I was invited by Architecture + Design magazine to discuss Green Architecture, its nuances, realities and myths.

It is pertinent now more than ever to create buildings with minimal architectural intrusion and the conservation of natural resources. In this session, I speak about conscious architecture based in context and the little steps that we can take in our pursuit for ecological balance and sustainability.

To the jaded, the mention of green buildings implies a marketing gimmick, and to an idealist, it conjures images of buildings built with mud and bamboo with compostable toilets. Invoking a strong response either ways, we recently concluded a Q&A session on Green Buildings on Instagram. The session had over 300-people join over the course of a 30-minute session. 

The first question that we tackled was, ‘What is a Green Building’? My answer, ‘A green building is one where you’re trying to reduce the impact of the building on the environment.’ It is about making the right choices at every stage of the project, with the ultimate goal to minimise one’s footprint on the environment. To make a building green, the architect must treat the environment as a key design criteria from the first step of the design process right until the occupancy stage. 

It is our commitment to build sustainably and we green certify all our houses in Goa. Our first home, Nivim was the first green certified residence in Goa. It received a gold-level certification and our project Navovado has recently been awarded the platinum-level certification by the Indian Green Building Council. Platinum being the highest level available in the ranking system.

While a building can absolutely be green without a certificate, a green certification is a great way to stay accountable to oneself throughout the design and construction process. It provides the involved professionals with a detailed list of checks and balances with specifications and design criteria that need to be considered and incorporated at every stage of the design and construction process.

In India, TERI (home-grown) and IGBC (offshoot of USGBC) are the primary agencies that issue green certifications. Both these organisations use a credit based system for the evaluation of green building design and performance. The credits fall under the following categories: Site Planning, Water Efficiency, Energy Efficiency, Indoor Air Quality, and Materials among others. Throughout the process, extensive documentation with detailed calculations are required which is then reviewed and tested by the certification body on site. While the system is elaborate, it proves effective as a way to stay true to one’s goals of sustainability. However, it is important for architects to avoid incorporating design elements or features, just for the sake of securing points and focus instead on strategies that are feasible for that specific project life cycle and use.

Demystifying Green Building

I would like to cut through the clutter on this topic. Specially as I would like to demystify the concept and express that green building design is not necessarily a specialized science, nor is it forbiddingly technical where only certain qualified professionals can build green buildings. On the contrary, it is my strong belief that a building built with the basic principles of good architecture would do very well on the green scorecard. The process of green building design starts with a deep understanding of the site, local climate, wind patterns, local materials and resources. Once a building is sited to take advantage of the sun and wind to maximize daylight and cross ventilation, is designed to be responsive to the weather patterns and is built using local materials, then that in itself is a great start towards making the building green.

In the predominantly hot and humid climate in India, one can further think of reducing the heat gain through an informed design of the building envelope. This will have a tremendous impact on the thermal comfort within a building and hence reduce the energy use in the building. Water is another key natural resource that is dwindling with increased human activity on our planet. Rainwater harvesting provides a simple (sometimes ‘no-brainer’) solution to this problem. The idea is simple, instead of allowing rainwater to drain away from your site, one can design systems to either collect it and reuse on the site itself, or feed it back to the earth to recharge the underground aquifers. In addition, a simple introduction of dual flushes can reduce water use by 50-60% and aerators to taps, which can reduce the water use by upto 70% percent. Aerators mix the water from the taps with air, and as a result the water pressure feels the same even when the amount of water flowing through the taps are reduced.

When it comes to building materials, it is wise to use local materials. In most cases, the vernacular building techniques and the local labor would be well versed with the local material. The green quotient of buildings can be further increased by choosing materials with a higher recycled content, higher recyclability, reusing salvaged materials and materials that are rapidly renewable such as bamboo.

The choices to go green are not always straightforward. Cement for example presents a big conundrum in the building industry. The production of cement produces large quantities of CO2, a greenhouse gas with a lasting impact on global warming and climate change. In fact, the production of every kilogram of Portland cement produces an equal amount (one kilogram) of CO2. This presents a huge challenge for our industry where the widely accepted structural material is cement. Wood is another material that presents a difficult choice with sustainability. On one hand, it is a naturally renewable resource and is biodegradable, and wood can be used and reused multiple times. But at the same time, we are cutting irreplaceable virgin rainforests at an alarming pace with long lasting disastrous impact.

Finally, a green building doesn’t have to cost a lot more. Majority of green building strategies are common sense and based on sound architectural principles, which do not come with an additional cost. In addition, there are simple systems that are available at extremely reasonable prices. The aerators mentioned earlier are a free addition offered by most companies that sell sanitary fittings. The difference is for the architect, client and the vendor to be aware of these systems and integrate them into the building design in a timely manner. 

