The house that green built

Groups partner to make green home building mainstream

BY CHARITY THOMPSON of the VBJ

A new sustainably built house is coming to Vancouver’s Lincoln neighborhood. But before it becomes the home of Vancouver City Councilman Tim Leavitt, it will be a green building education center.

Local businesses and community organizations are partnering with Leavitt to promote affordable green building during the home’s construction, which could begin as early as this fall.

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Dubbed the Mainstream Green House, the project site will be open for tours and workshops before it is occupied in 2009.

“We’re trying to make a reproducible project and meet LEED certification on a budget,” said Brandon Tauscher, founder and president of Project GreenBuild, a La Center-based nonprofit handling the project outreach and material research and selection.

Leavitt, a civil engineer at the Vancouver office of PBS Engineering and Environmental, is working on the house design with the Vancouver office of LSW Architects.

“I felt it was time to actually walk the talk,” Leavitt said. “That rather than just being a policy maker adopting new rules and regulations and requirements, I should actually go out and do it. And I have a selfish interest in reducing my own environmental impact every month. I want to see our community move forward progressively.”

Leavitt owns the land on the 4600 block of Northwest Grant Place and estimates the project could cost him $400,000, although a budget had not been set at press time.

At the end of the project, multiple budgets will be presented to show what conventional construction and utilities would have cost, along with actual costs of green construction and utility use and the value of the project’s in-kind contributions.

Leavitt said he hopes to have a contractor chosen by mid-August, after designs are more complete.

“I would like to see this project raise, in a significant way, the awareness of green construction in the community and the talents and skills available here to successfully build green,” Leavitt said.
Submitted rendering

So far, local businesses have made in-kind contributions worth about $37,500, split evenly for building costs and Project GreenBuild’s workshops and outreach efforts, Tauscher said. Contributors include Vancouver-based Décor, Lake Oswego-based Coulee Concrete Designs and Solidcraft, LeFuhrer Design, Light Benders and Bake’s Binster, all of Portland.

Possible partnerships are in the works with the Building Industry Association of Clark County and Clark Public Utilities, and Leavitt and Tauscher said they hope to work with the Clark County Skills Center and the Vancouver and Evergreen school districts to introduce students to the green building industry.

“The more partners we gain, the further we can advance the green building marketplace and stimulate (its) supply and demand,” Tauscher said.

The home is being designed to meet Leadership in Environmental and Energy Design Gold level under the Green Building Rating System. It will include locally made materials, wood from certified sustainable forests, recycled insulation content, high-efficiency plumbing and lighting and whole-building ventilation.

Tauscher founded Project GreenBuild in 2006 after building his own home in La Center.

“In working with subcontractors, there was a serious education gap,” said Tauscher, a third-generation logger who studied sustainability at Evergreen State College.

Now he runs the nonprofit full-time with his wife Lauren to help the education process.

“I’m seeing both sides of the table – the industry side and the environmental side – and I’m trying to find middle ground,” he said.

Project GreenBuild also is coordinating the $600,000 Living House project in Felida with Greenstone Architecture, Fazzolari Custom Homes and consultant Synergy Design Group, all of Vancouver.

Charity Thompson can be reached at cthompson@vbjusa.com.

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