Should Decatur Implement “Green Building Requirements” For New Construction?
Decatur Metro | August 23, 2011Decatur Environmental Sustainability Board Member KC Boyce recently asked about question facing his Board on Twitter…
#DecaturGA is working on ordinance updates (for 2012-13). What do you think about #green building requirements for new development?
From a look at the Sustainability Board’s agenda over the past couple months, it looks like this has been an ongoing conversation about whether the ESB should pursue an interim policy for consideration by the City Commission.
As for the other question that Mr. Boyce raised on Twitter a couple of months ago, “Should #DecaturGA ban or tax plastic bags and/or disposable take-out containers?”, and a subsequent Board survey, the Board’s meeting minutes it sounds like they’ve decided to pursue an educational campaign to reduce plastic and other non-reusable bags instead of an outright ban.
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no
No.
#no
DM – thanks for the post (and thanks to all of the commenters on these questions). I do think, though, that my wife might take umbrage at being called a “Broad”. #funnytypos
Ha! My apologies to your wife KC! Can you provide any more detail on what sort of codes might be required if this were to be implemented? I think folks would like to hear some specifics.
It’s still very open at this point. The City has already put in place an incentive for green building in 2010 (see http://www.decaturga.com/Modules/ShowDocument.aspx?documentid=149) whereby planning staff expedite permitting for projects that are LEED, EarthCraft, or EnergyStar certified.
There are any number of forms a “green building ordinance” could take. Just as context, the 2009 international building code that the state recently adopted and the 2012 building code that will be adopted in a couple of years are actually pretty good from an energy-efficiency standpoint (requiring tight building envelopes, efficient windows, etc.). So anything Decatur did would be over and above that.
Examples of changes that could be made to enable more sustainable building practices include:
– Reducing the minimum square footage requirement from the current 1500 sf as recently discussed on DM
– Allowing more flexibility in the installation of grey water or rainwater reuse systems
Examples of changes that could be made to require more sustainable building practices include:
– Requiring some sort of third-party green building certification (e.g., LEED, EarthCraft, etc.); this could be for all new building or, alternately, for buildings over a certain number of square feet as Dunwoody has done
– Writing either prescriptive (e.g., minimum R-factor for insulation) or performance-based (e.g., building envelope tightness) requirements that are tighter than the state-adopted building code into the Decatur code
Any of these could be done as either requirements (stick) or incentives (carrot), the latter likely by expediting permitting and/or “feebate”.
To me, the key question is how we – as a community – improve the energy efficiency of our building stock over time in a way that doesn’t become overly restrictive to new development.
Thanks to all who have commented so far – keep the thoughts & comments coming!
Nope.
No It shouldn’t be required.
But if anything can be done to encourage green building, I would be in favor of that.
Is there anything in the code the discourages green building? Those parts should be altered to remove the impediment.
+1. If the community values green building, we should start by removing any barriers to doing it easily. Then, beyond that, we could find ways to incentivize it. But flat out requiring it sets a barrier which, in these municipally competitive times, works against us.
I believe it’s George here on DM who’s been known to say, “More carrot, less stick.”
This. 100%.
No, but it should be encouraged.
If I had more than a vague notion of what “Green Building Requirements” would or could entail, I would almost surely have an opinion. In general, I agree with the approach of encouraging rather than trying to dictate, when it comes to building ordinances (and ordinances pertaining to building). Besides, I’d like to see all available time, energy and expertise focused like lasers on straightening out the parts of the code we were discussing last week (or the week before?) — especially relating to setbacks, density, subdividing, etc. — before getting too involved with anything else.
Incentivize don’t Penalize
Many communities have incentive-based programs to promote green buildings. Here is a list of programs that have incentives for building LEED certified buildings: http://www.usgbc.org/ShowFile.aspx?DocumentID=2021
Remove restrictions on property owners – yes.
Spend money and/or create new requirements – no.
Green building practices that make economic sense will be adopted, those that don’t will not (or will be done voluntarily by individuals who choose to make decisions on something other than pure economics).
How much does it cost to have a single family residence project LEED certified?
Many municipal developments, such as libraries, police stations, fire stations, courthouses, are going for LEED certification. This usually results in site appropriate, if more expensive, design, which I favor.
Three easy steps:
Enable, Incent, Recognize
Nothing in this process should punish or restrict.
BTW, love hearing that gray water solutions are being considered. It kills me to empty the toddlers’ bathwater down the drain. What a waste. Seems like there should be products easily retrofitted to the crawl spaces so many of us have.
In general, no to “requirements,” yes to incentives.
That being said, maybe new public buildings should have certain green building requirements (the taxpayers are paying the energy bills for these buildings and will benefit from energy savings over a longer period of time than most homeowners). My guess is that the newest public buildings (Fire Station #2, Fifth Ave School) are already pretty green, but it can’t hurt to put something in writing.
Along the same line, maybe some light green requirements for office and multi-family since it effects more people.
“Light green”–I like that designation. That’s what my family is. We try to be green, but intentions being better than actions, we end up being light green.
I think we will miss out on something that will increase our competitive advantage if we do not adopt a more green building code. Here is a link to an article that states those codes are spreading:
http://www.sustainablecitynetwork.com/topic_channels/building_housing/article_b714eb0a-c870-11e0-bcf3-0019bb30f31a.html?utm_source=SCN+InBox+e-Newsletter&utm_campaign=e7466b60e7-Newsletter_8-17-2011_V
Green building codes should ideally be done on a statewide basis so as not to push development to less sustainable places (e.g., places farther out or less close to customers/workers). They are very unlikely to push jobs or people from one state to another, but might from one locality to another (although there is no evidence of this either at this point.
If mandatory requirements are put in, they might be delayed until the development market gets stronger.
To do nothing – as some suggest – is just irreponsible. We can’t keep building without regard to climage change. Also, we need to incentivize businesses, and ideally residents, to actually USE less energy. If we incentize folks to build LEED, but they keep the thermostat at 65, it does nothing. Atlanta businesses – especially restaurants – keep thermostats WAY TOO LOW. Take a trip oversees — or even up north — folks in other places don’t supercool their buildings.
No. It seems there’s just not enough known about the whole global warming deal yet to really start trying to place regulations on builders, particularly in an economic time when less regulations are needed in order to encourage businesses to spend money. As of now it is starting to seem like global warming may be a result of naturally occuring sun cycle activities rather than emissions.