Episode One: Breaking Ground

Welcome to Building Green!

Join host Kevin Contreras over the next 13 episodes, as he builds his green dream home in Santa Barbara, CA. Follow along as Kevin learns about straw bale walls, recycled sheep barn flooring, blue jean insulation, solar panels and all manner of green building technologies, both ancient and modern.

The Way Things Used To Be...

"I've been building and remodeling for 20 years. Over the last several years I have been sickened by the waste of natural resources and the amount of toxic materials used in our traditional building materials." — Building Green Host Kevin Contreras

Did you know that the air inside your home can be five times more toxic than the air pollution found in most major cities? Carpets, vinyl floors, adhesives and other common construction materials can off gas, introducing harmful chemicals into the air in your home.

A Better Way to Build It

David Arkin, a respected green architect, presents his five main goals of ecological design:

1. Harmonize with the site. 2. Build as little as possible. 3. Buildings should heat and cool themselves and generate their own electricity. 4. Maximize resource efficiency. 5. Ecological design can be beautiful, and mainstream.

Bill Browning, a green building consultant, has led innovative design and development efforts for clients like the 2000 Sydney Olympics and LucasFilm. Browning puts green building in its cultural context, explaining that green building is about more than architecture and materials; it's about a different way of thinking about how we live and work. Research shows that work places with daylight and good indoor air quality make for healthier and happier employees. Retail sales are 40% higher in daylit stores, and students in daylit schools progress 20-26% faster on test scores. It’s about improving environmental performance and making better places for people.

Veteran green builder Dennis Allen explains to Kevin that today we really have no choice but to go green. "We're getting more and more clients coming to us saying, 'You know, I just don't feel right in my house.'"

Green Is Affordable

In Kevin's experience, a common misconception among homeowners is that going green is unaffordable. In truth, costs are coming down for a lot of green materials, and some are now less expensive than the standard stuff we've been using for years. "For example," says Kevin, "gravel driveways are half as expensive as concrete. They use far less embodied energy to produce. The less embodied energy used to produce a building material, the greener it is."

Green Is Beautiful

Another inaccurate assumption about building green is that you will have to give up style and comfort to live in an eco-friendly home. As Kevin learns from Ellen Strickland, the owner of the California retail store Living Green, you don't even have to compromise. Ellen's store specializes in chic, ecologically conscious products from furniture, bedding and wall coverings to interior paints and cleaning solutions. She says, "What a lot of people in the industry are trying to do is show that in fact you can find things that are just as fantastic or innovative in the design and aesthetic appeal."

Inside the Design

Kevin discusses his new home with his father, a longtime home builder. Kevin explains a number of green solutions for lighting, plumbing, greywater systems, and many green choices for appliances, such as a Kevin favorite, the solar oven. Kevin will be exploring more about all of these in future episodes.

Easy Green Step

Kevin shares an easy green step that you can do in one afternoon: Get rid of toxic chemicals. Go out to the garage, look under your kitchen sink, and anywhere else you might have household chemicals stored. Paints, pesticides, motor oils, and all other hazardous household wastes need to be completely and responsibly used, recycled, and/or kept out of landfills and water tables. Look into your community’s hazardous waste collection center, and safely dispose of your chemicals.

Green Is... Good for You

For advice on how to make health-positive choices in planning his new home, Kevin turns to healthy building expert Alyssa Alvord. Alyssa brought herself back to health from a devastating illness brought on by environmental poisoning. She and her husband, John, then started Environmental Depot, a store that makes it easier for both contractors and homeowners to buy non-toxic building materials. According to Alyssa, more and more traditional builders are starting to incorporate "small amounts of healthy building and green building techniques and products into what they're doing."

Getting Started

Kevin talks with his foreman, Michael Gordon, about the importance of planning; because in green building, it's even more important to have everything prepared ahead of time. Kevin then discusses site placement. Site placement, especially in terms of orientation to the sun, can greatly affect a home's energy efficiency.

Kevin's building site, like many urban lots, incorporates a pre-existing structure, or "tear down." The desired approach is to recycle everything, ideally by donating the whole house to anyone willing to undertake the task of moving it. When this proves impractical, the new goal becomes architectural salvage, and many parts of the building are deconstructed and recycled. When the time finally comes to break ground, Kevin uses earth-moving equipment powered by clean-burning biodiesel. According to Abe Powell of SolForce, "Biodiesel is an American-made, biodegradable, sustainable, non-toxic fuel. Biodiesel can be made from a variety of feedstocks including restaurant waste, animal fats and virgin oils like soybean oil." Compared to conventional fuels, biodiesel reduces carcinogenic air toxins by 90%.

Soil preservation during construction is also important. Green landscape architect Gordon Hopkins visits Kevin's home site to recommend techniques for preserving topsoil and native plants.

Next week on Building Green: In with the foundation and up with the framing.