What's a 'living building'?

Imagine a home in Kelowna that sustains itself and the people in it using the environment around it.  That creates clean air and water onsite and takes advantage of every natural element from the power of sunshine to the equality of any onsite ecosystems. All this while living in harmony with all that's surrounding you.

"The Living Building Challenge™ is the built environment's most rigorous environmental performance standard. It calls for the creation of homes and buildings that operate as cleanly, beautifully, and efficiently as possible."  Woah... that's a mouthful but it can be done!

Consider the Bertschi Primary School in Seattle, WA. When planning this building, project managers  incorporated the Living Building Challenge and 8 separate items (or "petals"... part of the LBC lingo) were considered.

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  Photo: Contributed
  Site. A previously a paved sport court, the concrete was re-cycled. The school's outdoor living space includes an outdoor student learning center, 2 garden areas that provide different examples of urban agriculture.
• Water.  Onsite water is harvested from 3 major areas. Rainwater, green roof stormwater, and greywater.
• Energy.  Solar panels provide heating, lighting, and plug loads and equipment.
• Health.  From the very start, those working on the Bertschi School put their student's overall health at the top of their "wish" list. Find out  here how they did that.
• Materials.  Finding natural, non toxic, and appropriately sourced materials is considered the most difficult part of the Living Building Challenge™
• Equity.  Supporting a just, equitable world.  This item or petal deals with creating more community.
• Beauty.  Although beauty is subjective, the goal here is create meaningful design using aesthetically pleasing natural elements.
• Process.  The Living Building Challenge requires some creativity from start to finish.  Financing, City zoning, Government, and the general public can all be hurdles to overcome.  More and more people are learning about sustainability and are interested in working together to make our planet greener.

The Center of Excellence in Penticton's Okanagan College was designed to the standards of the Living Building Challenge™.

Photo: Contributed

This amazing project has  features that include triple glazed argon filled windows and curtain walls for optimum energy conservation, a shading and ventilating louver system that reduces glare and overheating in the summer while providing solar gain in the winter, photovoltaic or PV solar panels that harvest sun and convert to electricity, and a green roof planted with local plants to attract local habitat and fauna.

My last three columns dealt with how everyone can green up their Kelowna real estate in all kinds of different, affordable and often easy ways.  Watch for our upcoming Green Housing Symposium hosted by Cascadia this summer! All the people you need to talk to about your home and sustainability growth in one spot.

For more information on Cascadia in Kelowna or if you are thinking of buyer or selling real estate call me, Paige Guernsey, on my direct line at 250-862-6464. I'm an award winning Kelowna Realtor® whose hooked on GREEN!

Talk to you soon...

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.