Architecture in 2047

The American Institute of Architects challenged us to think about how the architect's practice will look in 30 years.  I was inspired to respond by thinking of recent advances in design technology as the infancy of the every tools of the future architect, and I was inspired a little bit by the upcoming release of Blade Runner 2049.

Architecture’s current trajectory will continue to release projects from the silo of the office desktop, and the silo of the architect's brain. Virtual and enhanced reality will pull meetings from board rooms and into infinite occupiable versions, the project constructed and deconstructed many times before breaking ground. Time between iterations will become faster and faster. Hive communication in the Cloud will allow a continuous exchange to more thoroughly describe ideas. Expertise will be shared more readily, as the design community follows the sharing economy down alternate open-model paths that have already started to reshape the way business is done. Lessons learned will more readily be accessible and applied, like a software patch to the design. The end product will be ever more precisely in line with human intention and expectation for the built environment; and the efficiencies afforded by this fine tuning will in turn reduce the burden on the planet. 

The architect’s role must evolve to harness the power of the growing current of data and computational solutions, to shape the project around central tenets and targets, and to communicate the implications of numerous decisions - to be a guiding force and a fixed point in a swarm of forces and numbers.  This role as a guiding force will make the architect of the future an indispensable figure for any size construction project.

Economic forces will attempt to drive projects to serve a narrow purpose, however, it will also be the architect’s responsibility to respond with technology and data to show the undeniability of maintaining sustainability, responsibility and urban connectivity for a tenable world that can continue to grow and thrive at the rates we expect. Undermining these forces will be a continuous battle, but one that the architect can be especially equipped to orchestrate a stand against.
 

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Modern Camp: Sustainable Systems

Camping, in its simplest form, is all about self sufficiency.  Its about getting back to, and relying on, nature, and using your own skills to harness it.  The modern take on camping can be far removed from the humble Boy Scout pup tent, but the goals should remain the same.  A modern camp should harness nature, help in every way possible to preserve that nature that provides for it, and allow for its inhabitants to reconnect with nature.  Here, we take advantage of what nature provides in abundance to make the Modern Camp a responsible answer to its challenging environment.

1. WATER

At the Modern Camp, a smooth metal or tile roof is preferrable to collect the water, and storing the water underneath the deck structure keeps it cool and protected behind the gabion wall and pool structure.

Though water is plentiful in Louisiana, it is still a resource to be controlled and utilized thoughtfully and carefully.  Rainwaters can inundate both natural and man-made drainage systems and cause backup riverine flooding.  Rainwater is also a natural resource as potable water with fewer contamination and taste issues, reducing the desire for treated bottled  water. Rainwater collection is common practice in drier climates with unreliable precipitation, but we certainly see limited dry spells in South Louisiana as well.  The water can also serve irrigation systems, to ensure your thirsty tropical plants don't burn up during a dry month or two.

These sorts of reservoirs will fill up quickly in our climate, however.  The Aggies over at Texas A&M have a nifty Excel calculator to determine what your system needs might be.  Once their retention abilities are maximized, it's important to avoid dumping the stormwater directly back into city or parish stormwater infrastructure, if any is present.  

You can even incorporate condensation from your AC system.  According to the Alliance for Water Efficiency, a central AC for an entire home can collect 5 to 20 gallons of condensate water per day, equating to more than 300 gallons per month in the summer! 

2. HEAT REMOVAL AND POWER

Key to a sustainable and resilient home able to be used in a disaster are efficient mechanical and electrical systems that take advantage of natural resources.  These can often be pricey, but Residential Energy Credits can be taken to be reimbursed for many of these systems that make the most sense.  All of the systems below are currently eligible for 30% reimbursement, including install, from the Federal government (find out more here).

Geothermal Heat Pump - Using the earth, or large bodies of water, to help get rid of the large heat loads in Louisiana homes makes sense, and especially so with access to a large cycling body of water.  Geothermal systems essentially replace the exterior condenser unit with a long tube that circulates water through either the earth or a body of water to dissipate heat in summer and absorb heat in the winter.  On top of that, it eliminates the exterior equipment that is most vulnerable to the elements.  Geothermal systems are eligible for tax credits as energy-efficient residential equipment, which I talk about a bit more below.

Photovoltaics - Solar energy is already deployed on many rooftops across Louisiana, and the technology is rapidly improving.  Recent presentations by Tesla indicate that options will become more attractive, too, in the coming years.  We envision a smooth PV tile that will also aid with potable water collection by not collecting as much dirt with fewer nooks and crannies.  With promises of a 22% efficiency (compare to ~10% now), and improvements in battery storage capacity, the loud, very heavy, fossil-fuel guzzling generators will no longer be needed to keep a livable structure during a grid outage.

