While any structure built in a way that lessens its footprint is welcomed, some of the buildings that people try to turn green simply make no sense.
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LEED certification, in all its greatness, does not take the building’s intended purpose into account; this leaves us with some hilarious, unabashedly self-contradicting buildings. Here are the ten of the most laughable green buildings:
1. BP’s Helios House Gas Station – Los Angeles, Cal.
Yes, there is an LEED-certified gas station. It’s actually a nice building, complete with rainwater collection, solar panels, recycled building materials, and LED lighting. However, don’t think you’ll be able to refuel with biodiesel or charge up your electric car—they’re only in the petroleum-dealing business. How green of them, right?
2. Justin Timberlake’s Golf Course/Lodge – Woodstock, Tenn.
So Justin Timberlake decided that he wants to buy a golf course and fix it up with an LEED-certified lodge. While it’s an improvement compared to most other golf courses, the fact remains that maintaining a golf course takes chemicals and lots of water. In the United States alone, golf courses total more than 1.7 million acres and consume around 4 billion gallons of water every day. How does a green lodge counteract the water used to maintain the course? Justin, if you really want to be green, you should have turned it into a wildlife sanctuary instead.
3. Nestle Pure Life Water Bottling Plant – Boiling Springs, Tenn.
While this isn’t the only LEED-certified water bottling plant, it’s listed for having the most greenwashed name. Ozarka, Arrowhead, Ice Mountain, and Deer Park water bottling plants also have LEED certifications of some sort, but they couldn’t compete with Pure Life in the name department. If anyone needs a reminder of why bottling water is a bad idea, here are five reasons to ditch the bottle. Oh, and Nestle as a whole won’t be getting an award for their treatment of the planet and its people any time soon.
4. Logan Airport Terminal A – Boston, Mass.
Activists in England have put their freedom on the line protesting against a third runway at the enormous Heathrow Airport; do you think they’d be more satisfied with the runway if the airport terminal was LEED certified, with solar panels and the whole bit? You’d be right to assume they wouldn’t, because whether they take off from a green building or not, airplanes are still one of the top causes of global warming.
5. Toyota Car Dealership – Rockwall, Tex.
While Toyota is almost synonymous with green when it comes to cars, in reality they’re not much better than any other car company. They have a full line of vehicles, including four-wheel-drive SUV’s, some of which are 8-cylinder. In fact, their entire fleet’s average gas mileage is worse than Chevrolet’s. Perhaps they should clean up their cars before trying to green their dealerships?
6. Antilia Tower – Mumbai, India
While this probably will not be LEED certified, it has been often mentioned as being one of the greenest building concepts on the planet. While it does look beautiful and will act as a giant carbon sink in the middle of the city, there’s a major problem: it will be the home of one family. No matter how green this building is, that is a complete waste of space in a city known for its overcrowding.
7. Civic Center Parking Garage – Santa Monica, Cal.
The only green parking garage I want to see would be located at a train or bus station for people to drop off their cars to finish their commute on mass transit. To quote every politician involved in the 2008 campaign, “You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig.”
8. Vacation Home Development – Las Vegas, Nev.
You only need one house, people! Granted that seven of these eight homes are 1/12 shares, these homes are being built in a desert (Las Vegas) and if anyone needs a water-capture system, it’s people who live there year-around. Simply due to their excess, vacation homes may be the least environmentally-friendly structures on earth.
9. Spaceport America - New Mexico
Another case of the rich attempting to make the rest of us think they’re doing the world a favor. Recreational space travel, at least with the current technology, is a huge and unnecessary carbon polluter. But hey, the spaceport will be LEED certified, so everything’s going to be fine, right?
10. Every Fancy New Building – Dubai, United Arab Emirates
I know, I know — I cheated on this one. I couldn’t pick just one since they’re all ridiculous for the same reason. The government is intent on making Dubai one of the biggest, most gaudy places on earth. Perhaps to compensate for unending excess, they’ve mandated that all new buildings must have specific eco-minded properties, but when you take all of it in at once, you know it’s nothing but a giant waste of resources.
