East Tennessee witnesses surge in green buildings

Perhaps there is no one who is yet to comprehend the basics of green building, the latest bandwagon having a sway in the realm of USA. If we abide by the definition, it will be found that a sustainable building, or green building is a consequence of a design philosophy which cracks down on developing the efficiency of resource use — energy, water, and materials — while reducing building impacts on human health and the environment during the building’s lifecycle, through better siting, design, construction, operation, maintenance, and removal.

What is more, even though green building is interpreted in many different ways, general view is that they should be designed and operated so as to lessen the overall impact of the built environment on human health and the natural environment by:

Now the surge of the same concept, at the moment, is found in East Tennessee, state in east central United States. Oak Ridge, in the state, leads the way with LEED certified buildings in the city and on the ORNL campus and only on Friday, Clayton Homes in Maryville celebrated its LEED certification. “It’s the right thing to do,” said Jason Langston, Clayton Homes’ LEED Project Coordinator.

It is to be noted that Clayton Homes worked for 3 years in order to refurbish its headquarters, making it LEED certified. It happens to be only the 4th building in the sphere of Tennessee to earn LEED-EB certification, a title for already existing buildings that are brought up to strict LEED standards. “We basically had to peel apart the onion, if you will, and the more we peeled apart, the more we saw we had some opportunities there, especially with the lighting and water,” Langston said.

However, this is not all as East Tennessee depicts other green buildings as well. Take for instance
The John L. Duncan Federal Building in downtown Knoxville, it earned LEED certification a couple years ago. Moreover, as soon as renovations get complete at the University of Tennessee’s Ayers Hall, it will be LEED certified.