Are we all Environmental Architects

when i visited

arizona in the united states a few years

ago i was immediately shocked by two

things

first i was one of the very few people

walking in the street and not using a

car

and second i had to carry a jacket with

me everywhere i went

even when it was 38 degrees celsius

outside

why did i need the jacket well despite

being so warm outside

most of the buildings were

air-conditioned to freezing point

something which i’m sure you’re all

familiar with to some degree

but the contrast in arizona was one that

i’ve never experienced before

i can recall one building in particular

where i even noticed that

some of the workers had heaters set on

full blast

under their desk to keep themselves warm

as they tapped away at their keyboards

despite it being sweltering outside

as an observer i was bemused by the

situation

hot weather outside an air conditioning

system indoors to cool you down

but so much so that you needed to use a

heater on a maximum setting to warm you

back up

how much energy was being unnecessarily

wasted here

you may or may not be surprised that the

major

areas of energy consumption in buildings

are heating ventilation and air

conditioning accounting for 35 percent

of total building energy use

lighting 11 major appliances

18 with the remaining 36 percent

in miscellaneous areas including

electronics

most of us are already familiar with the

impact of cars on co2 emissions

but how many of us are aware of exactly

how our seemingly innocent conscious

actions

as building occupants from our homes to

the office

the under desk heater at full blast

being a casing point

are unconsciously damaging our

environment

while there is an expectation that our

buildings should be designed in a way to

minimize

energy consumption the key factors that

influence these consumptions

are far more complex than we realize

and make us accountable especially when

one of this

is the human factor a term used to

describe how humans

interact with a particular environment

under

different conditions buildings are often

thought of

or described in a physical aesthetic and

emotional sense

how do they look how does the space

within the building

makes you feel but how often do you hear

someone say this building is an

architectural marvel

i wonder how much energy it consumes or

i just feel so connected with this

building i wonder how much co2 it emits

well here are some facts that may

interest you

buildings consume around one third of

the total primary energy resources

building energy consumption accounts for

30 percent of the global co2 emission

human behavior and by this i mean the

good kind of behavior

can potentially save up to 80 percent of

a building’s energy consumption

now that we know that modifying human

behavior can have such a positive

impact on energy consumption how do we

as a society and individually work

towards this saving of 80 percent

i’d like to focus your attention on

these women

walking across the desert so elegantly

in their colorful saris carving water

parts

they are screened from the sun by their

light clothing

permeable to the wind they have a fairly

open

posture which maximizes the evaporation

from their bodies

cooling it down and water pots that they

are carrying

also for an extra shield from the sun

and some evaporative cooling

this is an example of adaptive behavior

a behavior that refers to when a person

is able to successfully endure their

environment

through modifying their behavior

deployed by our early ancestors

to deal with habited change and

environmental diversity

it has been our strongest weapon to

survive the harshest climatic conditions

for millions of years while

walking across a hot desert with the sun

beating down on us may not be an

everyday pursuit for most of us

from making a conscious choice in the

selection of our clothing

to how much we move in our home and work

environment

there are plenty of adaptive behaviors

that can

that we can adopt to achieve comfort in

the environments that we inhabit

alongside adaptive behavior tapping into

behavioral

neuroscience may also offer a solution

in conserving the energy of buildings

reminding us that the greater motivator

to behavioral change

is pleasure more than fear in architect

lisa hessen’s book thermal delight in

architecture

she reminds us of the potential of using

thermal qualities

as an expressive element in building

design

and inspires us to consider a new

dimension to the architectural

experience

she argues that for many years building

technology and design

has favored methods of high energy

consumption

to neutralize the thermal environment

which has compromised our thermal coping

and sensing

mechanisms the various ways that people

use

remember and care about the thermal

environment

and how they associate the thermal sense

with their other senses

like visual acoustic or factory and

tactile

has been somewhat deprioritized and

replaced with central heating system

and air conditioning and hermetically

sealed buildings

providing a thermally monotonous

experience

for example think about how coming home

after a walk in the cold to an open fire

might spark feelings of joy even if the

air temperature of the space is much

lower

than what you might experience in coming

back to say

an overly heated office the visual

stimuli

and evocative power of the open fire

and not your computer screen as well as

the acclimatization from being outdoors

enhances our thermal experience which

can increase our feelings of comfort

and even improve our mood theories

in thermal comfort science have also

revealed that

what regulates our thermal experience is

not

just a single core thermal receptor as

previously thought

but a multitude of thermal receptors

found in our skin so if we harness

this new knowledge in the way that we

think about comfort

the way we choose to see comfort and the

way we design for

comfort we are more likely to find

opportunities for adaptation

and energy savings like enhancing

natural ventilation

and relaxing the dress code in an office

as alternatives to cranking up the air

conditioning

of course we must forget the more

practical

basic ways to reduce energy consumption

that

everyone can get involved in sometimes

it can be difficult to know where to

start