Image Credits: (All Flickr under CC License) Top from J. Phil on Flickr. 1. danperry.com on Flickr 2. BP 3. Macon County, TN 4. MileageNYC on Flickr 5. Dushaun on Flickr 6. Concept illustration 7. City of Santa Monica 8. Emre Ersahin 9. Spaceport America 10. utpal. on Flickr
This is just more proof that you can’t slap a “green” label on anything and have it fly.
The lipstick quote really applies here. Makes me embarassed to be a LEED Accredited Professional.
Nice job!!
I disagree with your position on the Toyota Dealership in Rockwall, Texas. The building itself, for which the ownership is responsible, is in fact green and has achieved LEED Gold Status for its construction and conservation. The availability of gasoline powered automobiles is another matter over which the dealership has no control. You are talking apples/oranges here. If you wish to evaluate and compare automobiles from different manufacturers, fine. If you wish to compare dealership structures with other dealership structures, fine. But … don’t play down the importance of those facilities that are built with environmental concerns at the top of the list. Toyota of Rockwall is an exceptional facility and I’d compare it to any other ‘green’ or LEED Gold facility in the country.
The plant at Boiling Springs Tennessee has me wondering if they bottle boiling water. More likely they just use energy from the grid to power a filtration system to process municipal tap water.
Bob,
Thanks for your comment, but I think you may have misunderstood my intentions in writing this post.
As I said in the first sentence, all buildings that are designed with the environment in mind are welcomed. I don’t care if it’s an LEED-certified coal-fired power plant, of course it’d still be an improvement.
But that doesn’t stop me from pointing out the blatant contradiction between its purpose and its design. If you’re peddling something that’s bad for the environment, it’s much easier to build an LEED-certified building to house your product than it is to change the product altogether.
Personally, I’d rather buy a car from an electric car dealership that lacks LEED certification.
But in the end, remember that this post is in jest and that any action taken to lessen humanity’s impact on nature is appreciated.
-Alex
yes, dubai is a giant waste of resources. i think its funny that they’re using money from oil to pay for all of these buildings… and when the ice caps melt, they will flood all the islands and buildings that they built.
Lovely post.Hilarious examples.
Isn’t all that wretched excess in Dubai built on, um… sand? ….and at sea level?
LEED is the planting process. Just because a building gets LEED certification does no guarantee that it will remain green in the future.
What about LEED buildings that:
1. Have underground parking whereby car exhaust gets into the elevators.
2. That have a large waste footprint.
3. That have significant interior out-gassing from printers, copiers, and fax machines.
4. That have no carbon or waste reduction plans.
Thanks, Alex. My main point was that the facility itself goes a long way and sets an excellent example of how to conserve resources. It just happened that this one is an auto dealership. Had it been for some other purpose (a school or municipal building) it probably wouldn’t have made your list.
Thanks again.
Since the building is housing an environmentally unfriendly product, like the space port, perhaps the building should be environmentally unfriendly as well. Rather than try an clean upt a little at a time, lets just forget the whole thing!
Your reference to using electric cars makes me wonder, where do you paln on getting yourt electricity, from coal fired or oil fired plants, hydroelectric dams? Wind and solar aren’t there yet, and all the others are not carbon dioxide or water friendly.
That is the irony that is “Green.” Million dollar mansions, wasteful commercial buildings, silly garages and contradictions in terms when it comes to Green.
While I applaud all efforts to build sensibly, environmentally and with energy efficiency, I have to wonder if it is truly about being smart or simply credits and stars that motivate. Is it really about creating sustainable buildings or is it about an Architect, a Builder or a Corporation/Agency proving how good and green they are.
