Review: "The Green", episode two, "Build"

"Buildings are by far and way the largest insult that humans visit upon the planet."  The Green, the new series on the Sundance Channel, takes that kind of clear tone as it lays out a hopeful path toward a more sustainable future for mankind on planet Earth.  In episode two, entitled "Build," the focus is only partially on what's wrong with the way we've been building; it's much more on who's changing that and how.  This episode features architects who are designing and marketing "high-performance" buildings as well as those who are designing more futuristic housing that hopes to incorporate living trees as part of the structure.

Sub-titled "Big Ideas for a Small Planet," big idea one here is prefab housing, and we get a factory tour that explains how modular housing can rapidly build in special efficiencies and use renewable or recycled materials.  Today's best architects can adapt the home to the site to maximize efficiency, creating, for instance, homes where the lights do not even need to be used during the day.

Idea two is multi-family green housing, in this case in Harlem, New York, where green developers hope to ease the nation's highest asthma rates with healthy affordable housing.  They heat and cool with geothermal energy and work through the added complexity of using materials made within 500 miles.  These are extremely sensible and sophisticated buildings that will not take a disproportionately large share of the income of poor people.  In this section we really begin to see how the people engineering these green buildings do so for profoundly moral reasons and the productions let their convictions shine through.

Buildings can now be certified "green" if they increase efficiency by at least 30%, so those standards exist.  And what about cost?  Up front, these buildings are somewhat more expensive, but factored over their first five years, there is no additional cost because utilities are reduced so much.

Idea number three is called "growing homes."  This extremely futuristic idea envisions a world where everything we do will be sustainable, including grafting trees together to form a living arch under which to build a highly efficient home.  I hope I live long enough to see that happen! 

"The status quo is the enemy of change and progress"-another great quote, and the cameras track the necessary details to back up this movement beyond the status quo.  I found myself refreshed and inspired by this episode.  It's not just the message, but the precise and agile production, from the graphics to the music.  So much skill is woven into the creation of this series that it adds to my sense of hope that it can help bring us closer to a tipping point where environmental awareness is the human norm and short-sighted environmental manipulation becomes taboo.

It has been 45 years since Rachel Carson launched the environmental movement with the publication of Silent Spring, but one gets the feeling that the pace is picking up fast as we head into the vortex of difficult but exciting changes.  I highly recommend that you catch this episode this Tuesday night at 9 PM eastern and pacific time on the Sundance Channel and I look forward to great things from this visionary series.  Here's a final quote:  "When people are given permission to think thoughts they never thought before, they respond."