Green buildings are designed and constructed to conserve precious natural resources, reduce energy use, and enhance indoor environmental quality. This overview offers beginner answers such as “What is a green building?”.
Green buildings are designed with several key considerations in mind: energy use, water consumption, material selection and indoor air quality.
Energy Efficiency
Pro: Green buildings reduce energy costs by eliminating waste, conserving water resources and using sustainable materials that have low-emission rates – all which contribute to global warming. They also help mitigate any excess emissions of greenhouse gases which contribute to global warming.
Green buildings often rely on alternative fuels and renewable energy sources like solar panels and wind turbines for power, as well as heat pumps to provide heating and cooling. Cool roofs, natural ventilation and aligned windows to take advantage of sunlight are additional energy efficiency measures taken into account in green building design.
One challenge of using renewable resources as energy may not offer full control of building temperatures, leading to discomfort for occupants in green buildings. According to research studies, green building occupants report lower satisfaction with thermal quality, ventilation and acoustics than their conventional building counterparts. To combat this problem effectively, life cycle analysis (LCA) should be performed. This form of examination incorporates all environmental impacts resulting from extraction, production, transportation, use repair disposal.
Water Efficiency
Green buildings conserve water using sustainable systems that use non-potable water for cooling purposes and low-flow fixtures and toilets; rainwater can even be harvested and reused as irrigation water; additionally, drought-tolerant plants in landscaping reduce the need for additional irrigation.
Green building also involves using materials with reduced environmental impacts, often from recycled or biodegradable sources. Furthermore, this movement has seen the transition away from prescriptive design approaches toward more scientific evaluation of actual performance through Life Cycle Assessment (LCA).
Other greening practices involve minimizing carbon, energy and water use while simultaneously minimizing waste with high-performance insulation, lighting, heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC) measures and ENERGY STAR appliances and equipment. Renewable sources, on-site solar power generation technologies as well as electricity consumption control technologies may also help decrease fossil fuel reliance.
Materials
Green construction involves using recycled and biodegradable materials, which often have lower carbon footprints.
Many green buildings are turning to solar panels for renewable energy generation, cutting back on fossil fuel use and associated CO2 emissions while simultaneously using it for heating and cooling needs.
Wood is a green building material of choice when harvested from forests managed in an eco-friendly fashion, while bamboo grows quickly while sequestering carbon into its underground infrastructure.
Insulated Concrete Forms (ICFs) are a green construction material with immense potential. Constructed as hollow blocks containing expanded polystyrene foam or polyurethane foam insulation material, ICFs create an effective thermal barrier, drastically cutting heating and cooling costs during installation.
Other eco-friendly building materials and methods include straw bale construction, aerated concrete, hempcrete, compressed earth block and compressed earth block mycelium structures – an intricate network of thin fungal filaments which connect together into strong structures over time.
Indoor Air Quality
Green building practices often include indoor environmental quality (IEQ) in the form of air filtration systems to ensure optimal indoor environmental quality (IEQ). IEQ refers to the quality of air within a building and plays an essential role in maintaining occupant health – especially among those suffering from respiratory disorders like asthma or allergies.
Improved indoor air quality (IAQ) can be achieved by limiting the pollutants entering a building, restricting conditions that promote contamination, and eliminating or removing present pollutants. Microorganisms, mold spores and pet dander are biological pollutants which may cause allergic reactions, infections or chronic illness, while chemical pollutants such as VOCs may contribute to chronic illnesses in some individuals.
Ventilation systems in green buildings effectively exchange fresh outdoor air with stale indoor air, thus reducing pollutant concentrations and VOC paint and glue emissions. Furthermore, low VOC paint and glue helps further mitigate VOCs that contain hazardous chemicals; and water efficiency strategies like xeriscaping and permeable roofing channels moisture away from buildings to avoid condensation levels that promote mold growth.