I happen to be a builder in the Atlanta area and I build green modern homes. Our homes are some of the greenest in the country with green roofs, solar hot water, graywater capture, etc. I've also renovated homes in the past. The new homes we build are on infill lots and the majority of the time we have to demolish a house on that lot. The houses are essentially already falling down themselves. There is a very vocal minority of homeowners in the the Atlanta area, and around the country, who are against infill housing for various reasons, but in regards to the 'rational' that renovating homes is more green than tearing them down and building new ones is extremely short-sighted, naive and flat out wrong 99% of the time.

Yes, tearing down and landfilling an existing structure and then building a new one is initially more enviromentally impacting than leaving the current one as is. But what people fair to realize are the very obvious reasons why leaving that structure is going to be more damaging to the enviroment and the surrounding neighborhood even in the short-term.

- Renovating a severely dilapidated house often times takes almost as much material, energy, man-hours, time, and money as building new...often times it can require more than a new construction.

- Even a fully renovated home is never going to be as energy efficient as a newly built one (that is if it's one of the homes we build). You can completely gut a 60 year old ranch and do everything possible to make it the most energy efficient home it can be, but it will still pale in comparison to a home designed to be energy efficient from the ground up. I should know...I live in that 60 year-old renovated ranch and our energy efficiency isn't that great compared to the homes I build. People also need to remember that most people renovating a home can't afford to completely gut it down to studs and then rebuild and will more than likely merely make cosmetic renovations; therefore this type of 'renovation' is going to yield an even more energy inefficient house. An energy inefficient home can quickly become many times more damaging to the environment than a newly constructed energy efficient home.

- Infill housing keeps neighborhoods' property values up and is driven by demand. If people wanted to pay $250,000 to live in a run-down 2 bedroom 800 sqft house in the heart of the city they would...but they don't. Every neighborhood that has passed some sort of infill construction ban in Atlanta, that doesn't have valuable historic architecture, has seen a decrease not only in property values, but the condition of the houses in the area. Most of these neighborhoods are now moving to lift these bans due to the fact that it is cost-ineffective to renovate these homes and no one can essentially build newer homes, so the houses in the area just begin to decay after 50 60 years.

- Most tear down homes are beyond their life-span. At least in my area, the homes that are being torn down were built very poorly and have been kept very poorly. To try and keep a building of this type many times takes more energy and cost than to just build new.

Trust me, I hate throwing away anything let alone a structure, but you've got to be rational when evaluating the benefits of keeping a 50-80 year old dilapidated house that consumes the same amount of energy as 3 new homes of equal size. Common sense needs to prevail in these cases.

Perhaps the point isn't that old buildings shouldn't be replaced, but that we'd be better off recycling what building materials we can, rather than demolishing a building and sending those materials to a landfill.

Everyone has to do their part - Treehugger "recycled" this photo from a previous post!

I live in a city that is currently undergoing a massive rennovation (I joke that it sounds like Beirut...and looks like it at time, too!) including rennovation, demo, and rebuilding.

The rebuilding often happens because what was originally built is full of asbestos, mold, unsound floorings, etc. What is put up in its place is thoughtful construction.

Interesting addendum in favor of demo - directly across the street from the 8-story high rise I live in is a lot with 2 parking garages, a parking lot, and a few shops (building built in the early 1900s but have been neglected and are not pretty) all of which is being taken down via wrecking ball. They're "rebuilding" a park on that block and I can't wait.

Directly across the street is an historical building of major significane (Lee Harvey Oswald was shot in the basment) which one of our state universities would like to convert into a law school.

It's all about moderation. If the end result is a more efficient, attractive, 'hood of a city -- bring on the wrecking balls and architects.

We can't forget about the important role of deconstruction in taking down old buildings when it happens.

Take this scenario: let's assume we get to the point where buildings are 50% more energy efficient and 30% more water efficient than buildings built prior to 2000. Also assume that current buildings have 3x better IAQ as compared to structures finished prior to 1978.

Now - by keeping these older buildings, we have to weigh the opportunity cost of that building not being next generation green tech. It uses more energy. It uses more precious water. It's more unhealthy on the interior.

So what do you do? You try to rehab it. But in getting to the point of rehab, you strip it down to the bones and add a little here and there. You're not that far from complete demolition. So it's important to weigh the opportunity cost of keeping an out-of-date building, including the requirements to bring it up to green par.

Treehugger has often told us that keeping a car older than 10 years on the road is worse than using a new, ultra-fuel-efficient car, because the emissions cost to make a car are much less than the emissions savings from fuel efficiency.