in trying to address issues such as

climate change as the topic can seem so

vast

it can be difficult to visualize how our

small-scale

efforts will contribute towards

rectifying

these large-scale global issues

especially if there is no definitive

visible end goal in sight the solution

here is just to start

simple everyday energy saving techniques

in the long run can make all the

difference with the help of smart

metering and the internet of things

this will become increasingly easier to

implement

while climate change and energy

consumption are topics that are often

reported in the media with a plethora of

high-profile figures advocating

how our attitudes in climate change have

to change

many studies have shown that beyond the

use of transport

energy consumption and hence co2

emissions

and our contributions towards it is

poorly understood

amongst the general public so how do we

make people more aware

of the implications of energy using

buildings and what can we do

to change this how do we make this

discussion mainstream

and this is a challenge because let’s

face it the topic of energy consumption

in relation to building

isn’t sexy well we create a movement

currently we are not harnessing the

collective social and political

will to change in the right way and we

are losing a battle to achieve a better

future for subsequent generations

we need to make people more aware of how

their behavior

impacts the environment we need to

spotlight the simple

relatively effortless measures i’ve

already mentioned

in a way which is unequivocal achievable

and quantifiable and encourage people to

adapt their behavior

to do their part in reducing global

energy consumption

we need to drive people to take action

today in recent months

we have unwillingly signed up to the

biggest global experiment of our time

that may have restricted our movement

yet has clearly demonstrated

the power of our inadvertent collective

efforts

in making the air cleaner in our cities

and the water

clearer in our harbors and canals we

have given back to nature

because our choices have been restricted

through the forces of nature

yet the challenging experience of the

pandemic

has taught us as a very valuable lesson

that the possibility for change and a

better environment

is there if we want it the challenge is

how do we go about

engaging people and sustaining interest

which is no mean fit so how about if we

brought

the focus back to how the movement

benefit us in recent years

health and well-being has gradually

moved up to the top of the environmental

design

and sustainable agenda for buildings

environmental

design building experts have evolved

from documenting sick building syndrome

which is experienced when people

complain of symptoms associated with

acute discomfort

such as headaches eye nose and throat

irritation or fatigue for example

that are related to an experience in a

specific building

to developing new building standards

which focus on the health and well-being

of occupants

and give specific guidelines on the way

to design healthier buildings

these buildings are also defined as

those that require

a minimal amount of energy to run and

are based on natural

and climate responsive strategies to

maximize

daylight to ventilate cool and keep warm

with solar energy

these are the buildings where occupants

are encouraged to

adopt adaptive behavior and feel

motivated to do so

knowing that the building will have a

positive impact on their health and

well-being

these are the building of our future the

future we want to build

requires a positive vision of our world

inspiring the collective imagination

with this positive

outlook can be a valuable strategy to

motivate people

towards energy and environmentally

responsive behavior

not because it is a chore but because we

know it’s good for us

it makes us healthy and happy paula

allen an environmental expert in

professional speaker who has devoted his

career to the education of building

professionals planners and policy makers

on finding solutions for climate change

promotes a zero-carbon vision for

britain

which is based on a positive outlook of

the future

rather than the dystopian and

apocalyptic

narrative which has dominated much of

the last

40 years when it comes to climate change

the media often peddles notion of the

guilt and shame we should feel

and what we have done to our planet

accompanied by images of melting

glaciers

and ice caps and compromise wildlife

with constant reminders of the imminent

catastrophe that lies ahead

within a fragmented and divided

political scene

but it doesn’t have to be this way as a

society

we need to adopt the already existing

alternative frameworks for the

decarbonization of

transport food energy buildings and land

use

and approach climate change with

optimism

and hope originally derived from the

greek word

architecture meaning chief creator the

verb

architectare in italian which doesn’t

translate directly

in english means to conceive

and mastermind envision predict

and realize the end result we are all

capable

of becoming the chief architects of our

future

knowing that we can influence the

immediate environment around us

on a global scale the way we use our

buildings

and interact with our environment has

the potential to be much more efficient

powerful and meaningful than any other

design

object in any other time in history

with seemingly small decision that we

make

as occupants of those buildings from our

homes

to our offices can make a substantial

difference in the energy consumption of

a building

and hence our environment as evidenced

by those raging

under the desk heaters in arizona we all

share the responsibility for reducing

emissions

from the buildings that we occupy and

for improving the environment and its

performance

as we move towards the increasingly

interactive views

and complex co-production of buildings

we become

architects of our immediate environment

it is a simultaneous multiple ripple

effect

leading to something greater better and

more powerful

the british architect norman foster once

said

as an architect you design for the

present with an awareness of the past

for a future which is essentially

unknown

i now say let’s not let our future be

unknown

because we can all be environmental

architects of our future