Moore & Engstrom on green building codes

The more I read, the more I feel that my outline is insufficient and that my topic, even, is too restrictive (and that I'm rapidly running out of time). At this point, looking back, I must admit that writing this thesis has been a bit of a blind stumble through unfamiliar territory. Because only now have I found some actual critical literature about sustainable architecture itself! (And not just books about nature, environmentalism, economics, history, etc. or pretty coffee-table compilations of spectacular one-offs.)

At this point I'm also wrestling with the gradual realization that my thesis may well fail because it took me this long to get to a point that despite all the hard work I put in, I should have gotten to months ago..

But I will at least keep going.. and if my outline has to take a fourth beating, so be it...

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Anyway, I finally managed to get my hands on a book called "Sustainable Architectures: Cultures and Natures in North America." It is a collection of articles that contribute to the central idea that sustainable architecture is more a symphony of different discourses and understandings than a single unified ideology stemming from a well-defined practice. (Like I said, I should have reached this point in understanding much earlier, had I known what to read.)

Among these articles, I found one titled "The social construction of 'green building' codes" particularly insightful.

The authors use a categorical analysis of several building codes and standards in the US to argue that the idea of "green architecture" is comprised of not one but several competing, sometimes opposed ideologies stemming from local discourses. They further conclude that that these differing ideologies are not necessarily tied to the type of organization (government, NGO, industry) drafting the codes.

Good points/quotes:
- "Conflicting standards tend to frame problems and propose solutions in ways that define opposing 'goods.' All manufacturing standards are, in this view, socially constructed agreements that favour a particular set of actors because they contain the interests of the standard-makers." (52)

- The article also suggests that standardization is a sign of modernisation (read: cars, industrial processes, even going back to Le Corbu's interest in Greek temples...), so that the prevalence of green building codes today are a continuing relic of modernization. (Can use this to link LH's compliance to LEED with the interests of the Modernist school of thought) (52)

- Moore & Engstrom argue that sustainability can be viewed as the fusion of the (anthropocentric) public health and (ecocentric) environmental protection movement. Historically in America, the 2 were separate and even saw each other as the opposition (former emerged from Left, latte from the Right - p56). The link between environmental quality and human health was not explicitly linked until sustainability discourse came to the fore in 1980s, which is fairly recent. (Thus sustainability can be seen as a more holistic way of tackling the same issues, or as a compromise between various opposing interests.)

- However it's interesting to note that environmental quality had been linked to human health as early as 1840s in ideas of Edwin Chadwick in England. Then it was known as "the sanitary idea." (54) But then, it was in the hands of the ruling body, and has been criticized by writers such as Michel Foucault of being "little more than the illegitimate mechanisms of the modern bureaucratic state through which social deviancy might be eradicated." (bottom of 54)

- "By arguing that the concept of sustainable development can be understood as the fusion of the public health and environmental preservation movememnts, we do not mean to suggest that there is a single logic or set of ideas associated with the concept. Rather, we will argue two points in this section. First that 'sustainability' has become an umbrella for a number of competing social values and second, that contrary to an idealised model of sustainability in which competing values become balanced, it is far more likely that one set of values, or standards, will come to dominate the field." (57)

- Scott Campbell's "planner's triangle" provides an elegant way of looking at sustainable development. He sees it as the balance of economic development, environmental protection, and social equity, and that it is the role of a third party - a "valuable stranger" - to mediate the 3 forces to arrive at the center. However the authors point out that such mediators are in short supply and, when absent, the more powerful corners of the triangle dominate. The process of standardization suppresses "creative public conflict and alternative technological choices" that may occur in place of a mediating stranger, and standardization "consistently favour[s] the interest of economic development over those of environmental protection or social equity." (60, top)

- Point gleaned form looking at pictures: reading popular magazines such as Dwell and environmentalist blogs gives one the sense that a green house is a specific product that looks a certain way (modernist, highly designed), not that there are varying degrees of greenness and that ordinary homes can be green. Many of the building codes studied in this article applied to certifying ordinary homes built in vernacular colonial styles.

- The survey of building codes identified 4 types of logic: restrictive (efficiency for own sake, supports econ growth, defines unsustainability as lack of efficiency
sometimes seen as greenwashing), strategic (values efficiency but as means to protect home/industry owners, not for own sake; environmental problem defined in terms of conflict; sustainability seen as a "trade-off" problem, so seeks middle point where least is given up), adaptive (proactive, seeking long0term solutions; signs of first 2 logics; seeks to continuously redefine relationships between industry, gov't, public, and environment; constructivist worldview), and expansive (environmental problem understood as social problem requiring reform; whole-systems approach; "civilizational change" - society slowly modifying its values; seek concretization - process by which buildings are integrated into natural energy-flows - and fundamentally redefine limits of economic choices) (66-67)

- idea of concretization is most interesting: most green building interests would consider solar panels sand alternative energy sources exemplary additions to a green home, but this does not fundamentally change our reliance on energy add-ons. Solar panels are essentially the same as a/c in relying on an external source of power. Proponents of concretization support only passive processes such as passive heating, cooling, etc. (67, bottom)

- "Standardization is, for better or worse, the process by which local conflicts are commonly resolved. Interpreting this phenomenon positively would be to argue that the standardisation of green building practices reflects a changing cultural horizon and aticipates new technical codes intent upon altering the definition of 'good building.' To interpret this phenomenon sceptically would be to argue that standardization tends to suppress those local discourses that constitute what Kenneth Frampton has called 'tectonic culture.'" (68-69)

- Authors see the reason for LEED's pervasiveness as a matter of timing: it arrived early to the market and promoted itself strongly as an international standard. It also reflects the interests of shareholders by giving added market value to those products that it certifies.