Genzyme representatives included Rick Mattila, Director of Environmental Affairs; Lisa Hartman, Principal Environmental Engineer; and Bo Piela, Senior Director, Corporate Communications.

Genzyme has a longstanding involvement with sustainable resources and renewable energy, as evidenced by their environmentally friendly facilities in Cambridge, MA and Framingham, MA. The Genzyme Center in Cambridge – LEED Certified Platinum – was completed in 2003. The Science Center in Framingham – seeking LEED Silver Certification – was completed recently in 2008.

At present, Genzyme has green construction plans for two additional global facilities – in Lyon, France and Beijing, China. Genzyme intends for these buildings to be constructed following the ISO 14001 international specification for environmental management systems.

The Massachusetts structures hit all the high notes of green design and construction. Lisa Hartman described the collaborative integrated design process that enabled these buildings to function at peak levels of efficiency. In the Framingham facility, laboratories are located internally, around the building’s inner core. This innovative design principle allowed for a reduction in the number of air exchangers, improving the building’s overall ventilation, significantly reducing energy usage, and providing substantial cost savings.

Water conservation is another critical element in the design of a sustainable and renewable building. Again, measures to efficiently use water resources were built-in at the beginning of the design process. Genzyme’s buildings use a wide range of water-saving fixtures, including automatic faucets, low-flow showers, waterless urinals, and dual-valve flush toilets. Each of these measures has been shown to reduce water usage from 50 to 75%.

Importantly, recycling of process materials is a critical component of Genzyme’s industrial operations.

Additionally, Genzyme’s Framingham and Cambridge facilities boast numerous indoor gardens and green spaces. The company conducts tours of these gorgeous buildings – more than 12,000 people have toured the Genzyme buildings in the last four years. More than 40 employees lead these tours several times a month.

Environmental conservation has become part of Genzyme’s corporate culture. Employee surveys regularly describe how working in environmentally friendly offices improves personal satisfaction and productivity. Genzyme hosts “Steward of the Month” contests, acknowledging and rewarding employees’ innovative green solutions and community activities.

Genzyme walks the talk. The entire corporate chain-of-command, from C-level executives through scientists, laboratory workers, and maintenance specialists, is committed to high levels of success based on doing valuable work in harmony with nature.

U.S. buildings account for one-third of total energy usage and two-thirds of electrical usage. And of course, burning coal generates more than one-half of U.S. electricity. Construction in the U.S. consumes one-fourth of all wood harvested. Worldwide, building construction uses 3 billion tons of raw materials annually. One-third of the content of U.S. landfills is construction waste.

Enter the green building industry. Two main principles of green construction involve using recycled materials and utilizing renewable resources to supply the energy needs of the building. HOLISTIC HOMES – a green construction firm based on Long Island’s East End – is building a new home in Bridgehampton at 1188 Scuttle Hole Road which embodies these principles of environmental conservation and sustainability.
The magnificent 8300 SQ FT main structure sits on 2.5 acres and is being built following the guidelines of green construction, sustainable energy, and renewable resources.

The frame is composed of 300- and 200-year-old beams, recycled from buildings throughout the Greater New York area. The house is built of cedar and the decks are built of mahogany. The garage doors will be 100% wood. Wood finishes – used to preserve the look and life of these precious materials – are made of nontoxic bases. Penofin Oil is used for the cedar and Cabot’s Decking Oil is used for the mahogany.

Radiant heat throughout the first floor will be provided by a tank-less water-heating system. This system will also satisfy the ambient heating requirements for the second floor. A forced-air HVAC (heat, ventilation, air-conditioning) system will back up the radiant heating and serve as the primary system for cooling.

Comfortable temperatures throughout the house will also be obtained via well-designed and optimally located window systems and natural air flows. Pella Superwindows will be the key to cooling indoor temperatures in summer and warmth in the winter.

The rear facing of 1188 Scuttle Hole Road is oriented westward. The beautiful Long Island sun sets over the house. The rear outdoor deck features a stone fireplace and tropical stone flooring. The stone floor’s bright pastel colors – roses, teals, and burnt-oranges – highlight and complement the tonal range of the surrounding countryside.

The rear outdoor deck offers the healthful benefits of being outdoors while maintaining the feeling of being in a house – much like the ambience of sitting at “Rick’s” long bar in Casablanca.