LEED is really not as well known as people think. It is something marketed to those in the industry. To regular folk it means nothing. And with the challenges we have in today’s world it will become even less so as they cannot even afford their own homes let alone worry about the buildings around them.
I work in the residential field and spend many hours and days simply trying to get people to understand the trade offs and the purpose behind the ideas of what being green means. When I see buildings that are beautiful in design but wasteful in purpose I have a hard time selling that to those who think that being green is just another type of luxury.
On #6, wondering if anyone caught the Jay Leno interview last night on “vertical farms” serving 50,000 using a structure like this…??? It was with Josh T., director of the Sundance film, “Fuel”…What’s your take on the vertical farms approach (and/or the film if you’ve gotten a sneak peek?) I want to do a feature on Shaping Youth.org soon. Great list here for analysis, thanks!
The tone of this article makes it seem like you’d rather them not be “green”. I guess all we can say for these buildings is “better than nothing”.
Dubai runs on foreign investment not oil. If it recovers from the present recession, it plans to build a (very) high rise in which every floor rotates. Silly and wasteful, but it also will use an innovative prefab construction method that might allow green improvements such as a reduction in construction waste. But the most radical concept is to have horizontal wind turbines between all the floors. You can get a lot of windmills in a building this way and they claim it will produce (export) 10x the energy the building needs, but I don’t know if that is just when the wind is blowing or overall using the grid for demand balancing. If it works, this would be a very green building. Search on brochure, Dubai, rotating floors.
Hi Alex,
I found this post delightfully humorous, thanks!
Melissa
I like a bit of Dubai-bashing as much as anyone, but I may have to eat my words if and when they put those acres of desert to use and harness the reliable solar energy they get every day of the year.
Dubai and the other Emirates are already looking at how they can become greener than the rest by building huge PV arrays that will meet their energy growth.
Of course, that won’t solve the energy and emissions issues caused by relying so heavily on tourism and travel to the UAE. It may end up a little like #4 on a grand scale.
The Civic Center Parking Garage in Santa Monica, Cal. should not even be on this list. Where as there are much worse things and Santa Monica is one of few green focused cites in this country that really gives me hope and a reason to live on this continent.
I’ve never had need to use the parking garage as I’m in waling distance from that area but I can assure you that as the other parking garages in the city there are priority EV charging parking spots, as they released their PD EV Toyota Rav4 fleet to the public for a smaller three wheel EV and because this city really puts a hefty focus on being green – something that seems to have gone overlooked.
Another thing you have failed to realize is there has been a long standing fight to get a train down to Santa Monica which is now in the process of being resolved as the stuffy rich folks have had their fears of homeless people traveling from downtown to Santa Monica have somehow been subdued. The train will be near the Third Street Promenade area which is a short walk from the parking structure. Also the city will be focusing on getting more cars off of the road and more pedestrians out and about as stated in the “LUCE Strategy Framework” issued by the Santa Monica Planning and Community Development Dept.
Alex,
I don’t agree with your last item. I think maybe because you are very far away from Dubai, you don’t get the right news about what happens in Dubai!!
Dubai Government is trying their best to minimize their “inefficient buildings”, and please bear in mind that most of the designing companies in Dubai are very famous European, American and international design firms, that should design efficiently anyway without a mandate from the government but unfortunately this didn’t happen until Dubai Municipality came out with the Green standards (very much based on the LEED system) to force consultants and contractors to follow!! They also mandated that in many parts of Dubai, buildings to go for LEED certification as a MUST.
Also, for your information, UAE and Dubai in specific is the 1st city outside US that has the highest number of buildings going for LEED certification, this should give you an idea about how serious the people of Dubai to make their city green.