We must as a community of architects pledge to make green building design as important as aesthetics in our projects. A simple change in the thought process can have a long lasting impact on the quality of life for our future generations, which is a cause worth fighting for.

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I was recently interviewed by National Geographic for their upcoming documentary on Green Buildings in India. The following was my response to them and it lists my views in a nutshell on the topic. I hope I do not sound too angry, disappointed or disgruntled... the truth of the matter is that we have a long way to go to make green buildings as mainstream commercial and day-to-day construction practice in India today.

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Dear Mr. Producer

Thank you for your email. I am an IGBC accredited professional in India and a LEED accredited professional in the US. I am architect and have been working in the design and construction industry in New York for many years.

For the last year and a half, I have been busy in building the first green certified home in Goa. We are aiming for the Gold IGBC Green Homes certification. What makes the project unique is that we have considered and employed strategies from the three green ideologies that exist in India today:

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The age old traditional common sense building principles such as building orientation, retaining existing trees and building around them, courtyard plan, load bearing walls, etc.

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The alternative building strategies such as filler slabs, reducing use of cement, prioritizing use of existing material on-site, recycle and reuse of wastewater, etc.

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The new cutting edge technologies such as solar water heater, environment-friendly HVAC systems, moisture sensors, electric sensors, electric vehicles, low VOC paints, green roof, etc.

Unfortunately in India today these three streams of sustainability exist in individual silos and are not really working together. Everyone seems to be doing their own thing while commercial developers have joined the green building bandwagon only as eyewash to improve marketability and sales

The biggest challenges to green buildings in India are the vast regional climatic variations, perceived high cost, lack of usable information, material procurement, labor training, lax regulatory environment, lack of incentives and lack of education on the need for green building among contractors, building material manufacturers, vendors and the final consumers.

Organizations such as IGBC, TERI and CSE have done a good job of educating and training the architecture community. There is also awareness among the global material manufacturers and suppliers. But sadly, there is still long way to go when it comes to training the remaining regional/ local participants of the construction industry. It would actually be fun if you walk through a local building materials market in your city and simply ask the vendors and buyers ‘what is green building’. This could result in an amusing montage on the state of green building in India and how far we still have to go.

We are building in a small state of Goa and have faced challenges in procuring items as simple as low-flow water fixtures. We are now accustomed to receiving blank stares from vendors, public officials and neighboring community at the mention of the word ‘Green Building’. An interesting anecdote is my conversation with my neighbor who was shocked at our plan to construct recharge pits to percolate rain water back into the earth. Her state of utter shock (and some extent distrust) stemmed from the fact that she could not comprehend why we would spend money on something that did not give us anything back. When I explained that sometimes actions need to be based on the larger common good and not only immediate personal gain, I was honored with the same blank stare…

It is surprising that in a state with a high percentage green cover, a rich agrarian culture, low population and density, the residents frequently complain about lack of adequate water supply. Goa is a coastal state and receives a very high amount of 3metres in rainfall every year. Still the water table around our site has been dropping over the years. The same neighbor as above attempted to dig a well in their property many years back and did not find water at decent depth. The obvious problem is that we are using resources at a much faster pace than the earth can replenish. This problem is of course much more pressing in cities but it is a shame when you find it in the seemingly green paradise of Goa. As with the rest of India, Goa is experiencing a building boom. The responsibility of builders to preserve this fragile remaining slice of extremely biodiverse and sensitive environment is extremely critical.

Green building is responsible building. Among global consumption of resources, buildings account for: 20% of water use; 25-40% of energy use; 30-40% of solid waste generation; 30-40% GHG emissions; and 40% of use of raw materials. While building anything, even a tiny house, one must understand that we are utilizing material, energy and water in construction, and changing the ecology of the site and surroundings forever. Plus, we are adding to the demand for resources for as long as the life of the building.

Another favorite statistic that should be a wake-up call to the current mainstream building practices in India is that the production of Portland cement accounts for 5 - 8% of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the major cause of climate change. The high emissions are due to the chemical process that produces cement and as a by-product generates large amounts of carbon dioxide. One ton of GHG is released with every one ton of cement production. These figures are shocking and must be considered while thoughtless construction of concrete frame-structure building and hardscaping of open areas.

I have added brief notes to your questionnaire. Your show can go a long way in educating the common man about the need and benefits of building green. I hope that you will attempt to dig deep into the subject. I wish you best for your project.

