Hard hats aren’t the only protection Columbus builders are requiring at the construction site these days. Project managers such as Jonathan Collard are also requiring a soft heart for saving the environment.

Having worked on Leader-ship in Energy and Environ-mental Design (LEED) pro-jects such as the Little White House Museum in Warm Springs, the LaGrange College Library and the Southern Pines Conference Center at Callaway Gardens, Collard of Batson-Cook construction company says he’s all for programs that seek to protect the environment and promote sustainability. LEED is a rating system and certification program developed by the U.S. Green Building Council to encourage sustainable green building and development practices worldwide.

“I’m really for the program,” Collard said, “But there are still some challenges out there such as documentation tracking. You have got to get behind the scene and know where the core products are coming from. There’s a huge amount of data that’s got to be processed. Collard said his firm had to hire a staff member largely dedicated to just this effort.

“You have to ask your suppliers where they’re getting their cement from. And what about these trees, where did they come from? Were they harvested in an environmentally friendly way? You’ve
got to ask your roofer, ‘where are you going to buy your shingles, from Minnesota or Douglasville, Ga.?’ You’ve got to check the glue you use and the fiberglass,” Collard said. “Under the LEED program, all the chemicals that come off these materials or “off-gas” cannot exceed a certain number of volatile organic compounds or VOCs. Someone’s got to be monitoring all this.”

Greening the government
Peter Lukken, sustainability planner at Fort Benning, said he understands very well Collard’s challenges.

“Implementing green programs requires a top-down approach,” Lukken said. “The top echelon must be sold on the idea in order for them to hand the directives down.”

Over the next five years, at least 175 buildings, or more than $3 billion of construction, on Fort Benning will be LEED silver certified or registered according to Lukken. The standard became mandatory as the result of a presidential “greening the government” directive initiated by former President George W. Bush after concerns about the cost of energy and environmental aspects.

“It’s all a part of the military’s long-term strategic planning,” Lukken said.

Green beyond the gardens
Edward Callaway, chairman and CEO of Callaway Gardens, can relate.

“LEED projects start in the planning and design process,” Callaway said, as he reflected on his family’s legacy. “We’ve always been about saving the land and restoring it through resorts, gardens and community. It’s been about man living in harmony with nature.”

The Southern Pine Conference Center at Callaway Gardens opened in 2002, and is the first freestanding conference center in the world to be LEED certified. The building joins Callaway Gardens’ LEED certified Lodge and Spa, which opened in 2006. The Lodge and Spa provides natural bath products in the guest rooms and suites and uses refillable shower dispensers saving nearly 150,000 plastic containers each year. The furniture in the rooms has been “gassed off” removing toxins and thus the new smell usually associated with new furnishings. The facility also uses housekeeping chemicals that are certified as “green” by the GreenSeal Organization.

“When you’re in a LEED building, you can just feel it, you can tell,” Callaway said. “It’s all a part of intelligent design.”

Sustainability goes beyond the Lodge and Spa, however. The 13,000-acre Callaway Gardens has offset all of its electricity use with renewable energy by purchasing 21,000,000-kilowatt hours of renewable energy credits. Callaway Gardens is the Southeast’s first resort to embrace wind energy with a 100-percent annual commitment. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, this purchase helps avoid the same amount of CO2 emissions produced by nearly 2,990 passenger cars annually or the electricity use of 2,162 average homes in the U.S.

Callaway Gardens has also enacted on-property recycling programs and water conservation measures such as cultivating native plantings to minimize water use. Employees are encouraged to carpool and bicycle racks are provided for those who bike to work.

“To figure out how to improve the planet, we have to study our land, we have to study our water, and develop land in a way that is mindful of the environment,” Callaway said. “We are excited about this and fulfilling themission of CallawayGardens because we believe in it.”

Local hoteliers are taking note. Anne Rodwell, secretary of the Columbus Hospitality Association, said that while the local hotels do not currently meet all of the criteria to satisfy LEED certification, most hoteliers are implementing green programs at some level and standard.

“Many hotels have already implemented water and energy conversation programs and are using green cleaning supplies that are citrus-based,” Rodwell said. “Recycling programs are becoming more and more popular, as well.”

Home Sweet Energy-Saving Home
Green design can be copied at home. EarthCraft House was formed in 1999 as a residential, green building program of the Greater Atlanta Home Builders Association in partnership with Southface, an organization that promotes sustainable homes, workplaces, and communities. The EarthCraft House program serves as a blueprint for energy- and resourceefficient homes, providing healthier air quality, more comfort and more energy efficiency than standard construction.

Homebuyers seeking EarthCraft homes in the Valley have several options. In addition to Longleaf in Callaway Gardens, Harris Woods, located one mile north of the Harris/Muscogee County line on
River Road, offers an EarthCraft residential community closer to Columbus. These homes are built to meet both the Energy Star Qualified Home and the EarthCraft House certification.

For some home buyers, the costs associated with meeting LEED criteria may be a deterrent to green construction. The option to do something that costs less can be seductive. Lukken admits it is expensive to implement LEED upfront, and the return on investment comes later.

“During these tough times, companies may not want to put out more money for construction,” Lukken said. ”But, you have to think about the long term benefits.”

It’s a lesson that Greg Brough, of Southface, knows well. He said as people have more information available to them, they are becoming more educated on the benefits of green buildings.

