CHANNEL 8 SERIES ON SUSTAINABLE ARCHITECTURE
The PBS series Design: e2 (The Economies of Being Environmentally Conscious) is already underway, but the four segments that remain promise interesting watching.
The programs, narrated by Brad Pitt, explore the social, political, cultural, environmental, and economic issues of sustainable architecture.
On Wednesday, July 19, in the episode called “The Green Machine”, Richard M. Daley takes viewers on a tour showcasing his mission to make Chicago “the greenest city in America.” Mayor Daley built the city’s most prominent green roof atop City Hall and created an entire municipal office charged with overseeing the city’s many environmental initiatives. This episode demonstrates the many ways that green technologies are being adopted in Chicago, from the residential to the corporate sectors.
The following Wednesday, the episode “Gray to Green,” takes the notion of the three Rs (reduce, reuse, recycle) to grand proportions by looking at Boston’s “Big Dig” and the massive amount of waste created by the $15 billion project. Paul Pedini, a civil engineer on the dig, had the idea to build his own home from Big Dig waste. The success of this project has sparked plans to create an office complex in Massachusetts from the same recycled material. These innovative projects serve as prototypes to demonstrate to city officials that there is value in recycling on such a grand scale.
As an aside, this past Tuesday, July 11, an apparent construction failure in a Big Dig tunnel killed a woman Tuesday. Four concrete slabs, each weighing at least three tons, fell from the ceiling of the tunnel and crushed her car.
On August 2, the series moves to China, where soaring population and rapid industrialization have created a boom in urbanization that is unprecedented in human history. In an attempt to tackle this global issue, “China: From Red to Green?” explores design solutions in both theory and practice, including architect Steven Holl’s “Linked Hybrid” project, which when completed will be the largest residential, geothermal heating/cooling, and greywater recycling system in the world. Also featured in this episode is William McDonough – architect, designer and winner of three US Presidential Awards. Recognized by Time magazine as a “Hero of the Planet,” McDonough talks about his innovative plans to make China entirely sustainable and how it will demonstrate the ways architecture can be both profitable and environmentally intelligent.
Design: e2 concludes with a look to the future. “Deeper Shades of Green,” showing on August 9, focuses on three remarkable thinkers and designers of our time, Kenneth Yeang, Werner Sobek, and William McDonough. Each is radically changing the face of not only of architecture, but of environmentalism.
The series airs on Wednesdays at 11 pm on Channel 8 in Houston. The local sponsor is pioneering green-architect LaVerne Williams and his firm, Environment Associates.