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Green Building is not a new concept, but technology
and materials have evolved.
Frank
Laskey, president of Capital Construction in Ballston Spa,
is currently building a subdivision of energy-efficient
and environmentally
friendly homes in Wilton. Through his years in the construction
industry, he has come to understand the elements that make
a home “green”.
The process begins with the land.
Rather than building as many homes as possible on a piece of
property, Laskey leaves a
good portion of the land untouched.
“We think that you can maximize your profit’ by
developing in a responsible fashion and by respecting site topography
and
ecosystems and setting aside a portion of that land to
remain forever wild,” Laskey said.
In the subdivision Laskey
currently is building, there are 35 acres of open space, including
hiking trails, which
forms a corridor
to the Saratoga County Forest and Wilton Wildlife Preserve.
Green
Building requires a holistic approach, said Michael Phinney,
a principal at Phinney Design Group in Saratoga
Springs and
the architect for Laskey’s homes.
Phinney said
that to make a successful green building, all the parties
involved must be educated about the
process from the
beginning so that they all have a common goal in mind.
Phinney
has special certification as a Leadership in Energy and Environmental
Design professional for his
work with
green buildings,
including the state Department of Environmental Conservation
building in Albany.
As
an architect, Phinney is responsible for keeping in mind the
big picture. He must balance the environmental
aspects
of the
project with aesthetics, scale, and relationship
to the
site. Phinney wants the green aspects of the homes
he designs to
be a “hidden surprise” rather than
driving the look of the building. He likes people
to see beautiful homes and be able to tell them, “By
the way, they have all these great environmental
features.”
Deciding where to place the house
on the land is important.
Phinney looks at natural
features, such as mature trees and rock formations that would
be difficult
to replace.
Once the architect
and builder select the site, they have to consider
the direction to orient the home. That involves
figuring out how to bring as
much natural light as possible into the house.
Ideally,
the length of the house should be located on an east-west axis,
with most of the windows
on the south
side
of the house,
Laskey said. In the winter, the house soaks
up the sun, but in the summer, deep overhangs on
the house
protect
it from the heat.
Another consideration is
the building materials. In the Showcase of Homes house that
Laskey recently built,
the
only wood on the
outside of the house is on the entrance canopy
and rafters, and that wood came from around
Lake George
and Glens
Falls to minimize
trucking distance and gasoline consumption.
The majority of building materials are recycled
or
composite materials.
The Showcase of
Homes, a benefit project of the Saratoga
Builders Association Inc., this fall displayed newly
built and decorated
homes by eight different builders.
“Where we do use natural materials as
opposed to recycled or composite, we use materials that come
from managed or
sustainable forests where they grow more wood than they harvest, so we will not
deplete
that natural resource,” Laskey said.
Other
materials, such as 40-year architectural
shingles, copper and aluminum cladding are
durable, long-lasting,
and low-maintenance,
Laskey said.
Durability is an important factor
in green building, said Margo Thompson, a research
associate with
National Association
of Home
Builders Research Center.
She
said that’s
because quality materials require less
maintenance and make buildings last longer,
so fewer
resources
are used up.
Materials
are “healthy,” too.
That means that they are low in, or free of, volatile organic
compounds, such as the formaldehyde found in pressed board,
that emit toxic substances into the air. Laskey’s latest
house will be certified as a “Healthy Home” by the
American Lung Association.
Green buildings are super-insulated
to control moisture levels
and reduce energy consumption and have boilers that sense
outdoor temperatures and fire only as much as necessary.
Laskey’s
latest home is a “smart home” in
which lighting, heating and other systems “speak” to
each other. Marc Liedig, president of Ambience Systems
in Clifton
Park, the company that designed and installed the systems,
said there is, for example, a “goodbye button” on
a keypad near the front door.
When the homeowner hits the
button twice, the system knows that the house will be
unoccupied and automatically shuts
off lights
and entertainment systems and turns down the heat. The
system also incorporates motorized windows.
In addition
to the showcase home he recently built, Laskey has plans for
more homes in the same development and
plans to build
more homes on other properties.
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