Taking the LEED in China: Beijing's Building Green
by Alex Pasternack, Beijing, China on 12.27.06
China’s GDP is rising faster than a Beijing office building or housing project. But the color of that tower going up across the street—wherever you are there seems to be a crane and an army of construction workers—is slowly turning from the city’s traditional red to a neat shade of green. Over at China Dialogue, I've written something about the trend towards sustainable building in China’s capital, where the LEED green building standard has already been plastered on the scaffolding for a handful of new developments, like Steven Holl’s "filmic" Linked Hybrid mixed-use complex (above). Sure, greenwashing abounds on the real estate market (as it does in the supermarket), but that doesn’t mean architects and engineers aren’t incorporating low-E and rainwater collection into their vocabulary. LEED guru Rob Watson makes regular trips to the capital to meet with designers and officials (who are working on a homegrown standard), and everyone from developers to home buyers to big companies are lining up to learn more. Sure, LEED may have its naysayers (arguing among other things that the standard can be prohibitively hard), and indeed, getting the necessary materials is still harder in Beijing then, say, New York. But the increasingly easier LEED regime is helping construct greener buildings here, and giving green design something that can’t hurt in an increasingly image-conscious China: a nice shiny brand name.
See also the Church of LEED and Inhabitat’s LEED gospel.
China...shiny brand name...in the same sentence...???
China has a 1.2 billion people, and nearly half of them live with dirt floors.
That country is growing to big and to fast for its own good, there’s a HUGE social divide there, and its only getting worse...You tree huggers may like them now because they build a few "green" buildings...but In 5-10 years they will be a biggest consumer and polluter on the globe...then what will you be saying…
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Alex responds: No one is ignoring the fact that China's income gap is growing, nor is anyone naive about the prospect of billions of yuan more each year in disposable income to match Western lifestyle ambitions. But green buildings are better than no green buildings--and if the allure of a (Western) standard like LEED can both improve the quality of sustainable architecture and raise its profile, all the better.
I agree that a few green buildings are better than no green buildings, but still remain skeptical. I am an American living in China and have little hope for environmental issues. I live in the West where no one cares or would not put the money or effort into such things.
I'm hoping someone can help me find the video that appears to be on the topic of building green in china that was on cable (??? channel) in February 2007. It was fantastic and I would like to be able to use in a class I teach
Thanks in advance
Dwight Ely
For my update on the green building situation in China, check out this latest Treehugger post:
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/03/building_green_china.php
Alex
how many peasants are they kicking off their land to build that thing? whats wrong with dirt floors, is that leed certified?
Truth be told, this may be a little too positive about where things are going that side of the world. But, hopefully that would be sorted out, as many Chinese are actually starting to see things a little differently.
The West has also got to be honest about it's approach. While I'm glad to see green buildings and plans for the new World Trade Center, that's only a scratch on what cities like New York need. Besides the obvious, the amount of food waste America produces is totally ridiculous, and the country requires a huge change of philosophy if it wants to be practising what it preaches.
I thought China is running out of land area to house its people. This is why there are lots of Chinese living outside China. So where did this land area for such a huge and posh building come from?