The backyard itself will be paved in native stone, continuing the HOLISTIC HOMES mission of minimizing a building’s carbon footprint.

The huge free-form pool is being built with a negative (vanishing) edge for natural and improved filtration. All electrical and heating requirements for the pool will be provided by renewable energy – solar collectors mounted on the roof of the pool-house. Salt water and other non-chlorine alternatives are being considered for pool maintenance.

The 800 SQ FT pool-house is a combination cabaña and guest-house, including a sauna, steam bath, lounge area, and kitchenette.

The array of outdoor amenities includes a waterfall and a koi pond, offering the Feng Shui (wind–water) benefits of tranquility and inspiration.

In addition, the second floor of the main structure features a 200 SQ FT flower and vegetable garden. The garden will provide highly nutritious, locally grown produce, as well as natural insulation for the building’s interior. The garden benefits the local ecosystems as well, by cooling the microclimate, purifying air and water, and removing atmospheric carbon dioxide.

1188 Scuttle Hole Road, Bridgehampton, NY represents the very best in green construction and sustainable building practices. Building in harmony with nature, the aesthetics of the structures complement the beauty of the land. The aesthetics of the green spaces enhance the beauty of the living spaces.

The green revolution is happening now. A tipping point has been reached and passed. All news outlets are focusing daily on environmental and energy-related issues. Green living in harmony with nature – helping to preserve and protect our biosphere – is a phenomenon gaining momentum every day.

Installing a roof garden is a simple – and yet highly impactful – environmental action step with wide-ranging benefits. Roof gardens have been the rage in Western Europe for more than a decade, with over 100 million SQ FT of roof garden plantings in Germany, Sweden, France, Austria, the United Kingdom, and Switzerland. Roof garden installations in the United States are catching up in a big way.

Roof gardens can be planted on any flat surface. The benefits – aesthetic, ecological, and financial – are both dramatic and immediate. By installing a roof garden, a family can contribute significantly to the improvement of the local urban ecology and also help reduce atmospheric greenhouse gases and forestall the effects of global warming.

Roof gardens truly embody the principle of thinking globally and acting locally.

The ecological benefits of roof gardens are profound. Green roofs help purify air by absorbing carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen, and also by trapping significant amounts of airborne particulates on their leaves. Green roofs cool the air via the process of transpiration, using heat energy from their surroundings when the plantings evaporate water. When it rains, roof gardens absorb stormwater, reducing runoff and flooding, and filter and clean the water as it passes through the roof garden soil.

We’ve all noticed how much warmer it is in urban areas than in the surrounding countryside. New Yorkers know how much the temperature drops when they walk into Central Park from Fifth Avenue or Central Park West. The air is fresher and cooler. It actually feels great to take a deep breath. Imagine little bits of Central Park, spread around the entire city on the rooftops of office buildings, apartment buildings, and homes. Green roofs help bring the countryside to the city, reducing the urban heat island effect by cooling the atmosphere around them.

Roof gardens also provide remarkably broad benefits for home-based energy efficiencies. Green roofs have important insulating effects, keeping homes cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter. In the summer, for example, rooms under a green roof are 5–7°F cooler than the air outside. Also, green roofs lower roof surface temperatures by as much as 100°F in the summer. Reduced air conditioner use results in significant energy savings. In the winter, buildings with roof gardens lose 30% less heat.

Green roofs also promote biodiversity. Roof gardens, over time, provide important habitats for local bird and insect populations. These habitats are often much safer than the typical city environment, and native species can actually thrive in these easily maintained and much needed green spaces.

By taking the simple step of installing roof gardens, families and communities can contribute importantly and meaningfully toward the goal of restoring balance and harmony in our natural world. Each green roof helps rebuild local ecosystems, reduce greenhouse gases, and support the harmonious living and long-term welfare of our generation and future generations.

There are real issues, critical issues, hidden beneath the bluster, misinformation, and general hysteria. Energy is the key puzzle to solve in the 21st Century. New sources of energy, new solutions for maximizing currently available resources, and innovative strategies for utilizing energy efficiently – solving these problems is one of several and immediate grand challenges facing American society today.

Renewability and sustainability are essentially interchangeable concepts. Renewable, of course, means you can use something over and over again. Sustainability is probably the stronger term, with greater depth of meaning. When a resource is sustainable, you can use what you need and the resource will replace itself over time. Trees and plants use carbon dioxide and sunlight to create energy for their needs. Animals consume the plants for energy and return carbon dioxide to the ecosystem. These interactions are sustainable indefinitely.

