Week 7 Observations

On March 3rd, we toured the LEED Platinum certified, Energy Efficient building for a Green Earth--the Business Instructional Facility--on 6th and Gregory, and we got to take a closer look at what the certifications and gobbledygook actually mean.

We began in the main atrium, an open space flanked on three sides by the multiple levels of the building and on the east side by a wall made entirely of windows.  The roof is shaped with a large curve, which overhangs the window wall by twenty feet or so.  Our first look into "sustainability" began there, as we learned the large windows are used to bathe the atrium in natural light, and also to use the sun to aid in the heating of the area.  In the large, curved roof we also noticed what seemed to be tubes across its entire surface, which we learned aid in the circulation of air throughout the atrium.

As we progressed through the building, we discussed the concept of embedded energy, or the total energy required to extract, transport, and manufacture certain materials.  In the context of the building, there were materials with very low embedded energy such as the wood railings or concrete used during construction; however, there were also materials with high embedded energy, such as the exotic wood floors in the atrium or aluminum used throughout the building.  We slowly began to learn that LEED certification is less about "going green" and more about marketing.

From the atrium we progressed to BIF's two adjacent wings to get a closer look at the roof top gardens and solar panels.  The roof top gardens featured shallow soil and many grassy plants whose roots helped to filter rainwater that made its way to the roof.  Unfortunately, due to the size of these gardens, we didn't earn a point towards certification.  The solar panels, on the other hand, did earn us the handy dandy LEED point, but proved to be no more useful than the roof top gardens.  As we saw them, they were covered in snow, which unfortunately prevented any measurable amount of energy from being delivered to the grid.

So, for all the grandeur of this certification or that certification and the green campaigns, many of the things that supposedly make BIF a sustainable building are all for show.  Oh well.

On the 5th of March, we went to XPO, the architecture career fair, and I got a chance to speak to Raths, Raths, and Johnson, which, as I learned was a bit different from most architecture firms.  In my brief interview with the recruiters, I learned that they don't actually design the buildings, and deal mainly with forensics and figuring out what went wrong with existing structures.  RRJ has experts in a wide variety of areas pertaining to the actual construction of the building, and when there are mishaps with construction, these experts try to pinpoint what the issue it.

Once they have determined what the issues are, RRJ assists and oversees the repair of these issues, so they mainly clean up the mess that the original builders and architects created.  I learned that they have a large contingent of engineers in addition to architects, which got me a little excited, but then I also learned that they only take structural engineers, which made me a little sad again.  It was still interesting to learn about another realm of architecture that I didn't know existed.