The Educational Green: Researching Ways of Combining Professions

The Educational Green was an innovative 3rd year design studio held in 2007 in the faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning at the University of Melbourne. The studio both informed and was informed by the authors’ involvement in a Research Council (RC) grant (ongoing 2007-2010). It involved collaboration between university staff and students, a teacher educator and staff and students at a local secondary school as a case study and the studio leader wished to experiment with her teaching, evaluate it and respond to her evaluation immediately. Keywords: School Design; Environmentally Responsible; Sustainability</p

Sustainability in production: Exploring eco-creativity within the parameters of conventional theatre

Contemporary ecological concerns bring with them an opportunity for innovation; to rethink traditional practices and forge new approaches that not only strive for sustainability, but also push intellectual and creative boundaries. Despite this, current notions of sustainability are still dominated by suppositions of creative limitations; the perception that sustainability and theatre do not mix is a common assumption. This paper explores the possibilities of sustainable production practices within the parameters of conventional theatre. Using a practice-led research project, Helicopter (Melbourne Theatre Company, 2012), the investigation examines the designer’s journey of integrating creative processes with eco-efficiency, aesthetics, organisational considerations and director’s expectations. In this context, the designer considers how sustainable strategies might drive the creative process and aesthetics, given altered constraints, requirements and opportunities. While there are challenges and barriers to implementing sustainable approaches in conventional theatre productions, the paper reveals how thinking about environmental considerations creates exciting new avenues for exploration—including new ways of thinking about how scenographies are designed, constructed and distributed for a sustainable paradigm

Possible roles for environmental Life Cycle Assessment in building specifications

Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a systematic methodology for evaluating the envi­ronmental impacts of different product systems. It is a useful tool for comparing different alternative products or systems (including buildings. However, complex­ities of the built environment and limitations in current LCA data and methodol­ogy make implementation of LCA into decision making for building design and specification, very difficult. Streamlined LCA techniques and life cycle thinking are currently the easiest ways to introduce LCA to the building sector. However, in the future, with new developments in LCA. more rigorous tools should become available

Planning healthy, liveable and sustainable cities: How can indicators inform policy?

Creating ‘liveable’ communities that are healthy and sustainable is an aspiration of policymakers in Australia and overseas. Indicators are being used at the national, state and local level to compare the liveability of cities and regions. Yet, there are challenges in the adoption of such indicators. Planning scholars see a challenge in creating indicators that measure something publicly valued, while public health researchers are concerned about scant systemic research on relationships between policies, the built environment, and health and well-being. This article provides an overview of liveability indicators used to date in Australia and internationally. It then outlines the results of consultations with Melbourne-based academics and decision-makers, on how to increase their utility and support the creation of healthy, liveable and sustainable cities

Design and Social Context Portfolio

turning observation into practic

Facilitating ‘green’ building: turning observation into practice

© 2005 Dr. Dominique HesThis thesis is the story of my five year journey developing a practice in integrating ‘green’ innovation within the built environment—mainly in new buildings. It is an exploratory thesis based on qualitative observation and documentation of my experience and detailed reflection on the successes and failures of this practice as I moved from naïve novice to expert. Initially I identified a great deal of desk-based and survey research on ‘green’ buildings, but little research actually looking at the field from within the practice of a building project. I thought that exploring this would create some understanding of why some ‘green’ initiatives were not taken up at the rate many people expected. Through the telling of the over fifty stories which make up this thesis, I hope that I can create vicarious experiences in readers thus enabling them to use my journey to reflect on their own paths and to therefore learn with me. A number of useful tools and methods I developed to support my practice are presented, along with the key insights I extracted from my experience: that different types of ‘green’ information are relevant at particular stages of the building life cycle; that reflective practice is an essential tool in a facilitative practice working in a discursive, dynamic and complex field; that the power, culture and nature of the agents play a role in the ability to successfully integrate ‘green’ innovation; and, most importantly, that there is a need for all agents to have a voice in the integration of ‘green’ innovation into a project

Effectiveness of ‘green’ building rating tools: a review of performance

© 2007 Dr. Dominique HesIn the context of the built environment this paper presents an approach using a series of nine criteria for investigating the effectiveness of building rating tools. The ability to measure a building’s performance using rating tools is one way of looking at the integration of sustainability objectives into the built form. The term effectiveness, as defined in this paper, is not limited to demonstrating improved environmentally performance but also the long term effectiveness of the rating tools application and usability. Further, it covers the ability for the rating systems to provide the outcomes expected by those using the tools. It was found that though rating tools tend to look primarily at environmental sustainability, reports covered broader outcomes such as social sustainability, productivity improvements, comfort gains and costs savings. Effectiveness therefore also encompasses these other issues particularly as these are often used as arguments for the design and construction of ‘green’ buildings, and the use of rating tools as a support for the process. The research method uses existing publicly available reports on the performance of buildings which have been rated over the last 10 years. This data is then used to discuss effectiveness based on the criteria identified by the research. It shows that the rated buildings do seem to have significant reductions in energy and water consumption; there is evidence that employees are more comfortable and there is increased productivity. Their effectiveness does not seem as high in other areas though, as the tools do seem to be both costly and bureaucratic in their implementation, and seem to be less geared to supporting the dynamic nature of building design and development, needing to be more proactive in support of innovation. The paper closes with a brief discussion of the future developments occurring internationally, particularly how these are addressing some of the less effective parts of the tools. The paper closed by posing the question whether rating tools can lead to a sustainable built environment when the tools are predicated on increasing efficiency and efficiency is limited and only part of the solution

Qualitative and quantitative tool development to support environmentally responsible decisions

© 2007 Elsevier. Publisher PDF version is restricted access in accordance with the Elsevier policy.The Centre for Design at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia has developed various quantitative and qualitative tools to supportdecision-making by industry and government partners in product design and policy development. The aim, in general, is to support developmentof attractive, functional, marketable products while enhancing their environmental performance. Depending on the product, the project scope andthe client, the tools that are used can be anything from a half-day char-rette, environmental checklist, to a one-year life cycle assessment (LCA).In this paper we describe our approach and the various tools that have been developed by the research team at the Centre over recent yearswith the use of case studies. The paper argues that it is important for tool development to be based on solid research and information, but the keyto influencing product design decisions is the translation of this information into a usable format for the users

Sustainability uptake in housing in metropolitan Australia : an institutional problem, not a technological one

This paper examines the uptake of environmentally sustainable housing in two major cities in Australia. The paper responds to literature that suggests sustainability is not so much a technological problem as an institutional one, and to theories of innovation which focus on innovation diffusion through chains of production. The disaggregation and piecemeal nature of innovation within the building industry is underpinned by unfamiliarity with new technologies, a lack of consistent legislation and pricing and unclear channels of communication. These generate uneven adoption of environmentally sustainable materials and processes within this industry