In the natural world, resources are used and replaced ongoingly. Living systems will increase their numbers until they reach a limit of available food, water, and air to sustain their population. Natural systems are naturally sustainable. But human activities create new systems which are often antagonistic to innate principles of sustainability.

The concept of sustainable cities attempts to infuse the principles of harmony and balance into man-made structures of concrete and steel. This is a noble effort. Sustainable cities incorporate four big ideas –
• Walkability
• Mixed Use
• Smart Transportation
• Quality of Design

Sustainable urban design leads to greatly decreased dependence on cars, with dramatic decreases in energy utilization and greenhouse gas emissions. In a sustainable city, shopping, health care facilities, and entertainment are located within a short walk of home and work. In addition to the immediate and long-term effects on environmental quality and energy security, walkability provides built-in exercise for residents and the opportunity to connect with an ongoing variety of people.

Mixed-use design creates egalitarian living environments that are both sustainable and diverse. A mixed-use neighborhood includes pedestrian-friendly stores, offices, residential homes, and apartments. In Curitiba, Brazil – a poster-city for sustainable design – each building devotes its bottom two floors to commerce. Mixed-use apartments foster diversity of cultures, races, and demographics. A group of units are reserved for low-income families and a group are reserved for upper-income families. Senior citizens, couples with young children, and a variety of cultures intermingle, thrive, and create robust, vibrant communities.

Sustainable cities offer smart transportation to support energy and environmental conservation. In sustainable urban design, high-quality trains connect neighborhoods, towns, and cities. Within cities, light-rail systems offer high capacities, safety, comfort, and speed. Light-rail transport is both cost-effective and energy-efficient, providing a convenient, realistic alternative to automobile congestion.

Sustainable cities are people-oriented. Architectural diversity and design aesthetics are key considerations in renovation and new construction. Form and function are optimized to create beautiful living and working environments.

Practical, on-the-ground examples of urban sustainability include Portland, Oregon; Davis, California; and Chattanooga, Tennessee. These thriving, dynamic cities offer real-world proof that successful solutions are available to our energy and environmental challenges.

Reclaimed wood is gorgeous. Douglas fir, heart pine, red oak, American chestnut – these old-growth woods were originally harvested 100 to 300 years ago. Reclaiming these woods provides materials that are rich in color and character, creating warm and beautiful spaces.

As a green construction material, reclaimed wood offers aesthetic beauty, balance, and harmony. Using reclaimed wood is an environmentally friendly practice, reducing the ecological footprint of new construction and recycling resources that would have ended up in a landfill.

Reclaimed old-growth wood – rich in history, tone, and style – is also denser, stronger, and more stable than quickly harvested new wood. Old-growth timber is slow-growth timber – high quality, tightly grained wood. Old-growth forests grew slowly due to the extensive canopy created by larger trees. The canopy limited rainfall and sunlight, resulting in tighter growth rings and wider and taller trees. These qualities are not reproducible in today’s wood harvested from deforested and replanted areas.

Reclaimed wood has plenty of character. Sources include old barns, industrial warehouses, railroad trestles, 19th Century residences. Heart pine, American chestnut, Douglas fir, and red oak are woods of astonishing beauty and complexity of tint, tone, and grain pattern. Using these green construction materials maximize domestic beauty and greatly assist environmental recovery and renewal. TOP

Reclaimed masonry includes reclaimed brickwork and stonework, reclaimed cobblestones, and crushed concrete. Bricks and stonework are most often recovered from demolished buildings. Crushed concrete is salvaged from old buildings, sidewalks, curbs, and highway rubble.

Reclaimed masonry has multiple uses in green construction. Reclaimed masonry is used to build walls, stairs, and floors, as well as driveways, walkways, benches, and stone masonry projects.

Reclaimed bricks include antique bricks – often more than 100 years old – featuring beautiful colors ranges of maroon, dark purple, red, salmon, yellow, and gray. Bricks reclaimed from buildings and streets have charm and rustic elegance, as well as unmatched beauty and character. They may be used for paving, construction, and indoor flooring. The colors do not fade and these bricks are impervious to moisture and extremely durable.

