The green building boom has players in the commercial sector racing to outdo one another with cutting edge environmental features. Architecture and design firms, construction and development, hospitality, and other service providers have learned that boasting an awareness of sustainable building practices is critical to marketability. The residential sector, however, has lagged behind in developing exemplary models for green homes – perhaps partially as a result of being a late recipient of the incentive of LEED standards, which were initially applicable exclusively to commercial buildings. But if incentive was the missing link, home builders have it now, and just one company has gotten the platinum stamp.
Living Homes aims to revolutionize the homebuilding market. We mentioned them when the design was just an early concept, and later when the prototype was under construction. Now the model home is complete and ready to defend its rank as the greenest home on earth.
Founded by serial entrepreneur Steve Glenn, the venture breaks more than a few molds. You could call it a big zero – a building that yields zero impact on all dimensions: water, energy, etc. I would say that it is a harbinger of things to come in the residential real estate market.
First, its product is a prefab home, a unit whose parts are manufactured via a mass assembly process and snapped together almost like legos at the construction site. This is far more efficient than new manufacture: construction-related detritus constitutes 40 percent of the waste in landfills. Its modular nature also facilitates the process of adding rooms and living space with little to no waste so that the home can adjust to the changing needs of its owners without sacrificing its sustainable nature.
Don’t be fooled by the term ‘prefab.’ This isn’t one of those shoeboxes you might see riding down the highway on the back of a flatbed truck. Living Homes’ first unit – essentially a demo product that Glenn himself lives in – was designed by pioneering architect Ray Kappe. The aesthetic is breathtaking, something that you might expect to grace the cover of Dwell Magazine rather than the catalog of a typical homebuilder.
Despite the design and efficiency of Living Homes, it's most notable for an unrelenting commitment to sustainability. The 4BR/3BA 2480 sq ft Kappe home was the first residence in the country to receive LEED for Homes platinum, the highest level of certification from the United States Green Building Council. Not bad for their very first product out of the gate.
Living Homes applies this sustainability ethos to almost every aspect of the home. The company exhibits its dizzying array of green features in a slick Flash media tour (complete with voiceover narration by CEO and chief homeowner Glenn) on their site. Some notable elements:
- A greywater system that reclaims nearly all water used in the home and drives a complex predictive irrigation system that uses moisture controls and Internet-based weather telemetry to minimize the amount of water used on the drought tolerant plants that decorate the landscaping;
- A Photovoltaic system mounted on a McDonough-style living roof that provides 75 percent of the power needs of the home, plus provides shade so you sit back and can admire the nifty rooftop garden of your favorite fruits and vegetables
- An environmental monitoring system that constantly measures household water and electricity usage, enabling a real-time environmental scorecard
As we green our lives, the home is a natural place for innovation. There will be lots of players in this space, but Living Homes has set the bar with its extraordinary product. Nevertheless, the home has received its share of criticism, largely for it luxurious, high-end package, which knocks affordability off the list of features to boast about. The expense irks critics for two reasons: One, the original mid-20th century prefabs were fundamentally about affordability and access to the average consumer, so for prefab purists, Living Homes betrays the founding mission. Perhaps more importantly, though, many sustainable building devotees believe that affordability is an indispensable element of being truly "green." In other words, if you are pricing out a huge segment of the market, you're not really sustainable. Both of these arguments are debatable, to be sure, and at Worldchanging we often justify pricey green design by reminding people that most innovative products hit the market at a price-point well outside most people's budget, and eventually demand drives down cost.
Hopefully this will be the case for Living Homes, because surely the rest of their sustainability agenda is a model to be replicated widely in residential housing. And no doubt everyone deserves to live in a home this green.