Therefore, following the same logic, it does not make sense to keep old, fuel inefficient homes standing.

I am an Architect in Cape Town, South Africa. The practice i work for not only reuses builing materials from demolished buildings but designs new ones to be easily disassembled and reused.

-similarly, legislated consideration should be given to new construction on pristine greenspaces when there is plenty o’ brownfield to go around!

Just like cars, I feel. Some are worth maintaining, and some are a disaster just to turn on. It's an environmental cost/benefit analysis.

There is not a solitary solution to our environmental problems, at least not one that we can all agree to follow. And there doesn't need to be. We can be environmentally resposible six billion different ways if we want to. It is really the end that justifies the means.

Oh yeah, just this:

"...an historic building..." is a popular mistake

According to every respected english language reference in use on planet earth (including OED, Chicago Style and Merriam Webster), it's "a historic building" unless you are pronouncing 'historic' as 'istoric.'

LA: I know that American dictionaries would not say an historic, but I have done so all my life, and say it that way as well. Oxford says:

"There is still some divergence of opinion over the form of the indefinite article to use preceding certain words beginning with h- when the first syllable is unstressed: 'a historical document' or 'an historical document'; 'a hotel' or 'an hotel'. The form depends on whether the initial h is sounded or not: an was common in the 18th and 19th centuries, because the intitial h was commonly not pronounced for these words. In standard modern English the norm is for the h to be pronounced in words like hotel and historical, and therefore, the indefinite article a is used; however, the older form, with the silent h and the indefinite article an, is still encountered, especially among older speakers."

so I guess I am dating myself and placing myself outside of the USA.

Looks like from the comments what we need are better, smarter demolition techniques that recycle and reuse materials, rather than an outright ban.

There always seems to be a reason as to why we should ban this or that, with the end result being that should probably just roll over and curl up and die, since ANYTHING we do is bad.

Instead, we need to realize that someones interests will ALWAYS be impacted. The question is: is the overall benefit greater than the impact?

Wind power, for example, would help to solve our energy needs. Unfortunately, too many times it's opposed for "looks" or because it MIGHT impact property values, or because some birds may be killed.

Fine. Actions have consequences. But are those consequences greater or less than, say, dealing with the issues created by global warming, or having your son or daughter dying over an oil well?

I also like the irony in that this story is next to "New Drywall From Serious Materials Saves Serious Energy". Did the authors take new construction materials and techniques into account when they proposed their ban? Is doing so saving enough aluminum cans?

Those that support green ideas need to stop jumping on the bandwagon when a green idea comes around and actually think about it. Ban demolitions? Seriously?

Not only will this never work, but ATL ModGreen pretty much made it clear why it's a bad idea. But I would like to take it one step further. What happens to the building and houses in Louisiana and Mississippi? After Katrina many of the buildings in those areas had so much water that mold and bacteria quickly took over. Are those buildings to be renovated or kept because we cannot demolish buildings due to a ban?

I hate to come off as an a** but this is a great example of why "TreeHuggers", environmentalists, and others like myself will not be taken seriously in society. As Michael Long indicated we should instead be looking into ways to recycle building waste and manufacture buildings in ways where they not only produce less waste, but can be disassembled easily. We need to focus on the real, pressing issues at hand.

Have you ever tried to bring an old building up to current buiding codes, provide "modern" services and expected conveniences for the occupants, and make a bit of money?

Construction is a business, we are all entitiled to a margin, and usually refurbs turn into an act of charity/love/folly.

Having said that, if the individual materials are able to be reused, fantastic, - where theres muck there's brass, and somebody somewhere will be working out a way to make a buck out of that.

'The houses are essentially already falling down themselves....in regards to the 'rational' that renovating homes is more green than tearing them down and building new ones is extremely short-sighted, naive and flat out wrong 99% of the time.'

