Got Green?

July 7, 2006

   And, for a large majority of those of you reading this, it’s probably something off in the wild (and very clean) blue yonder that may not make the tiniest of dents in your business through the next decade. Since that would make for a very short column and a lot of blank space, let’s go back to the first paragraph.
   And that’s the problem with the movement to go green, or sustainable design, or whatever the current tag is for buildings with an environmental bent. It can be a disaster. It can be a blessing. And, it can make little difference to a lot of you out there.
   Green is a great buzzword. For more than a quarter-century, since the first Earth Day in 1970, being environmental-friendly is something you really can’t attack head-on. It’s like crusading against the fat content of Girl Scout Cookies® or creating a no-smiling-babies zone; at the core, it’s just a good thing.
   For years, the most-effective argument came not with the idea, but the cost. It’s a nice idea, and we can do some high-visibility, low-impact duties (such as eliminating Styrofoam® cups from the lunchrooms of America), but much of this is time-consuming and expensive. Just toss those cola cans in the right receptacle and we’re doing fine, folks.
   The counterargument is a healthy, thick slice of promoting public good and responsibility, as expounded by the likes of former Vice President Al Gore and activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The latter’s presentation last month to the annual convention of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) became a prelude to the group’s meeting next year in San Antonio, where the entire theme will be on sustainable design.
   Whatever you might think of the recent push for green – whether it’s public service, ecological stewardship, political maneuvering, shameless promotion or a mix of all of these – it’s getting stronger and possibly trumping the it-costs-too-much crowd.
   Green’s momentum poses a dilemma for dimensional stone, with good, bad and invisible consequences. Let’s take the bad news first.
   The certification yardstick for green construction is a rather large mouthful: the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®) Green Building Rating System®. It’s a process of using a set of standards to establish a tally of credits that, as they add up, determines a building’s greenness. The more materials and construction processes that are friendly to the environment, the higher the credit count, and vice versa.
   Unfortunately, this is all on a case-by-case, building-by-building process. It’s not like the UBC, where copper wiring is good and aluminum wiring is shown all but the evil eye. And, currently, there’s no set determination for stone.
   Dimensional stone may get bad marks, mainly because of its origin. LEED specs favor local materials to cut down on energy consumption, and it takes plenty of cumulative power to cut a block of granite in India, process it, and transport the slabs to, say, St. Louis. Given that the overwhelming majority of dimensional stone used in the United States comes from overseas, it’s not exactly a material burgeoning with green credits.
   Stone isn’t exactly renewable, either, unless you want to wait a couple million years for the next round of Uba Tuba to form up. It pales next to something like wood in the regenerated-resource department, although I’m still looking for those lumberjacks working a forest of 2’ X 2’ parquet flooring ready for installation.
   On the good side, a hunk of quarried stone is natural, which does mean a lot in green certification. It’s a matter of the stone’s origin; if the quarry is within 500 miles, the LEED credit kicks in. If you’re using recycled stone from a remodeled or demolished building, or from prior mistakes, the credit chips start to stack tall. Stone’s insulating qualities also help save energy in heating and cooling buildings, which is also an LEED goal.
   And then, well … who cares? Most of the LEED emphasis of the moment is on large projects from government agencies and corporations looking to buff their images as good guys and gals in green hats. It’s not a factor in 99 percent of residential construction, and it’s going to be a particularly weird customer who wants to champion environmental causes with a kitchen countertop.
   Or it is strange? The politics of green are growing mainstream by the day, and lofty goals and mandates about sustainable design may turn into quotas and laws on a state and local basis. Your competition may end up as less solid surface and quartz-based materials and more hard-surface countertops made from recycled beer bottles or waste paper (please check your doubts at www.icestone.com, www.tmi-online.com and www.shetkastone.com, among other places).
   It won’t pay to be indifferent about where stone fits in the green pool of materials. Luckily, it’s an area where the Natural Stone Council is taking an aggressive and proactive role in helping to literally carve out an identity for stone; in terms of long-term results for the industry, it’s the most-important task the NSC may have on its to-do list.
   The concentration on using stone that’s quarried close to a project courting LEED credits may also be a boon for the thousands of sites around the country where production petered out in the Great Depression. There’s a huge palette of indigenous stones that fell out of favor due to hard economic times and the rise of concrete; small quarries can come back to life as part of the green movement.
   There are plenty of other considerations with the green movement – processors and fabricators may need to curb the amount of wasted stone, for example – and there’s plenty of work ahead in getting the material noticed with those touting sustainable design. It’ll take a different approach in selling, and working on more U.S. quarrying … but, overall, green’s a go for stone.