 |
 |
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Sustainable Building Practices
There are several examples of sustainable building practices incorporated into the center's renovation. To conserve building materials, the original building materials were used as much as possible in the renovation. In several instances epoxy was injected into weakened framing members so that they could be re-used. Also, unusable Cypress siding was replaced with a recycled material made from sawdust and concrete. The heating and air conditioning system selected for the building is an energy efficient "ground-source" heat pump. This system, based on geothermal heat transfer, uses a closed loop of buried pipes to circulate water to a depth of up to 200 feet to heat and cool the house.
One of Hurricane Hugo's important
lessons related to sustainability was that storm damage to homes generates
a tremendous amount of debris that has to be disposed of. The debris from
Hugo added the equivalent of ten years of normal fill to the area's landfill
in just one year. That constitutes a
highly significant, but little
understood, public cost associated with hurricane damage. Making houses
more resistant to wind, flood and earthquake damage makes them more environmentally
friendly, or sustainable.
Sustainable
Living
The final educational element
of the project is related to how people can live their lives in ways that
conserve natural resources. Some practices demonstrated at the center include
water efficient landscaping and sustainable pest control. The center's
landscape is designed to manage water efficiently and effectively. It includes
permeable paved surfaces (to minimize run-off), native plants and drip
irrigation. To effectively protect the building against termites, while
helping to protect the environment, newly introduced termite baiting systems
that lure insects away from the structure have been used. In addition,
insulation treated with boric acid will help control household pests in
the walls.