I think at least we should give them an applaud not to criticize them
Hey – I just filled up at that BP station! Funny how their press photo shows the station without any cars in it (looks like it’s setup for the station’s grand opening – notice the tables and chairs). With carbon emitting cars and trucks in the station on a normal day, the only positive impact the station has is on providing an unusual visual spectacle on the side of the road. But then depending on your taste, that impact may be negative as well…
Alex,
While this post is in jest, it smacks of the green righteousness and simplicity that caused me to keep out of the industry for ten years after completing an environmental science degree. Disregarding people’s efforts because they don’t go “all the way” is a sure way to ostracize potential partners and advocates. The work of Amory Lovins and others showing that sustainability and capitalism were not exclusive turned me around.
The success of USGBC in getting sustainable principles into the mindset of building owners, designers and constructors is fantastic, but the LEED system is far from perfect. None of the certification programs are, and never will be. It is all about incremental improvement, with some steps bigger and more visible than others. The contradictions between the three pillars are real and sometimes unreconcilable. It’s how we work within those contradictions that is the true measure of our success.
Sam
Great article, Alex. It was entertaining, but it also points out shortcomings in the LEED system. To give another example, LEED 2009 provides fewer points for indoor air quality than did LEED 2006. A number of us in the health and safety fields are concerned about LEED buildings becoming “sick buildings”, and last week an EPA scientist speculated we might be “returning to the seventies” with IAQ problems.
The only thing stupid I could find is the list itself… and perhaps the author. In no case could he successfully critique the building as as such. He only mumbled something derogative about a secondary aspect. Poor journalism at best!
Amarillo,
Lighten up! This was a fun top 10 list on a blog, not the cover story for the Economist.
-Alex
This blog was presumably created on a computer; computers are not made of particularly environmentally friendly materials, technology becomes obsolescent very quickly, landfills are brimming with old computer parts. A point could be made that this green blog is actually not very green. I’m just sayin’.
The fact is that LEED is not a very good system to begin with, but is it better than nothing at all? A point could be made either way. OK, enough burning energy run the computer while I post. Shutting down the grid and going to bed.
Alex–I appreciate the spirit in which these examples are offered, as further explained in your response to Bob C. However, I think the title is misleading. The buildings are dumb, as are all buildings–they only do what we ask them to. The businesses are what are really stupid in the contaxt of our understanding of global warming, energy security, resource depletion, etc. Perhaps the title should be ‘Ten of the greenest buildings serving some of the most destructive human behaviours’. Let’s not malign the buildings (or their designers), but bravo for pointing out the irony.
Your little caveat doesn’t counter what your article is conveying, it just makes it more snooty. It is unrealistic to think that we are going to stop using gasoline or driving cars or needing trucks, or flying on airplanes, or playing golf, or going on vacations (if it’s not a vacation home, it’s a hotel). Instead of publishing articles discouraging sustainable buildings, and telling everyone to basically stay home and not live their life, why don’t you focus your energy on encourage sustainable building practices? Nobody’s perfect (except probably you), so let’s just work on making realistic improvements and not alienating everyone.
so… what buildings would make the top 10? They would be LEED certified but what would they do? If a church or place of worship was LEED certified, would it make the list? How about a restaurant or a hotel?
Okay so no one’s perfect, but its a start. A green gas station is like being a vegetarian who eats fish.
Now if the station also provides hydrogen…
I only agree with you on the Nestle water bottle facility, single family skyscraper. Other projects are part of our real life and to make the best of them is the right way to go. To start the change in construction to green building we all need any little impact and I count them as a positve step.
Good observation
try to fix it if it’s broken.
Alee! I’m not from Dubai, but don’t express your jealousy towards Dubai like this. You blaming Dubai for icecaps being melted? Do more research on it.
God bless you
ugh. I’m tired of this. I don’t want to live in a big house, have a fancy car and all that stupid stuff. I want to live in the jungle but I can’t. Because those stupid jerks wrecked Earth! I want to live in the jungle without people cutting down trees and burning them. I also don’t know why we have cars. There was nothing wrong with horses. feed them let them sleep. sure they cost alot to take care of.most people would not want to clean up after them. Think about it. you clean up after your dog. why not clean up after the horse? it may be a bigger mess but still. I don’t understand people at all. want to know something else? People can live in a bathroom sized house. sleep in the tub ( tub has 2 uses), use the toilet, sink for water. get food outside.cook outside. sheesh.