“Consumers are becoming label readers and are interested in how a product they are supporting is affecting the environment,” Brough said. “When the market drives something, it accelerates the process.“

Tim Jensen, managing director and architect for Hecht Burdeshaw Architects, said that because there is no definition for what a green product is, the term has become an overused buzz word. Labels help clients and homeowners so they don’t have to find the information for themselves. come an overused buzz word. Labels help clients and homeowners so they don’t have to find the information for themselves.

“The labeling programs provide a score sheet of what that builder did,” Jensen said.

The community is increasingly interested in green building but that doesn’t mean LEED certification must be achieved to meet high sustainability standards. Sustainable design should be among other things about saving energy and saving product, be it water, electricity or decreasing our carbon footprint, Jensen said.

“We encourage people to think about proximity of public transportation and working and living in mixed-use environments,” Jensen said.

“It’s different from the way we’ve always done it, and it’s easy to take the low road,” Lukken said. “But with the energy crisis, new government and new standards, LEED certification and green construction are here to stay and will become more common all the time. Everyone needs to get on board with it.”

Many in the design and building industry agree. Sam Andras, of Andras Allen & Star Architecture, is in the process of becoming a LEED accredited professional.

“LEED is a trend that’s not going to go away,” Andras said. “People are becoming more conscious of it, especially the public sector who wants to not only weigh out the financial return, but also the environmental return.”

Collard agrees and said costs of green construction will come down as green products become more and more competitive with less environmentally friendly materials. Lodge and Spa which adjoins Southern Pine Conference Center at Callaway Gardens is also Leed certified.

School LEEDers
Janeen Tucker, executive vice president of workforce development of the Columbus Chamber of Commerce, said the Chamber recently received a Georgia Department of Labor workforce grant to support BRAC growth and address sustainable construction challenges.

“Although you see LEED primarily in industrial and military construction, that is going to start to change. It’s going to start filtering down,” Tucker said. “We have to try to be ahead of the curve and develop something that can evolve to see how we can be smarter with what we’re doing.”

Tucker said the Chamber is trying to help drive LEED construction for new schools in the 10-county region impacted by BRAC. She has Hecht Burdeshaw Architects’ Bobby Hecht’s support. The director of construction said there have been no specific policies addressed at board meetings, but that his division will recommend to the superintendent and board that future projects be LEED certified.

“I think everybody is interested in being more environmentally friendly, Hecht said. “It’s the way of the future, and it’s what ought to be done even though it costs more,but over time you get your money back and then some.”

LEED Accredited Professional Sudhir Patel is a principal with Hecht Burdeshaw. Patel grew up in Bombay, (Mumbai) India where he said buildings and design are constructed to take advantage of the natural environment.

“Go back over 100 years to the home my grandfather still lives in,” Patel said. “By design the house needs no air conditioning. It has natural ventilation.Whoever designed the building took into consideration all these things, but when we started making money, we wanted air conditioning and conveniences. When you don’t have resources, you get creative–what can I use or reuse–whereas when there is ample opportunity, you don’t think about that. We need to go back to a simpler way of life.”

The green bottom line
In the southeastern region of the U.S., Columbus is at or above average in some areas of sustainable design. The city of Columbus returns 80 percent of its water to the Chattahoochee River, more than most communities, according to Beth Bickerstaff, spokesperson for the ColumbusWater Works.

It’s all a part of corporations becoming more socially responsible. In addition to implementing greener work environments, some local corporations such as Aflac are going a step further, encouraging their employees to be greener at home.

Alfred Blackmar, vice president of facilities at Aflac, said the company has implemented a number of green programs and participates in state-sponsored rideshare programs and employees volunteer on green committees in efforts to decrease their footprint on the environment.

“We are making progress,” Blackmar said. “Since 2006, we have achieved a 20- percent improvement in reducing electricity consumed at the Aflac tower. And, in 2008, we recycled 535 tons of paper and cardboard. We recycle more paper and cardboard than the total waste we send to the landfill.”

Blackmar said Aflac started a telework or work-from-home program two years ago and now has over 200 teleworkers in the Valley with plans to grow that number to 500. Aflac’s commitment to sustainability is further evidenced in its remodeling of an existing building.

“Our intent is to pursue a LEED commercial interiors designation,” Blackmar said. “We’re doing this because we believe it’s the right thing to do, and we’re looking for more ways to be efficient.”

Green Culture
Dr. Bill Frazier is a geologist and environmental scientist at Columbus State University. He said that while our community has a large number of people who are very concerned about the environment in general, it is not enough for change that promotes sound growth.

“What I’ve seen is a need for Columbus to get modernized, get caught up with the rest of the country,” Frazier said. “Policies that have been made here do not keep sustainability in the forefront.”

Virginia Peebles is director of the Coalition for Sound Growth, an alliance of individuals, businesses and organizations dedicated to improving quality of life in Columbus and the surrounding region. She said much more attention has been given to sustainability now than even five years ago. "We just didn't understand how important it was and we were not being good stewards of our environment," Peebles said.

Peebeles said she is especially concerned about the increasing cases of asthma in children and rising number of lung diseases. She urges people to learn more about sustainability and green building for the difference it can make to the immediate quality of life and for the future of our children and grandchildren.

Callaway agrees, "It all matters. We all live on the same planet."

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