Google's Project Sunroof is an attempt to analyze and quantify all the roofs in America for their potential for solar panel installation.  The numbers they come up with in terms of savings should probably be vetted with your local installer, but it's a good benchmarking tool for making a decision, and interesting to fly around the city and see the potential for solar.  It would be great if they could detect via their satellite view those surfaces with panels already installed so that we could see how a city is doing at optimizing its potential for solar harvesting.

FEDERAL TAX CREDITS

Not deployed here but also available are credits for solar water heating, small wind energy production assemblies and fuel cell technology.  You can learn more about these credits from the IRS by learning about Form 5695.  Louisiana's own solar credit has expired, but power providers like Entergy and Cleco still have some incentives available at the local level.

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Modern Camp: 3 Things to Consider When Building in a Hazard Area

The percentage of the US population projected to live near a coast is expected to approach 50% by 2020. The draw of these places is clearly stronger than the fear of the growing dangers generated by a heating and rising ocean - a testament to the inevitability of coastal architecture's importance.  Building to co-exist with hazards has created great architecture throughout history.  We think that good buildings respond to disaster not by retreating from it, but adapting to and learning from disaster; and that resiliency is what ultimately makes a place great over time.  This is the first in a series on our study for the Modern Camp, a prototype for development in a changing coastal Louisiana and the importance to not reacting to hazards, but to owning and integrating them into a design.

1. ELEVATION

Crucial to all development in coastal Louisiana, and increasingly the coastal United States, is the elevation of the structure above the constantly shifting, and sometimes sinking, ground.  FEMA guidelines are a good place to start, but many cities and parishes are looking at these as minimums that may be appropriate now, but insufficient in the future.  Local governments may require a set distance ABOVE what's already required by FEMA - this is called 'freeboard'.  Depending on where you are, your elevation could be the top of your lowest floor, or the bottom of your floor structure (if elevated).  A good starting point to check the status of land you're looking to build on is LSU's Flood Maps project.  In our case we have a minimum elevation of 11 feet, on land that is generally around 2 feet, creating a challenging opportunity to address a welcoming entry to a home 9+ feet off the ground.

To avoid having the gigantic staircase look of many elevated camp homes, we decided to break up the upward travel into segments.  Grading the site to get a higher starting point, we have an initial ramp to an elevated platform, from which you can choose which entry to use.  One ramps up towards the bayou views and the dog-trot guest house, while the stair entry heads around toward the main house entrance.  The natural inlet is spanned with a boat house structure that provides access from both the boat's raised storage position and fully lowered position.

2. STRUCTURE

FEMA published a residential guide in 1984 (FEMA 54) and an updated version in 2010 (FEMA 4969) that outlines general best practices for building homes in high-risk coastal areas.  Some of these principles can be seen already employed in vernacular camp design in the area.  Piles extending up and through an elevated floor, for example, provides a rigid structure tied together by the floor structure than can be braced beneath the floor with sufficient room and protection.  As piles are already generally needed throughout the Louisiana coast, continuing this structural system above ground makes sense.  Locating the piles outboard of exterior wall envelopes alleviates some of the tolerance issues with locating piles exactly where walls need to go.  Cantilevers for exterior walkways is an old strategy for increased efficiency when using a pole-frame system - less piles, more floor area.  The guides are a good primer on basic strategies to consider with regards to site, structure and systems in a hazardous and changing environment.

3. PROTECTION

In an emergency situation, with surging water, protection of what cannot be elevated is important.  Siting behind natural berms and breakwaters is the cheapest option, but in order to site the building with water access, construction of a barrier will be necessary.  Many of the homes along the bayou utilize sheet piling to retain the land and hold back the water, however, the issues here are evident in the many rusted out walls that can be seen.  Steel and maritime environments do not mix without significant expense.  Oysters do, however.  In a strategy already deployed in many places along the Delta, oyster shells from restaurants are collected and repurposed as ballast for open cages called gabions, typically filled with rocks for civil projects at inland locations.  These oyster-shell filled gabions are an effective seawall and protect the structure below flood elevation, as well as an utility lines, vegetation, vehicles, or anything that has to remain at grade.  Any equipment that can be located high, is located high by using space-efficient systems in attic space, well above the reach of flood waters.

We'll continue later with our strategies on both passive and active energy efficient design in our series on our study of the Modern Camp!

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Getting Started with Energy Modeling

Additional service lists are kind of like the list of extra toppings on the menu when you get a burrito.  They seem like nice things, but hey, you’re on a budget, and do you really need guacamole?  Unless you’re ordering a government burrito with mandatory guacamole and extra cheese, you’d be more inclined to pass.