- My first reaction on reading this statement was: what utter rubbish. 99% of the time tearing down an old structure and rebuilding it from stratch is short-sighted, naive and flat out wrong. (Of course, the 99% number is an extreme exaggeration whether used for or against new building construction.) But reading the complete post and those of the other commenters led me to see why there is this fundamental difference in opinion. The posters all seem to be reflecting on traditional American home architecture - in other words, wood homes. Whereas I live in Europe and take that as my backdrop. And in southern Europe (where I live) few homes are made of wood - the overwhelming majority are masonry. This argument goes to show what I have been saying on many occasions here at TH: masonry homes in most cases are 'greener' than wood homes because they last much, much longer. Wood homes deteriorate quickly and are especially vulnerable to all types of climatic extremes - excessive sun, excessive moisture, hurricane winds, flooding, fires, rot, termites and other insects, warping and cracking, etc, etc. To avoid most of these problems requires very regular and intensive maintenance and it is my opinion that: 'To try and keep a building of this type many times takes more energy and cost than to just build new.' Wooden homes simply 'fall apart' within a person's lifetime. Masonry homes do not. As an example, my sister's French boyfriend (a relatively young guy) has inherited a plot of land with a centuries old stone barn. The walls are massive, thick and made of local stone. The roof is made of wooden beams and boards. The structure hasn't been maintained in many many decades, so the roof is basically falling apart and useless. However, the walls are as solid and safe as the day they were built. This guy plans to renovate the barn into a home rather than tear-down and rebuild because it will be faster, easier and cheaper for him. The walls will stay but the roof basically has to be redone. Suffice it to say that if the entire structure had been wood, the choice would most likely have been tear it down and rebuild from scratch. Masonry homes do have considerably more embodied energy than wood homes but such an argument against them is inappropriate because masonry homes last many times longer than wood homes. If society does not want to go tearing down homes every 50 years, then they need to be building with brick, stone and concrete rather than wood. Such houses not only last longer and require much less maintenance, they are also safer in many extreme weather situations such as high winds, flooding, fires, etc. (Notable exception being strong earthquakes.) Futhermore, these masonry buildings, with their high thermal mass, if properly designed, built and insulated, drastically reduce both heating and cooling energy needs, in some locations completely eliminating their need.

I am of the opinion that it is silly to build a house that will effectively last only one lifetime (if lucky two) unless the raw material (such as wood or strawbales) is extremely renewable, sustainable, and within walking distance. Otherwise, the best thing is usually to build masonry homes as they will easily last many lifetimes, eliminating the need to constantlly rebuild - with all the energy, expense and hassle that that entails. As for the argument that old masonry homes in good condition need to be torn down to make them more energy-efficient, I think that to be incorrect logic. It is completely possible to make any old home as energy-efficient and water-efficient as any new-built home - it simply requires the right design, materials and technologies. The question is how expensive will it be to renovate an old home to the standards of new homes - NOT whether it can be done or not.

'Even a fully renovated home is never going to be as energy efficient as a newly built one (that is if it's one of the homes we build). '

- As I stated above, it is not a question if it can or can not be. It is a question of cost. ANY old masonry home in good condition can be made as resource efficient as a comparatively-sized new home - even the ones you build. Some old homes will require little cost to bring their efficiencies up, some will require LOTS of money. And in my opinion, renovation costs are greatly influenced by the intelligence, experience and work-ethic of the architect designing the needed renovations - get a smart, experienced, and hard-working 'green' architect and he/she will find a way to renovate the house to high-efficiency at a reasonably cost. If an architect says that a masonry building can't be renovated to high efficiency, than the problem is the architect - NOT the building.

I basically agree with most of the rest of the comments made by ATL.

'... keeping a car older than 10 years on the road is worse than using a new, ultra-fuel-efficient car, because the emissions cost to make a car are much less than the emissions savings from fuel efficiency. Therefore, following the same logic, it does not make sense to keep old, fuel inefficient homes standing.'

- IMO, all old homes (that are not literally falling apart) can be made extremely energy-efficient WITHOUT the need to completely tear them down and rebuild. It is all a question of cost. And in good measure cost will depend on the renovation architect's abilities at finding solutions. But I do agree that the embodied energy of homes is only a fraction of the operational energy of the home's lifetime, so it is more important to have a home that uses little operational energy rather than to focus on minimizing the homes embodied energy. A reason which I stated above in arguing for masonry homes.

'we should instead be looking into ways to....manufacture buildings in ways where they....can be disassembled easily.'

- As stated above, I think most homes - the overwhelming majority of them - should be built of masonry and have expounded a few of those reasons in this post. As such, I tend to disagree with the idea of easily 'disassembled' homes because masonry homes are not easy to disassemble (at least I have not seen or heard of any masonry construction systems that allow or hint at easy disassembly) and I think it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to come up with such masonry homes. And I believe homes should last as long as possible. Homes should not be treated as disposable products or as dismountable. Tearing down and rebuilding is energy intensive and so is putting up, disassembing and then reassembling (if less so). Yes, we need to maximize operational resource efficiency, but this can achieve through renovations - sometimes easily and cheaply, other times not so. What we need to do is design good passive solar-cooling homes appropriate to local climate and environmental context that are able to last as long as possible without undue maintenance needs. For me, in most instances, this means fixed, permanent passive small masonry homes.