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Living Green in Lofts & Condos
Atlanta Intown
By John Christensen
Motorists exiting I-20 at Memorial Drive and Glenwood Avenue and turning south can be excused for thinking they've driven through a rip in time into a strange new world.
Arising from what once was a blighted industrial plain are scores of condos, townhouses, single-family homes and a cozy, pedestrian-friendly retail area.
It is Glenwood Park, a 28-acre development built on an industrial wasteland that puts a handsome face on the term "environmentally responsible."
Not only is Glenwood Park aesthetically pleasing, it also is 100 percent "green." Every building in the community, as well as the ground they are built on, will meet exacting environmental standards. Prices range from $150,000 for a condo, $394,000 for a townhouse, and $493,000 for a single-family home.
"We are an official EarthCraft community," said Walter Brown, vice president and co-founder of Green Street Properties, which is developing the site.
The EarthCraft House program, a joint venture of the Greater Atlanta Home Builders Association and Southface Energy Institute, trains builders to construct energy-efficient homes.
They work from an eight-page, 300-item worksheet that provides guidance on everything from site preparation to waste management. Typical measures include using energy-efficient windows and recycled insulation, tightly sealing ducts and doors, and making maximum use of natural light and emission-free materials. A home must score at least 150 points, be inspected and pass two tests to be EarthCraft-certified.
Glenwood Park also planted 800 trees and used permeable concrete and crushed stone to aid in the capture of storm-water runoff, which is treated and used for irrigation. And construction has just begun on a nine-unit condo building that will use geothermal energy to heat and cool the building and is expected to cut energy costs by 50 percent.
Brown said building to EarthCraft specifications "typically adds about two percent" to building costs, but the expense is worth it.
"Georgia Tech has done a study and found that drivers from Intown neighborhoods drive 20 percent less than those in suburban neighborhoods," he said. "That saves 1.6 million miles a year."
Studies also show, he said, that the energy used in the typical suburban home - and transportation to and from it - amounts to 226 million BTUs a year. An urban "green" home, he says, uses just 82 million BTUs a year. (A BTU -British Thermal Unit- is defined as the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of one pound of water by one degree Fahrenheit.)
"That nice, clean electric energy in your home is created by coal-burning plants that emit pollution," said Diane Butler, development director for the EarthCraft Home program. "If you can diminish the energy needs of your home, you're cutting down on pollution." (The primary power plants in the metro area are coal-fired, but there is also energy on Georgia Power's grid from nuclear plants in east and south Georgia as well as hydro plants at Morgan Falls and in north and west Georgia).
Butler said there are about 3,500 EarthCaft-certified homes and condos in Atlanta area, and each represents the equivalent of taking a car off the highway for a year.
Living green is a choice, but one that an increasing number of builders are eager to make. As Brown put it, "[We're] in a position to help improve our chances to survive and prosper on the planet. Any builder or developer who is not concerned about global warming and habitat destruction is either ignorant of the obvious or planning a future vacation on Mars."
Atlantic Station
Glenwood Park is not the only "green" development in Atlanta, nor is it the biggest. That honor goes to Atlantic Station, the 138-acre, $2 billion ZIP Code (30363) that has risen from the old Atlantic Steel Mill site in Midtown.
"We were the first ones to go through the U.S. Green Building Council's LEED [Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design] program for an entire site," said Brian Leary, vice president of design and development. "We have about 10 points that are certified by the council, so we have a head start for anything built on the site."
Leary said Atlantic Station is also the largest industrial site in the world to be rehabilitated to "green" standards. About 2,000 people live there now. Leary expects it to reach 3,000 by June, with a maximum of 10,000. (Units range from $100,000 to more than $1 million.)
The development's 17th Street Wachovia Bank building is LEED-certified, and a heating and cooling plant was built to service the entire development, cutting energy costs by an estimated 30 percent. Atlantic Station also separates and treats storm-water runoff, operates shuttles to the Arts Center MARTA station and offers other incentives to residents to cut energy consumption.
In fact, said Leary, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have begun a study there to determine whether residents of "live/work/play" communities have healthier lifestyles.
"Our goal," said Leary, "is that every building we build will have that [LEED] certification. We believe that to live well is to live green."
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