Live green like Lost: Sustainable building
Along with their other accidental green exploits, the Lost crew also gets props for their eco-friendly building practices. Building a village on the beach usually means a combination of thousands of tons of concrete, condo highrises, at least one Hard Rock Cafe, and slew of swimming pools -- I alway thought pools right next to the beach were weird. The beach village on Lost, conversely, is built out of reused airplane wreckage, tarps, bamboo from a local source -- we could learn something from their building style.I'm not advocating that we build houses out of trash -- I've seen it done, and it's not pretty. What I am saying is that sometimes examples like this TV show can help us to re-evaluate how we think about building. Sustainable building and development is getting really popular these days. From houses built out of shipping containers to eco-friendly pre-fab, the materials and the method you choose can make a huge impact on the environment.
While Jack's motto "live together, die alone" might be a bit drastic for our purposes, a focus on urban living is good for the environment. Mixed-use developments encourage people to live where they work and therefore cuts down on suburban sprawl, pollution and the clearing of natural greenbelts. If you're about to build or remodel, here's a site with checklists to help you make good green decisions.
Pick a random tip
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_thumbnail.jpg "Green superheroes")
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
2-07-2008 @ 3:48PM
M.E. Williams said...
I used to live in Florida, and, in fact, spent almost the entire year I was 11 in a beachside condo with a pool.
The reason for them is that if you just want to swim, they tend to be safer and easier (and warmer!) than the Atlantic Ocean. No tides, no currents, no tar, no sharks, no stinging jellyfish, and not much space for kids to get -- heh heh -- "Lost" in. That has nothing to do with any environmental impact, though. ;)
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