Energy Commitments for Green Schools
Oct 1, 2011 12:00 PM, By Yanel de Angel
A study for carbon neutrality: the impact of decisions, design and energy.
This communal space, known as a “four-season porch,” is an opportunity to expose materials in a didactic way.
Transforming decisionmaking processes regarding energy efficiency can affect the design of an education building. Many academic institutions have committed to adopt sustainable practices that both save energy and use material resources more wisely.
Many factors affect the carbon dioxide (CO2) footprint of a building, and several steps and considerations are required during the design, construction and life cycle of a building to achieve carbon neutrality. A carbon-neutral building is focused primarily on low operational energy use and the embodied energy of the building materials. As such, a carbon-neutral building must mitigate the carbon emissions released in the materials’ fabrication, construction and continued operations of the building by generating more energy than it consumes over its life span through renewable resources. It is important to realize that carbon neutrality is not achieved the day the building opens; it is achieved over the life of the building.
Paradigm shift
The latest design approach recommends a paradigm shift in which the top decision drivers no longer are simply "reduce, reuse and recycle," but are encompassed by larger planning concepts. These concepts are represented in an inverted pyramid diagram that illustrates decisionmaking based on the constant assessment and measurement of the CO2 consequences, shown in Figure 1.
The greatest potential impact on a building’s carbon emissions and energy load is in the optimization phase at the top of the diagram. The decisions made in this phase are critical—they set the framework for the design team and will influence the decisions made in each subsequent phase. For example, the less carbon emissions resulting from decisions made in the first three phases, the less energy must then be offset in the fourth phase. As the inverted pyramid narrows, the interventions become less impactful and more costly. It is therefore essential that careful assessment precedes each decision throughout the design process.
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