LEEDing the Way - New York's First Gold LEED Home
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A Skaneateles home owned by Elet Sangrey Callahan, professor of law and public policy in Syracuse University's Martin J. Whitman School of Management, was recently the first home in New York State to receive a LEED-H designation at the gold level from the U.S. Green Building Council (USBGC). As described on the USGBC website, "The Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System™ is the nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction, and operation of high performance green buildings."
The home was built by Kevin Stack, president of Northeast Natural Homes, a partner of the Syracuse Center of Excellence in Environmental and Energy Systems. LEED-H is a voluntary rating system that promotes the design and construction of high-performance “green” homes. The LEED-H program is currently in a pilot phase and will be launched nationwide this summer. LEED-H offers four certification levels: certified, silver, gold and platinum. The Callahan home is one of four “gold” certified LEED homes in the country and one of nine LEED-H certified projects in the Northeast.
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This home adopts the principles of a 7th Generation Sustainability Ethic. This is based on Iroquois Great Law, and the requirement that there be a representative dedicated to voicing and protecting the interests of the 7th Generation to come. In Iroquois tradition, the Great PeaceKeeper gave this mandate on the shores of Onondaga Lake.
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“First” generation, project-specific elements of this theory include:
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In-Floor Radiant Heat. The radiant heat system consists of five (5) heat zones. Individual 7-day programmable thermostats with “Night Set Back” control each zone. All zones are equipped with their own circulation pumps, service valves and power switches. The radiant water supply temperature is automatically raised or lowered when responding to outdoor temperature to match the exact heat load of the system.
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 Dual Flush Toilets. These cost about $168 and save an average American family of four approximately 6,000 gallons of water per year. |
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 Site Protection during Building. Existing vegetation on the building site was protected as shown by this tree wrap. Other measures taken were to use silt fencing and erosion control strategies. |
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 A Two-Stage, Recycled Bio-Mat Septic System.
This innovative septic system has a smaller ecological footprint in many ways:
- Pre-treats effluent with a two-stage recycled biomat filter
- Greater long-term leaching capacity (more optimal life cycle) – 3 to 10 times more durable than a conventional leach field
- No stone is required which reduces the ecologically invasive and intensive impacts of mining and transporting aggregate
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 Global Positioning System Directional Bore. This was used to install the home's water service, preserving the site's natural capital including the lake and soil's invertebrate and other species, the trees' “ecosystem services” of natural water filtration purification, CO2 sequestration and O2 production, and habitat for biodiversity. |
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 Modified optimum value engineering (MOVE) – This includes pre-cycling engineered lumber and eliminating unnecessary wood from the home's structural “skeleton.” In the photo on the left, the headers were eliminated from windows with no loads. Removing unnecessary wood framing elements also eliminates thermal conduction and allows additional insulation to be added. This creates a more energy efficient building envelope. |
 The photo on the right shows the actual amount of wood removed from the walls (think of it as a source of heat loss, now replaced with additional insulation). This boosts energy performance, preserves forest and natural capitalistic services, and saves financial capital (less lumber, less labor and better insulation for lower operating energy costs). If all homes adopted MOVE principles, we could preserve – conservatively – 30,000 acres of forest each year. |
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Preserving Natural Drainage Patterns. This was done by minimizing lot coverage, protecting existing vegetation, reducing impervious surfaces and preventing erosion.
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100% Locally-Generated Green (Wind) Power for All Onsite Construction Activities. More energy strikes the earth's surface in less than one hour than all that humans consume in a year. The builder balanced different types of natural capital; instead of cutting 60 to 80 year old trees on site to optimize solar resources, losing their “free” ecosystem services and unique beauty, Northeast purchased sufficient wind energy to cover all onsite construction activities.
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30% Fly Ash Replacement of Portland Cement. Manufacturing portland cement irreparably harms the environment, is energy-intensive, and constitutes 8% of the world's CO2 emissions. Utilizing fly ash in concrete reduces waste and pressure on landfills, creates a stronger, better performing product, and captures the embodied energy of a waste material (avoids having to manufacture new Portland cement and its associated ecological destruction).
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Cork Floors. Cork is a rapidly renewable product, harvestable every 6 to 9 years without cutting down the cork tree itself. The cork flooring in the home contains natural anti-microbial substances, has excellent acoustical qualities, and can actually be easily de-constructed.
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