LEED is the best known “green building rating system.” We all love to take pot shots at the top and laugh about it. These 10 LEED “oxymorons,” so to speak, advertise their own ridiculousness. You should see the claims some manufacturers make about their so-called LEED products if you really want a good joke!
This article and the responses sound a lot like the far left political correct style where sarcasm and hate are the operative elements. Green is good in almost any form.
Alex:
While you claim to be “pointing out the blatant contradiction between [a building's] purpose and its [sustainable] design”, I would point out the same contradiction in your premise for this article.
Your lead-in states that “while any structure built in a way that lessens its footprint is welcomed, some of the buildings that people try to turn green simply make no sense.”
No sense? Really?
To take your first example, the LEED-certified gas station in LA. Yes, a provision for charging electric cars would be a nice touch, but the simple fact of the matter is that our car culture (gas-powered or otherwise) is not going away anytime soon. The simple fact of the matter is that this gas station is saving (and producing!) energy, and saving water, compared to what would have been built in its place — your typical, unenlightened, status quo gas station, with energy-sucking light fixtures and rain leaders that lead directly to the sewer.
Similarly, in example #2, you suggest that the golf course should have been turned into a wildlife sanctuary. This sort of Utopian tongue-in-cheek is short-sighted and, again, ignores the net benefit of a LEED Platinum (http://www.jetsongreen.com/2008/10/justin-timberla.html) lodge over a lodge built to status quo building standards. I am no fan of the sport, but the golf industry is not going to simply disappear for the sake of “going green”. What’s to say a golf course can’t also implement sustainable practices like water conservation and integrated pest management?
I am no stranger to griping about, say, so-called “green” houses way out in the suburbs. But if they are going to be built in the first place (and they WILL continue to be built), why NOT use green building practices for them?
Your smugness belittles the efforts, however small, that these designers and builders are putting forth, and sends a discouraging message to anyone who is at least “trying” to implement green strategies in their buildings, i.e. “if you can’t be REALLY green like me, don’t even try” (isn’t that the real message in your lead in statement?). At least these people have words like “sustainable” in their vocabulary. I see that as a huge step forward.
I enjoyed the post and think it has it’s humor but I also am glad that there are steps to create green buildings even if the products are not yet there. One step at a time.
Great article. I’m one of the LEED professionals working to “green the desert” in Dubai. And yes, I am fully aware of the contradictions.
Environmentalism used to mean planting palm trees along the highways, irrigated with desal water (100 liters/day/tree) up until about 5 years ago (and still to this day according to some people). The knowledge transfer that is happening is as important as the LEED Silver or Gold certification and the required 21-25% energy (4 or 5 points on EAc1) and 30% water (WE3.2) required savings.
I think we all know that sustainability is a “more than, less than” issue and this city is getting built (at least until about 3 months ago). While I am not totally comfortable with working on green here, I do feel that gains are being made.
When ice melts it takes up LESS volume. If the Polar ice caps ever melt the ocean levels will go down not up.
When you own a home you gain much more than a place to rest your head. You gain financial stability as your lodging becomes a fixed cost. You gain privacy. For the super rich, privacy is something money can buy and they willingly pay.
Without the super rich to try new ideas and products, the middle class and masses will never get them. We could rely on gvernment to be the only super rich, but if you think the super rich are wastefull go read the federal budget.
certainly …these buildings are not dumb atleast …
like u said .. the golf course is consuming some gallons of water every day ..and should have been,,wild life sanctury instead… but if golf course needs the amt of water to maintain u cant help it na,,,or dy might nt hv tht much rainfall in tht area to consrve also..can be a situation ,, i can think of
neways
bt according to my opinion,,, LEED has atleast helped building industry to make buildings ‘little green’ if not ‘bright green’..
its atleast givin some guideline for a common person..who can understand green phenomena..
