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Community College Campus Will Be One of Few 'Green' Buildings in Area

Posted on: Tuesday, 28 March 2006, 00:00 CST

By Georgina Gustin, St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Mar. 27--WILDWOOD--When St. Louis Community College's new campus in Wildwood welcomes its first students in 2007, they'll enter a rigorously designed "green" universe. The college's new education center will, for starters, have a roof covered with plants -- a "green roof" designed to absorb heat and control the building's inside temperature.

The roof is one of the elements within the new building that will enable it to earn a "green" certification by the United States Green Building Council -- a first for an educational building in St. Louis County, and a second for the St. Louis area.

"Green," or environmentally sustainable, construction has become more popular around the country, particularly in the past decade as people have sought homes and buildings that are more energy-efficient, cheaper to operate and less harmful to the environment.

"Green building primarily started on the coasts," said Taryn Holowka, of the council. "Now it's making its way toward the middle of the county. We have projects in every state now."

As green architecture has gotten more popular in home and commercial construction, educational architects and builders have also caught on. On many college campuses, students have started requesting that new construction "go green." At Washington University, for example, a burgeoning green movement in the School of Architecture prompted a 2004 symposium titled "The Sustainable University Campus," and on Saturday the school launched a new course in environmental design.

For universities and colleges, "green" is also a selling tool. "Besides the fact that this is environmentally conscious, I think our students are environmentally aware," said Lori Thompson, facilities director at St. Louis Community College. "Our students expect us to be leaders in helping sustainable building."

For schools, green building also provides a critical advantage, proponents say, in that it provides a better learning environment.

"There are some good studies that show that (green) elements -- natural ventilation, daylight, good air quality, low VOC (volatile organic compound)-emitting materials -- really lead to improved performance and attendance, with teachers and with students," said Ralph Bicknese, a partner in Hellmuth + Bicknese Architects. "It's particularly important for public schools because their funding is based on attendance."

In the late 1990s, the council wanted to establish specific, measurable standards in order for buildings to be labeled environmentally friendly, and in 2000, it launched its Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification program. For any building to earn the certification, builders or owners have to go through a rigorous process demonstrating that the construction of a building and the building itself adheres to environmentally sustainable principles.

In the St. Louis area, there are a handful of certified buildings and others that are registered to become LEED-certified. Washington University's Earth and Planetary Science Building is the only education building in the area that is already LEED-certified. Some of the other area structures on the list are the Alberici Corp. headquarters in Overland and the Nidus Center for Scientific Enterprise on the Monsanto campus in Creve Coeur. Three more higher education buildings and one K-12 building in the area are currently registered to become LEED-certified, but for privacy reasons, the council cannot disclose where those buildings are.

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Copyright (c) 2006, St. Louis Post-Dispatch

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Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch

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