Zach Babich Brown
ENGL 145
7 June 2007
Professor Marx
The Walls are Crumbling Down
Universities strive to offer a wide range of services to students, but most of all attempt to transform incoming students into highly marketable graduates who apply cutting edge skills and ideas to the industry they have chosen. Cal Poly SLO has a great reputation for achieving this goal on a wide scale, but that doesnÕt mean that it will be like this forever. Society and the economy change at a rapid pace from year to year. If the school doesnÕt keep its curriculum up to date, its graduates will find that the skills they have worked so hard to attain are outdated. Sustainability is a hot topic on campuses and in boardrooms worldwide. With increased regulations requiring greener processes, along with incentive programs for those who are self-motivated to operate in a more sustainable way, many companies are jumping at the opportunity to hire college graduates that are well informed on sustainable practices. But how much are companies going to want students graduating from a university that does not utilize these green practices? Cal Poly has shown negligence in not implementing plans to meet sustainability goals in the new construction projects on campus. Not only is this a failure in environmental responsibility, but also economic responsibility towards the CM graduates leaving the school for the workforce.
Cal Poly is known as a technological leader for universities throughout the country. Cal Poly has appeared at the top of lists of many college polls countless times. However, sustainability is a very important issue, on which Cal Poly is already far behind. According to new laws in California, all new state funded construction of buildings (such as those on the Cal Poly campus) must achieve LEED Silver certification. LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification is earned through the use of green material, processes, and designs. This certification is recognized worldwide as a symbol of responsibility and leadership in the construction industry. However, according to Cal Poly CM Professor and LEED Accredited Professional Mike Montoya, Cal Poly has Òthe only new CM building under construction in the US that will not be LEED certified.Ó This is not the type of distinguishing characteristic that Cal Poly wants. The university should have absorbed the extra costs, which were rather small in the context of the entire budget for the building. In proceeding with this project in this manner, Cal Poly has built another hurdle to a completely sustainable campus; one that will remain for many years to come.
There is always an excuse for why something didnÕt get done correctly. However, we can look just south to University of California in Santa Barbara, which has set the bar high for colleges around the nation by achieving LEED Platinum certification for the Donald Bren School of Environmental Science and Management (3). It was among the first buildings to attain this certification, and is a symbol of leadership in a bold way. The decision makers at UCSB showed their forward thinking in understanding the benefit of green building at a time when it was not nearly as prevalent as today. Cal Poly and UCSB are not dissimilar enough, as far as resources, to justify the deviation between construction practices. How can they construct a LEED Platinum Certified building, while we canÕt even get ours certified at all? Montoya also commented that the new building projects have been hampered by the bureaucracy and inefficiency of the Cal Poly Facilities Department in all phases of the new construction processes. If Cal Poly wants to become a leader in sustainability, they must lead by example and need to start immediately.
The buildings that are built today are going to exist for decades to come, and we will never be able to fully eliminate the waste that has been designed into the building. Sustainability needs to start at idea conception and continue through design, materials selection, and the actual construction. Michael Multari, of the Cal Poly Facilities Department, agreed that budgets and bureaucracy are the main obstacles to LEED certified building on our campus. He explained, ÒThe actual certification process is somewhat time consuming and somewhat costly; the costs for certification can not be part of the budget paid out of state funds (although the sustainability features themselves can).Ó It is shameful that the reason that we are not more actively implementing sustainable building is simply because our accounting processes do not allow the reconciliation of future monetary savings compared to a cost premium incurred during building. Regardless of the fact that there is no widely accepted way to account for environmental savings (i.e. water/energy usage and reduced landfill waste), we should be able to understand the monetary benefits of more efficient buildings over the next 50 years (as is the planned life span of a new building). It boils down to pure politics and bureaucracy, which is embarrassing for those in power and all of us that are part of the Cal Poly family.
LEED certification is a good benchmark, but is not the be-all-end-all of sustainability. Multari did note, ÒAlthough not LEED certified many sustainability features are incorporated into the design and construction process,Ó of the new buildings. He cited the fact that water consumption has decreased over he last several years, while the campus has continued to grow. However, not attaining LEED certification is bad publicity in the midst of the movement to sustainable life, which needs as much good publicity as it can get. It would send a much clearer, unified, and positive message to the country if Cal Poly declares all new buildings LEED certified. It is understood what that means and what level of green building was employed in the process. It is a way to quickly communicate the attitude of the campus to whoever is looking our way.
A common misconception is that green building comes at a prohibitively high up front costs. A study conducted by Washington StateÕs Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, found that the cost premium for green building projects is about 2%. This up front cost is balanced out by the longer term savings born from more efficient buildings, meaning less harmful waste is produced. The study found that an upfront extra cost of $5 million would yield over $7.5 million over the life of the building (4). According to the Cal Poly Facilities Department, the buildings were not built to earn any LEED certification because there are two separate budgets for initial and long-term costs (2). There needs to be immediate changes to the budget system to handle the offsetting of short-term costs by long term savings. It is an embarrassment to the San Luis Obispo community that this is the reason that we are not building certifiably green structures. LEED Certification is not absolutely crucial, but it surely helps the movement towards for sustainable life and sends out a unified, easily understood message.
It seems that the urgency to move toward sustainable building methods at Cal Poly are lacking in both what is practiced and what is preached. There should be immediate action taken to force the Cal Poly Facilities to comply with the LEED Silver certification required by the State of California, along with the an increased saturation of sustainable ideas into the current curriculum of the CM Major. There needs to be a clear message of forward-thinking on our campus sent to Cal Poly Students, Administrators, and Alumni, along with the CSU system, the State of California, and Universities around the world. Sustainability is the future of all industries, and Cal Poly should strive to be a leader and raise the bar for everyone else. Simply meeting minimum requirements is not good enough.
Works Cited