Concrete is a key waste material from construction and demolition projects. Recycling concrete in the form of crushed concrete helps reduce landfill and conserves natural resources. The use of crushed concrete offers significant savings on materials and disposal costs. The green construction practice of using aggregates reclaimed from crushed concrete promotes better individual health, better community health, and assists in environmental renewability and sustainability. TOP

HOLISTIC HOMES are built with green construction materials. These sustainable, reusable, energy-efficient materials maximize the health of the occupants and minimize the environmental impact of construction. Green construction materials include

• Wood
• Flooring
• Paint
• Concrete
• Windows

Using sustainably harvested wood sources is a key practice in green construction. Of course, it’s not enough just to say it. It’s important to walk the talk. The Forest Stewardship Council provides documented proof that wood was harvested with certified sustainable methods.

Urea-formaldehyde (UF), used in the majority of plywood, composite panels, and sheathing materials, has been classified by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, part of the World Health Organization, as “carcinogenic to humans”. UF off-gases into the air, and is then inhaled by a home’s occupants.

To help ensure cleaner air and reduce the risk of respiratory diseases and airborne illness, green construction uses formaldehyde-free plywood, composite panels, and sheathing materials. Healthy flooring greatly improves the quality of indoor air by reducing pollutants, reducing the impact of building materials on the health of the occupants.

Minimizing the use of toxic solvents, coatings, and glazes is critical in the construction of HOLISTIC HOMES. In recent years, public health initiatives have highlighted the importance of healthful internal environments – the insides of homes where we spend much of our time. Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are the main culprit – VOCs are associated with asthma, allergies, and numerous respiratory diseases. Also, VOCs are a major contributor to low-level atmospheric pollution and may be one of the factors in the development of climate change.

Green construction materials use VOC-free paints and VOC-free construction adhesives. These VOC-free materials meet recommended emissions standards such as those listed in California’s Section 01350 testing protocol, ensuring good air quality and protecting human health. Many paint manufacturers now use zero-VOC or near-zero-VOC paints in a range of finishes. The Green Seal Paints GS-11 is an important industry standard.

In addition to using nontoxic materials and sustainably harvested materials, green construction also looks to incorporating recycled materials. Concrete is the most widely used consumer material – after water – worldwide. Concrete is an aggregate of sand and gravel, bound together with cement. But the manufacture of cement consumes a lot of energy and contributes to greenhouse gas emissions. Replacing cement with fly ash (from coal-burning plants) is an environmentally sound practice. And, recycled glass may provide an ongoing source of sustainable aggregate. Concrete can be produced using environmentally friendly ingredients – “greener” concrete.

Green construction materials are low-emitting and low-maintenance – they reduce the amount of pollution released inside the house. Low-emitting windows focus on another issue – energy efficiency.

In the past, windows have been a major source of energy loss. With advances in green construction, windows can now be even better insulators than the walls of the house. One solution is to manufacture windows using energy-efficient glazing. These low-emissivity (“low-e”) windows prevent heat from flowing in and out. Low-e windows – transparent to visible light and opaque to infrared radiation – provide substantial energy savings.

The benefits of a HOLISTIC HOME extend beyond its immediate boundaries. Protecting the local and community environments is accomplished by using recycled materials and reducing construction and demolition waste. HOLISTIC HOMES are landscaped for energy and water efficiency and use renewable energy technologies.

Using green construction materials and improving a home’s energy efficiency may yield life cycle savings of more than ten times the initial investment. Investing in a family’s health and well-being naturally aligns with long-lasting financial benefits and environmental stewardship.

HOLISTIC HOMES embodies the spirit of personal accountability and responsibility regarding sharing resources, protecting our many communities, and creating beautiful homes in which we can live comfortably and well.

Green construction is the evolutionary next step in the natural history of the construction industry. HOLISTIC HOMES forwards these principles. A HOLISTIC HOME is built with healthy, green construction and insulation materials, and uses cleaner and healthier energy sources and utilities. HOLISTIC HOMES are energy-efficient, based on natural lighting and clean air and water. Renewable resources are the answer.

HOLISTIC HOMES works with all architects and designers, providing detailed custom construction to fulfill blueprint specifications and requirements. A HOLISTIC HOME fulfills the vision and goals of the architect and designer and the desires of the homeowner, utilizing the best materials nature has to offer. These are homes of harmony and balance, creating value for their owners, their communities, and the surrounding natural world.