Energy prices rise dramatically. Experts debate whether world oil production will peak by the end of the decade or if it has topped out already. Competition for natural resources of all kinds shifts into over-drive as China unleashes the productive—and soon, perhaps, consumptive—capacities of its 1.3 billion people. While global climate change looms ever more menacingly on the horizon, we Americans pour more than 6 tons of greenhouse gases per person into the atmosphere every year, some 18 percent of it from energy used by our homes.
Are we ready to talk sustainable building yet?
This issue of CUSTOM HOME features four houses aimed at sustainability, so we put the question to the four builders responsible for those projects. Are custom home clients waking up to the importance of sustainable building? Are custom builders ready to step up with the technology and building practices?
Austin, Texas, custom builder Carl Rieck says he has been ready for a long time. “I’ve always been a borderline tree-hugger, so it’s been easy to do.” His location helps, too. “Energy efficiency has always been big in Austin,” says Rieck, who credits the city’s educated population and ground-breaking Green Builder program. Rieck’s clients are accustomed to talking about energy consumption and payback periods for efficiency upgrades. “Those things are becoming mainstream in Austin.” But Rieck has long been concerned with conservation of durable materials, too. “We were always big on recycling on the jobs,” he says, to the point of separating out copper wire and steel. “I just got tired of the mentality of throwing everything in the Dumpster.” In addition to recycling job waste and donating used doors and windows to a church-supported resale center, Rieck makes every effort to reuse materials on remodeling jobs. But he finds clients less receptive to saving old materials—say, cleaning up and reusing masonry stone—if throwing them away and starting new costs even slightly less. Compared with selling clients on energy efficiency, Rieck says, “Reclamation is a little bit tougher, because they see the cost increase but they don’t get the payback.”
How many of Rieck’s clients will hire him to build as green as he can? “It’s pretty sad. I’d say 20 percent at most.” Asked when his clients will fully embrace his approach, Rieck says, “I still think it’s going to be a few years. I’m hoping that younger kids will be more geared that way, but I don’t see it.” Still, in recent years he has seen progress. “It’s gotten better and better over the last five years. Ten years ago it was like hitting your head against a brick wall.”
Chicago-area builder Rick McCanse is part of that progress himself. Having founded his company six years ago, he dove into green building only in the past two years. He did so as a long-term positioning effort, though, rather than to take advantage of current demand. “We would like to be the green builder in our market,” he says. But as of now, “It’s quite a small market, because there’s a substantial price penalty.” McCanse would like to see green materials like low-VOC paints and certified lumber made more available in his area. The biggest obstacle he sees, however, is Americans’ short-term attitude toward their homes. “Most people buy houses for five years rather than for the long run,” he says, a span shorter than the payback period for many energy upgrades. But McCanse, too, sees change coming. “I think the rising fuel price is going to spur some interest in [energy efficiency].” And he notes Mayor Richard Daley’s stated goal of making Chicago the “greenest city in America.” While the future of sustainable building has not yet arrived in the heartland, McCanse says, “It’s coming, and I think Chicago will be one of the centers of that. I don’t think that we’re even close yet, but we’re moving in the right direction.” In the meantime, “It’s whatever the customer wants, but I try to nudge them that way.”
