center. They also have a display in the lobby open normal business hours.
You can learn about the philosophy of living buildings and ways to meet that challenge. If you like, and especially if you would like our little space ship earth to keep us thriving, apply those ideas to your home, or office.
The Bullitt Center is a beautiful office building that people interested in design and architecture can visit for up-to-date inspiration on sustainability in the built environment.
As good as it gets. read more