Page 171 - The Green Building Bottom Line The Real Cost of Sustainable Building

150 CHAPTER 5

Other tenants, such as Panera Bread Company and Grand Harbour, worked with us
to modify their base lighting plan to include almost all high-efficiency fluorescent
light fixtures, which helped our building program meet Abercorn Common’s overall
environmental goals.
Over the course of the renovation, we demolished over 45,000 square feet of build-
ings (the unwanted portions of the existing shopping center). This included the front
sections of two buildings, three retail buildings, an auto repair shop, two auto show-
rooms, and a restaurant. Most of this demolished material and the construction debris
from redevelopment was either recycled or reused. In the end, we diverted over 80
percent of typical construction waste (weight by volume) from the local landfill. This
equates to over six thousand tons of material.
One interesting reuse effort we accomplished was the on-site production of our
graded aggregate base (GAB). We brought a machine to the site to convert (crush) the
block, brick, cement, and mortar from the demolished buildings into GAB and used
the new material as the base for the asphalt parking lot. It would have cost $50 a ton
to dispose of the debris plus the wasted use of front-end loaders, dump trucks, and
fuel. At the time, we estimated the cost of setting up the on-site crushing station would
cost about the same as hauling and dumping the debris and purchasing new materials.
It was a wash financially, but environmentally, we saved big.
Prior to demolishing the first building, we compared a proposal to demolish all struc-
tures with machinery and haul the debris to the dump with a proposal to hire a local
company to disassemble the buildings by hand and salvage the reusable materials. We
decided to go with the latter choice and were very pleased with the results. Though it
took almost four times as long to demolish all the structures by hand, the cost to us was
the same, as we had time in the schedule to allow for a longer demolition period. The
crew was able to salvage a variety of materials for reuse, including the wooden roof
trusses from the old Western Auto store, three-inch-thick tongue-and-groove cedar roof
planks, piles and piles of old pine paneling, stacks of framing lumber, and tons of block.
When all was said and done, we saved tons of useful material from the landfill, and we
provided employment for several men for over a month. I liked the idea of our money
going to pay workers rather than paying a landfill for dumping privileges.
Over 70 percent (by cost) of the more than $2.5 million of new materials and prod-
ucts we used on the project were manufactured within 500 miles of the site, including
pipes, structural steel, metal framing, insulation, stucco, concrete, asphalt, glazing, and
gypsum board. Using materials and products manufactured close to the site significantly
reduces indirect emissions associated with transportation, supports local businesses, and
keeps money in local communities. Also, on average, those materials contained 20 per-
cent (by cost) recycled content (both post-consumer and post-industrial).
Circuit City chose to become an Abercorn Common tenant and to participate in the
LEED Core and Shell program. However, they chose to use their own contractor, engi-
neer, and architect for the building, and their architect and engineer became LEED
accredited. The Circuit City design team followed the Abercorn Common design
team’s specs and complied with the LEED Core and Shell rating system. They started