I am adding some biographical information about myself below. For more information on our project in Goa, you can visit:

http://www.newyorkgoadiaries.com/

http://www.newyorkgoadiaries.com/search/label/Green%20Building

Best

Anjali

View of the entrance courtyard, part of deck and pool pavilion

We have a small milestone to celebrate this week. We are completing 32 weeks into construction at our project site. With a projected total of 12-14 months as our construction timeline, we are close to the 60% milestone. The real reason to celebrate is that we have completed 60% of construction on-site and are almost on-track to finish within our projected schedule. For anyone who has built in India, this is quite a considerable feat. Projects in India are ridden with unexpected and often unexplained delays mainly due to the unorganized construction industry, loose legal frameworks and maybe skewed priorities among builders and contractors. While design is all glamorous and intellectual, the construction process is where one needs to get down and dirty with all kinds of details of sourcing the right materials, controlling quality on-site, meeting deadlines and coordinating with the various professionals involved. Our team deserves a lot of credit, they are working hard and have a common unique trait (that is central to our hiring process but sadly not that easy to find), they all "take pride in their work".

Last month, we had the privilege of a visit from two prominent architects from Delhi to our site. They left with two comments. First - "Finishing a project in India in 12 months is only possible if it is regular building, it is very difficult to finish a project in that time while building the way you are building". I guess they were referring to our load bearing stone wall structure that require much longer to build than a typical concrete structure, plus the large size of our rooms with high ceilings and possibly to the fact that we have very large openings and not little pigeon hole windows and doors. Their second comment was, "If the talent exists then how come we do not see buildings in Goa built in even half as conscientious manner as you are building." This is the best compliment we have received so far and I was joyous to hear this observation.

At our 60% milestone, we have completed nearly 90% of our civil works, electrical and internal plaster. Civil works for external landscaping is almost 50% complete. We are now busying ourselves with the internal and external door frames, plumbing and flooring.

Sketch rendering of our elevations and opening design

Since, we keep talking about our extra large openings, it is clearly evident that they are critical to our design proposition. We have gone back to our drawing boards many times in order to perfect the design of the fixed and movable doors and windows. The final design looks like the rendering above. All openings will comprise of fixed glass windows on top with wood louvers and movable sliding door panels below. The movable panels will all have a fixed shutter on one corner with wood louvers. All the remaining sliding doors when opened will stack behind this fixed frame. The louvers are designed such that they provide an interesting play of light and shadow within the room at different times of day. Louvers reduce direct sunlight and glare into the rooms. On the other hand, louvers also reduce the visibility to the outside. Keeping this in mind, the openings have been carefully designed with a balance of louvered panels and ones with clear glass.

Sample of a fixed louvered section of the opening built on-site for review

Another interesting functional design feature in our external opening design is that the fixed louver panels will actually be fitted with mosquito nets and have a sliding glass door behind them. This is our proposed solution after various design iterations to address the following conflicting factors that influence living in Goa:

- the ability to keep the doors open for as long as one can to connect with nature

- the insurgence of mosquitoes at dusk specially during monsoons

- the ability to allow for cross ventilation at all times of day even when there are mosquitoes, or if it is raining, or for any other reason the doors need to be kept closed

- the need to make the space air-tight if the use of mechanical air-conditioning is needed

Attention to details such as this comes only from living in a place through the seasons to know peculiarities in climate and livability. Trust me, I wish I had mosquito nets in the openings in my house that allowed cross ventilation, did not block my view, were easy to clean, not stuck with velcro, did not obstruct my ability to open and close my windows and most importantly kept the mosquitoes out but the breeze in.

Another key success of adding nets to the openings is enabling cross ventilation at all times and reducing the need for mechanical air-conditioning at all times of the day throughout the year. This reduces the energy requirement of the house and the pressure of added development on the land.

As a result of our opening design, 100% of our living spaces are daylit. This is based on the math that shows that 100% of our living area has a daylight factor of at least 2%. (Daylight Factor = Window Area/ Floor Area X Actual Visible Transmittance X Constant)

In addition, 100% of our living spaces have access to fresh air ventilation. This calculation is based on the area of openable windows as a proportion of the living area of each room.

Both these statistics far exceed the standards for Indoor Air Quality as mandated by leading green guidelines as being critical to healthy living.

So far so good. looking forward to more happy discoveries and experiments in the remaining 40%. 

View of the river and hills from the living room terrace

It is the month of July and we are right in the middle of monsoons in Goa. Monsoons in Goa bring with it torrential rains with gusty winds that sometimes continue for days without interruption. Most people agree that monsoon is the best time to be in Goa. Everything gets covered with a carpet of green. Plants grow several inches as if they were fed by artificial growth hormones. The sights and sounds of Goa in the monsoons are therapeutic in the most natural way.

Now let me tell you how it feels on our project site when it rains. First, you hear the rain approaching from a distance, rushing towards you. You see in a distance that the hills begin to blur from view. Then you can hear it above you but you miraculously remain dry due to thick tree cover. Finally, you start to feel a light spray of water that is escaping through the leaves. That is when you smile to yourself and decide whether to dash indoors for shelter or in the open to join in the fun...