Energy modeling is one of those formerly “guacamole-level” extra services that is fast becoming a standard, not a small part due to the fact that BIM and cloud computing trends are allowing the design team access to what was once a prohibitively intensive engineering exercise, and earlier in the process than ever.  The days of shipping this task out to a specialized consultant that is not familiar with the design concepts and intents should be numbered.

Wading into the swamp of regulations, modeling engines, measurement standards and codes can be daunting, and even if you were fluent in such things a few years ago, the field is changing so quickly that you may have missed some things.  Having taken the LEED exam 7 years ago, I can attest to that.

How do I start?

To make a plan, you have to know where you are and where you want to be.  This means identifying your local requirements, and then setting goals for the project; or more simply: What do I have to do, and what do I want to do?

If you’re not familiar with your local requirements, a good place to start is with the DoE:  https://www.energycodes.gov/status-state-energy-code-adoption

There may be local requirements that one-up the state adopted codes, such as New York City’s Local Law 85, so be sure to check with local approval entities.  States will either adopt ASHRAE 90.1 versions directly, or the corresponding IECC (International Energy Conservation Code) which allows either ASHRAE 90.1 or its own prescriptive requirements to be used.  ASHRAE 90.1 updates are issued every 3 years (2007, 2010, 2013…) and 2 years later, IECCs are updated (2009, 2012, 2015…).

So you know where to start, but how far you want to go?

First we have to quantify distance and orient ourselves in terms of scale.  One very helpful metric that does exactly this is EUI (Energy Use Intensity).  Measured in energy used per square foot per year, it goes a long way in leveling the data of very different buildings to give you at least some hope of a meaningful comparison.  This kind of data is being collected on existing buildings by several entities and some are available to sort through such as

The DoE’s Building Performance Database - allows you to filter lots of data on existing buildings by many useful criteria, though some regions are better represented than others:
https://bpd.lbl.gov/#explore

The New Buildings Institute - collects projects that seek to be leaders in energy efficiency, less a look at standards and more at goals:
http://newbuildings.org/resource/getting-to-zero-database/

ASHRAE 90.1 - uses DoE data to establish benchmark EUIs for different building types, with the intent being to display what compliance with 90.1 meant at a certain time.
http://cms.ashrae.biz/EUI/

When you sort EUIs by Climate Zone and Building Type, all of a sudden you have a very useful means of measurement specific to your project.  Another benefit of EUI, is that you can plug in energy costs of your region and get a much more persuasive unit of measurement:  $$$.

So how far do you want to go?  It depends on your client’s motivation and while it may be marketability or a sense of civic responsibility, it is likely tied to performance savings.  At the concept stage, you can introduce these tools to display the benefits in a more concrete way.  
Once everyone is on board, you will need to pinpoint a destination.  Some predefined destinations include:

LEED ratings:  The current LEED uses ASHRAE 90.1-2010 as its reference point, setting its requirements as the minimum, and linking percentages exceeded to points in its rating system.
http://www.usgbc.org/leed

The 2030 challenge:  An architect-led initiative that works with the building design and planning industry and governments towards the goal of carbon-neutrality by 2030.  In a white paper, they define goals relative to existing codes and rating systems:
http://www.architecture2030.org/files/2030Challenge_Codes_WP.pdf

Design to Earn the EPA Energy Star:  The same Energy Star program your microwave participates in has its own building rating system that heavily utilizes EUI, and emphasizes energy use of a facility exclusively, as compared to LEED which is a much more holistic and vertically-integrated view on green buildings.  Still, Energy Star goals can be used to inform how efficient a project is aiming to be.
https://portfoliomanager.energystar.gov/pdf/reference/US%20National%20Median%20Table.pdf

You may have less specific motivations, more along the lines of performance and monetary payback.  If you don’t shoot for a Brand Name™ energy goal, once again EUI can serve as a concrete monetized target to shoot for.

So you know how to start, and where you’re going, but how do you get there?

Short answer: with an energy model.  As the design process progresses, you can enlist your MEP to head this up, but for architects, the initial siting and form-making fun may happen before one is even on board - or on small or competition projects, you may not have the luxury!  

The options for how to execute this seem numerous and scattered.  I found this chart published by the Building Codes Assistance Project extremely helpful in sorting out options:

The BCAP also does a great job of aggregating resources for architects and discussing in detail codes, processes, and industry dilemmas on most of the things I’ve touched on here.  This white paper is a good place to start:  http://bcapcodes.org/compliance-portal/design/energy-modeling/

Now more than ever, it's important to get educated and share these values at every opportunity you have to influence the built environment.