Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Sustainable building practices

[Peter Starr (startrak]

There has been an ongoing theme underlying the discussions about foam core, 
strawbale, and other building systems that assumes that good old-fashioned 
wood is not sustainable.  Given the poor state of our nations' forests and 
the criminally-lax environmental law enforcement in them, I would have to 
agree that current timbering and lumber practices are incredibly 
destructive.  We are wiping out whole populations of salmon, seabirds, owls, 
and dozens of less-imposing but equally significant plant and animals 
species, that might not return ever because of soil erosion.  We are also 
destroying communities, and local and national economies in the name of 
short-term profit.  Here in the Pacific Northwest, I see on a daily basis 
the result of leveraged buyouts by Wall Street Wizards and Junk Bond Kings.  
We are giving away our children's natural assets right now, to Europeans, 
Japanese, and certain very rich American suburban yuppies who build trophy 
homes and then go down the Colorado river to find themselves.

There is a solution to this.  If any of you understand the principles of 
organic agriculture, you should be glad to know that a similar environmental 
movement is afoot in the timber industy.  Check out the Institute for 
Sustainable Forestry, PO Box 1580, Redway CA, 95560.  They will send you the 
"Good Wood" guide to purchasing ecological forest products.  It lists 
suppliers and other organizations.  There is one large timber firm, Collins 
Pine Company, 1618 S.W. First Avenue, Suite 300, Portland, Oregon 97201 that 
claims to has been harvesting wood for 50 years on a 90,000 acre piece of 
land.  They say that have never clearcut and they have never had the need to 
replant.  That means no chemicals, no fertilizers.  It indicates good 
forestry practices.

The sustainable timber industry is where organic agriculture was 10 years 
ago.  Organic is now a $2.5 billion dollar a year industry and growing at 
20% a year.  People are now making very big money in it, even though the 
mainstream still tends to think of it as fringy.  The sustainable forest 
products industry is just now creating cerification standards and groups 
that can go into the woods and say with assurance that this timber plan, and 
those practices are for the long-term good of the community.

There is no reason why lovely homes could not be built from local lumber 
anywhere in this country or at least from forests that aren't devastated in 
the process.  It might cost a little more, as organic did and an 
increasingly doesn't, but then here's a opportunity to put our money where 
our mouths are.  Hey, how about good, old-fashion stone.  Shakespeare's home 
outside of London is over 400 years old -- warm in the winter, cool in the 
summer -- great R value.  It's made from timbers and stone. The solution is 
APPROPRIATE technology.  Not technology that is exciting because it is new.

Peter Starr