From that romantic vision, let us turn our attention back to matters of construction, matters concerning brick, mortar and cement. As I explained in our last post, with the rains in full swing we are concentrating our energies to completing interior construction jobs. Last week on site, we completed the construction of internal partition walls in the main house. The material we have chosen for the internal walls is fly-ash bricks.

Fly-ash bricks being delivered to site

Fly-ash bricks are made with fly-ash that is a waste product from burning coal in power plants and sponge iron plants. This fly-ash when mixed with gypsum, lime (both also industrial waste products) and sand can be used to produce a viable building material in the form of fly-ash bricks. As a result, fly-ash bricks constitute 75% post industrial recycled material by weight. The performance properties of fly-ash bricks are also known to be comparable and in some cases better than regular brick, with high compressive strength, low water absorption, good thermal and sound insulation and no efflorescence.

The advantages of using fly-ash bricks are:

1. Recycling an industrial waste product for a new viable use. Fly-ash otherwise if not properly disposed is responsible for increasing air-pollution, making arable land infertile and contaminating water bodies.

2. Manufacturing of fly-ash bricks does not require firing. Fly-ash bricks are either sun-dried or steam dried. This eliminates the high energy use during the firing of regular bricks.

3. Reduces the need to quarry natural stone.

4. Fly-ash bricks are made locally in Goa about 50 kms. from our project site, reducing the embodied energy used in the transportation of the material to project site.

(Source for some of the above materials is an article written by Tallulah D'Silva on Fly-ash Bricks for Business Goa magazine, April Edition.)

Along, with fly-ash bricks, we have also chosen to use fly-ash cement in construction instead of regular Portland cement. It is not very well known but the production of Portland cement accounts for around 5% of global greenhouse gas (GHGs) emissions. It is estimated that the production of one ton of Portland cement produces about one ton of GHGs. Look out for more details in future posts on our use of fly-ash cement, load bearing walls and filler slabs in our effort to reduce the use of cement and concrete in this building.

Building partition walls with fly-ash bricks

Now that our contractor Partner 1, Binod Arya has returned to Goa and we convened a big meeting on-site with the entire team. The idea was to get the construction schedule back on track and develop a new plan for the monsoon that allows us to execute the next tasks in an efficient manner. It was decided that in the main house, the contractor will work on the wood and tile roofs and the internal partition walls next. Then move on to the internal door frames and then the doors for the main openings in the living room followed by the bedrooms. 

What would be the central courtyard in front of the main living room

We also addressed the material shortfall issue. The progress of our pavilion block had suffered severely due to the lack of supply of laterite stone. We dealt with the issue by switching to the use of regular brick to complete the walls of the staff quarters so we can move forward with this block. The next step here would then be to install the roof and then put up the steel structure for the pavilion above.

The pool and deck and beyond

Next, with all the woodwork ahead of us, we addressed the wood issue head-on. We had decided very early on to use as much reclaimed wood as we can in the project. Using reclaimed wood has obvious advantages. One is that we will reuse old wood and not cut new trees for our project. Secondly old wood is actually very well seasoned that reduces the well known problems of wood expanding and contracting with moisture that lead to jamming doors, wood splitting, bending and warping. In my initial discussion on the issue with my contractor, he explained to me that buying old reclaimed wood can cost me more or less the same as new wood and hence it is better for us to use the new wood as I guess for most people new is automatically always better. He went on to give me the example of another project that he is building and explained that ‘Madam - you see this project, we have cut an entire jungle for it’. This was the perfect starting point for my rhetoric on why using reclaiming old wood was important and why we must use it in our project. Contractors actually prefer working with new wood as it is softer and easy to work with. Old wood in comparison has hardened; require meticulous planning for reuse and need to be prepared for new use by shaving off the skin and removing any spoilt sections and nails and other aberrations. But our contractors are very admirable and know their craft well. They are open to and good at implementing new ideas. After a short discussion, they are on-board with the plan.

Mainly in the project, we are using two types of wood – local timber (Matti, Jack) and Burma Teak. We have found vendors that deal with reclaimed Teak in Mumbai. For local timber on the other hand, there is no organized trade that exists in the state. So we resorted to some innovative sourcing techniques. As a result we have been combing through all types of old wood waiting to be found and reused, from packing wood, to doors and windows to wood beams and rafters from old roofs. We are mostly interested in the later. After short listing a few, my architect and I have been cris-crossing the state to look at available wood to judge its quality and reusability. The main criteria is to make sure that the reclaimed wood in not bent, does not have significant termite damage and has not become brittle over time. We think we have found 3-4 sources of good supply. In the next couple of weeks, we will carefully study our requirements vs. the wood that is available and purchase the necessary quantities. More updates on this will follow.