New Orleans Sees Green Rebuilding Efforts

Recent ordinances under consideration in New Orleans demonstrate that in the effort to rebuild after Hurricane Katrina, green building advocates are playing a role. In August 2006, the City Council approved a resolution spelling out a “Green Building Program” that would require City-funded buildings to achieve Gold certification in the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED^® Rating System and offer incentives for private-sector commercial and residential developments that meet LEED and Energy Star™ standards. According to Beth Galante, director of the New Orleans office of the nonprofit Global Green USA, each portion of the Green Building Program must now come before the City Council as an ordinance. The first portion of the program, legislation establishing a procedure for net metering, is currently undergoing public review and should return to the Council for final approval by the spring of 2007.

Another ordinance currently under review is the voluntary “Standard of Sustainability,” which lays out broad criteria for residential development in the city. According to Christophor Faust of the ReGen Group, which crafted the standard, it has been approved by the City Council, which is putting together a roundtable of experts to craft the final language of the ordinance. Prisca Weems, principal of FutureProof, LLC, who is involved in the Council’s efforts, enlarged the scope of this work, telling EBN that the roundtable would be looking not only at the standard but also at how it fits with the recommendations laid out in the green building program outlined in the August 2006 resolution.

A draft version of the voluntary standard includes a commissioning requirement for sustainable dwellings and targets a service life of “at least 30 generations.” It also defines a home as having passive survivability (see EBN Vol. 15, No. 5) if “comfort is not degraded” and “food refrigeration is not compromised” should the home be disconnected from the grid for a week. Although the standard offers specific measures for achieving some of its goals, many of its requirements lack methods of measuring success. According to Weems, there are “a lot of questions about whether the standard can be implemented.” Galante agreed, saying that while the document “seems to encourage a much higher standard for buildings,” it’s unclear how it will specifically work in legislation or building codes. “As a resolution setting goals for the city, however,” she added, “it certainly seems laudable.”

– Allyson Wendt

For more information:

New Orleans City Council
New Orleans, Louisiana
504-658-1000
www.nocitycouncil.com

Global Green USA, New Orleans Office
New Orleans, Louisiana
504-525-2121
www.globalgreen.org

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Passive Survivability: A New Design Criterion for Buildings EBN: Feature - May 2006

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