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Waste - Recycling in the TrenchesLEED Construction Company ArticlesSpotlight
on Green Builders - Construction & Demolition Waste - Recycling in the TrenchesBy
Jacqueline HershipsIn
today’s world of shrinking throwaway options, a reuse, recycle approach is rapidly
becoming practical, and construction professionals are being forced to focus on
this idea by a combination of growing popular support for GREEN plus dollars and
cents considerations-whether they are environmentally minded or not. According
to Frank Coolick, Administrator of Department of Environmental Protection’s Solid
and Hazardous Waste Program - http://www.nj.gov/dep/dshw/ there were over 400
landfill sites in N.J. in the 1970s many of which accepted construction and demolition
waste. Today there are 13 and one is scheduled to close at some point in the foreseeable
future. The pressure is on, says Mr. Buono, who is also a founding member
of US Green Building Council’s N.J. Chapter (USGBC-NJ). It’s very important now
to get people thinking about sustainability and recycling. Mr. Buono entered this
once unlikely marriage between his chosen profession of construction waste management
(CWM) and environmentalism, as a result of this point of view. Not one to
pull punches he spoke of ‘garbage’ a number of times during our discussion, and
said he sees garbage as a key bridge connecting people to GREEN. “People relate
to garbage much more than they do to geothermal or sunlighting,” he said. When
they hear about recycling garbage they say – “Oh yeah – saving the planet”. It
is because of people like Mr. Buono that the times are a-changing. To those invested
in building awareness of the new GREEN order, garbage has become our teacher –
first, because it is everywhere and second, because it isn’t going anywhere unless
we rethink our practices and policies. The ascendancy of USGBC’s LEED -
Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design - rating system is an indicator
that environmental concerns are being taken seriously. Language on the national
USGBC website illustrates how overarching this system is, stating that “LEED gives
building owners and operators the tools they need to have an immediate and measurable
impact on their buildings’ performance… promoting a whole-building approach to
sustainability by recognizing performance in five key areas of human and environmental
health: sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials
selection, and indoor environmental quality.” Yet because LEED standards are still
relatively new to the world of construction and demolition – the USGBC itself
was only founded in the 1993 - working towards even one LEED certification is
regarded as a major undertaking by many, and is not entered into lightly. Achieving
a LEED certification is regarded as a cause for pride. It is therefore noteworthy
that Mr. Buono, who has been hammering away at recycling C&D waste for over twenty
years, has created construction waste management programs for 32 LEED projects,
including the ground breaking Willow School, in Gladstone, N.J. the first LEED
Gold Certified Building in the state (2002) - which recycled over 90% of its waste
at a significant net cost savings for the project. Simply put, Mr. Buono
goes in as a consultant, conducts a waste audit and identifies the percentage
which can be removed from the dumpster. He anticipates saving the cost of paying
for those disposal services completely. Yet, broaching a waste management program
can still be a tough sell. To succeed in his mission he has to bring in the idea
of recycling without alienating his clients. While most people are theoretically
in favor of a healthy environment, in most cases, he said, dollars and cents are
still the bottom line. His job is to get them to see that recycling can be conducted
at least at the same cost as not recycling, and more likely at an unanticipated
profit which can be used for GREEN materials and systems later on. He wants to
get his clients to see that being GREEN is not simply amorphously ‘good,’ it is
good business and very good PR. This is why planning is of the essence,
Mr. Buono says. But when a company throws its hat into the LEED arena, there is
a much bigger picture to consider. LEED provides a roadmap for measuring and documenting
success for every building type and every phase of a building’s lifecycle by attaching
points to carefully articulated specifics within a number of categories including:
- New Commercial Construction and Major Renovation projects
- Existing
Building Operations and Maintenance
- Commercial Interiors projects
- Core
and Shell Development projects
- Homes
Neighborhood Development - Guidelines
for Multiple Buildings and On-Campus Building Projects
- LEED for Schools
- LEED
for Retail
Each one has C&D components according to Robert Kobet, AIA,
President of Sustainaissance International and a lecturer on the topic of LEED
accreditation and the credits or points required to fulfill LEED requirements
- rkobet@yahoo.com. In the CWM arena LEED rewards you differently for those things
which are kept out of the landfill and those things which are kept out of the
landfill and then reused in other building projects, he said. Attention is paid
to the quantities involved, and innovation is rewarded. For example, projects
are rewarded for increasing demand for building materials and products that are
extracted and manufactured nearby, thereby reducing the environmental impact of
transportation. They are also rewarded for using rapidly renewable building materials
and products made from plants that are typically harvested within a ten year cycle
or shorter, reducing the use and depletion of finite raw materials and long-cycle
renewable materials. If you do an exemplary job, he said, you can score additional
materials reuse points (MR).According to Mr. Coolick, we generate 6 million
tons of C&D a year – much of it concrete. Thanks to Mike Buono and companies like
his, over 80% of that gets ground up to be reused for purposes such as fill for
foundations or road bedding, for example. “One container of concrete – the heaviest
of materials – weighs 10-12 tons. You can have that container recycled for $350.
Or you can throw it out at $65 a ton which is about double the cost. For years
they’ve picked up all the waste and taken it to a landfill,” he said, “even though
it is possible to recycle at half the cost of throwing it away, in part because
there are no landfill fees.” In short - there is money to be made, says
Mr. Buono. There are an awful lot of things that come out of the buildings that
are recylcable – glass, steel, masonry, brick, stone – so many dollars per pound
of stuff. Often, even GREEN oriented construction projects don’t realize that
they can be sustainable right from the start, before their buildings are built.
And so he continues preaching the cost benefits of putting a waste management
plan in place right from the beginning, whether in construction or deconstruction,
rather than just throwing the stuff away. The challenge is to figure out how we
are going to achieve the level of recycling we need, he said. “Sustainability
is important. It’s important to do sustainability even before you build.” For
more information on LEED certifications visit the USGBC.org website. About
the AuthorJacqueline Herships is a publicist and communications
strategist working to build public understanding of Sustainability, Green Building,
Smart Growth, Community Redevelopment and the Environment. Her column "Spotlight
on Green Builders" appears in the US Green Building Council (USGBC-NJ) newsletter.
For further information: jacqueline@jacquelineherships.com http://jacquelineherships.com Article
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