This is ridiculous…are these things contradictory? Well somewhat I guess but I think the poster is missing the point. All of the above buildings would be built and the purposes for which they were made will continue. So the people are saying okay, how do we lessen the impact of an environmentally negative purpose.
That’s all. If you had any idea how much it costs to be leed certified over conventional construction I think you might recant.
The point very simply is there will be cars, there will be planes and there will be bottled water but how do we minimize those impacts.
Your article is tantamount to me ridiculing for somebody who puts in energy efficient light bulbs into their house…”Well using electricity isn’t very green so putting in those light bulbs is one of the stupidest things I’ve heard of”.
The only one I agree with is the single home in Mumbai if in fact that is the case.
thank you! I am tired of being badgered by green friends who deride me for using plastic bags… while they drive off to their second home 6 hours (by road) away while I live in a 2 bedroom apartment.
I also work in the architecture industry and more often than not, LEED is applied as a “cheap as possible” solution to a public relations problem, not as an integral part of the beginning building design. being thoughtful about location and purpose is far more important than whether the paint is solvent based or not — the design process is more complicated than simply selecting products.
Yes, I do think dubai is a way of wasting resources…
From:
Suet Long
A ten yr old girl
you raise some very interesting concerns. It seems something can always be critized when it claims to be green
I really like the buildings is housing an environmentally unfriendly product, like the space port, perhaps the building should be environmentally unfriendly as well. Rather than try an clean upt a little at a time, lets just forget the whole thing! Very green i think .
Maybe the author of this article should start his own certification program – and then see how many are interested in the ‘back to the caves’ mentality.
Improvement is the keyword – only a fool thinks the world will completely change overnight.
The green ‘mafia’ – meaning the ‘you have to do it our way bunch’ set any environmental effort back far maore than they move it ahead.
Your inclusion of the Toyota dealership in Rockwall is an unfortunate one. The family, who are committed to sustainability and personally funded this project – with zero incentives from Toyota, wanted to have a facility that achieved the first LEED Gold status for their particular industry, so as to serve as an example for all of the other dealers to wake up and see that even they could green up their businesses. Add to that, they’ve become the leading voice in their community (which doesn’t even have a recycling program) to green themselves, and you done a nice job damaging a dedicated husband and wife team, and their daughters who moved half way across this country to pursue this dream.
Who knows that the photo is of – because it’s NOT this project, clearly you didn’t even visit the facility.
This project is not about Toyota selling electric cars – which you seem to believe are ready for prime time… I’m still waiting myself… See any Tesla dealerships popping up – no, and why…?
And now you “funny” article (without you claim this is in ‘jest’) has been circulated around the internet… nice…
I’ve done some research on BP’s Helios house for a similar project and was able to visit with a few people that extensive knowledge of the project. One surprising thing that I learned was that the State of California seriously restricted BP’s ability to sell alternate fuels (beyond the normal useless varietys) at this facility. Sad – as BP appears to have been willing, at least at this faiclity to give it a try.
While this is a ‘showcase’ facility, it does run a serious risk of becoming a Green ‘Disneyland’. This about how ‘futuristic’ tommorow land is today… it’s a laugh today. This project, with it’s “inovative” LED signs is hardly something to be studyed – storing rainwater off a tiny roof costs so much that this building is unlikely to EVER recoop the expense, and like it or not, ‘solutions’ that are not sustainable economically are not sustainable…
On the Antilla Tower in Mumbai – Living in Mumbai is sustainable enough. The same project anywhere else in the world would have been a 10-15 acre expanse. I don’t see any other Trillionaires living in a more greener environment than this?
You could add Al Gore’s home. Good example of talking LEED but doing excess.