Green Building Worldwide

Some Norman Foster Buildings in Duisburg

Düsseldorf

                  I was here for the weekend only, so I didn’t have a chance to meet with any building owners or architects. But I did get the opportunity to marvel at a threesome of Gehry buildings along the waterfront and get some pictures of the Stadttor designed by Petzinka, Pink & Partner.

         The Gehry buildings were quite a sight. Kerstin, the girl I stayed with in Düsseldorf, told me that in summer, the titanium clad building in the middle reflects so much sunlight that it gets too hot to walk on the sidewalk next to the building.

Stadttor Building, Düsseldorf

Freiburg

         From a sustainability standpoint, Freiburg was the best city of my trip by far. There is so much going on in Freiburg that a tour company has designed a tour focusing solely on sustainable projects. I was able to join the Futour group taking developers from Portland, OR to see 7 different projects ranging from sustainable residential neighborhoods to solar power research and training facilities to a zero emissions photovoltaic panel factory.

         On my own and accompanied, I visited the Vauban district, a mixed-use neighborhood of over 5,000 residents. The district was within 15 minutes of my hostel by tram. The first time I went out there by myself. It wasn’t hard to find examples of sustainability. There were solar thermal collectors and photovoltaic panels on many of the roofs. I saw a building called Heliotrop, designed and inhabited by architect Rolf Disch. The entire building rotates with the sun and its facade laden with solar thermal tubes and photovoltaic cells is an energy factory that poduces more energy and hot water than it uses. So both of these resources are fed back into the grid.

         The second time I visited the neighborhood, I went with a landscape architect who was staying in my hostel and told me how he had worked on the landscaping of the plus energy houses. So I went out to the site with Klaus and his companion, Heidi. We were invited by a resident to see the inside of her house. The woman said it had been tough working with the architect because he was very inflexible on many design issues that she as a resident considered important features, such as a mudroom for changing out of dirty boots. She said all the changes had high costs which was frustrating after the high cost of the townhouse itself.

         On the last visit to Vauban, I met with Michaela of Meinhard Hansen Architecture firm, who explained the historical nature of this old French army base that was turned into a sustainable neighborhood after the French left the base in the mid 80’s. She then showed me three of Hansen’s Passivehaus apartment buildings.  After the walk through the neighborhood, I met Meinhard Hansen in his flat, located in one of the buildings he designed.

         Mr. Hansen described how the super insulated houses are able to achieve energy savings of up to 90% of what a traditional apartment uses. At the same time, the cost of construction over traditional is just 10-15% more. Like many other architects I’ve spoken with, Hansen said the way to sell these buildings is to make them look sexy and even downplay the energy savings achieved by the homes. The homes sell for their design and the incredible energy efficiency is just an added bonus for many of the purchasers.

 

Other Places

         Over the weekend, I visited my old roommate, Juan, in Switzerland. We spent one day in Annecy, France. Another day we walked around Geneva. I saw the United Nations building and a park with life size chess boards. I was also able to practice my French a little.

          Back in Freiburg, I spent my last day there taking a hike around the Black Forest (Schwarzwald). After spending so much time in cities, visiting buildings, it was really nice to get out into nature and enjoy unbuilt, green forest space.

         I returned to Barcelona for just 2 days before flying out to Mexico for the World Green Building Council Annual Summit and Sustainable Building Congress & Expo. This was an incredible event that I will cover in the November update.

A Group of Frank Gehry Buildings along the Düsseldorf Waterfront

Solar Technical Classroom, Freiburg

SolarFabrik: Zero Emissions PV Factory

Heliotrop: Extreme Solar House

ISIS Passivhaus, Vauban District

Old town, Freiburg

Vauban Mixed-Use Buildings with PV Roofs

Schwarzwald: The Black Forest

Solargarage: Rooftop PV panels generate electricity for the grid in this Vauban neighborhood parking structure.

Statue of Calvin & Co. in Geneva Park