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New School Gets Green Thumbs-Up

By Ana Beatriz Cholo
Tribune staff reporter

May 12, 2004
Chicago will break ground Wednesday for the city's first certified "green" elementary school, an eco-friendly structure featuring drought-resistant plants on the roof, solar panels, harvested rainwater and flooring made of recycled glass.

District officials also say the new Tarkington Elementary in Marquette Park won't be the only school like it for long.

In the future, all city schools will be certified as "green" by the U.S. Green Building Council, a nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C.

The schools will be built following a philosophy of using resources efficiently, making the least impact on the environment and making the health and productivity of the occupants a priority.

Only four public schools in the country--in Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Oregon--are currently certified by the council. But it has registered about 76 more public and private primary schools that are being planned or built.

That number includes a new addition for a charter school already open at the environmentally conscious Prairie Crossing development in north suburban Grayslake. The structure is expected to be completed in December.

Tarkington, a kindergarten through 8th-grade school planned to meet demand on the growing Southwest Side, is slated to open in the fall of 2005. The school will be built on park land, and the Chicago Park District will share some of the facilities.

The school will be built using 50 percent certified wood from "responsible" lumberyards, and building occupants will be encouraged to use public transportation to get to work. Twenty percent of the materials used to build the school must come from within a 500-mile radius, to cut down on energy used for transportation.

It will cost $23 million to build, about 8 percent more than the cost of a typical non-green school, said Chicago Public Schools officials. The cost to build an elementary school is approximately $140 to $160 per square foot, versus $168 per square foot for Tarkington.

However, the school district expects to save money on energy, lighting and other operating costs, said Sean Murphy, the district's chief operating officer.

"It should have a positive impact on student learning and a positive impact on the environment," he said.

Environmental experts say students at green schools perform better because of the exposure to natural light and higher air quality. The staff would also benefit, they say.

Mark Bishop, state policy director for the Healthy Schools Campaign in Illinois, said there has been a movement nationwide to build energy-efficient schools, but Chicago is the only district in the state that has pledged to build only green schools.

"I think this really will serve the public and students well," Bishop said. "To do something as broadly as Chicago Public Schools, it really is a great step forward."

City school officials said the new Haugen Elementary School in Albany Park, for which ground was broken about a month ago, is the last Chicago public school to be built without "green" components.

The new Anderson and Ellington Elementary Schools now under construction will include environmentally conscious features, such as rooftop vegetation and infrastructure that will allow solar panels to be installed. But those schools, in the Englewood and South Austin neighborhoods, will not meet all of the many requirements to be certified as green.

The U.S. Green Building Council in 1998 developed a set of stringent measurements that buildings must meet before they can be LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certified--the gold standard for being green.

The council ranks Illinois as the ninth "greenest" state for its existing and planned environmentally friendly buildings.

A certified building can achieve different levels of "greenness," with the highest level being platinum. There are only five of these sites in the world, including the Chicago Center for Green Technology. That building boasts recycled carpeting, linoleum made of wood flour and linseed oil, and a parking lot paved with crushed gravel and pine tree resin.

In recent years Mayor Richard Daley has encouraged city building designers to add rooftop gardens, which can reduce energy costs by cutting down on the heat generated by dark surfaces. The city planted a 20,300-square-foot garden atop City Hall four years ago.

Sadhu Johnston, whom some call "the green guru," was handpicked by Daley to oversee green initiatives for the city. About 12 buildings in the city are in the process of becoming green or are already certified, he said.

In Grayslake, the new green 10-classroom building for Prairie Crossing Charter School reflects the conservation philosophy of the surrounding Prairie Crossing housing development.

Architects have come into the classroom and explained how and why recycled products are being used during construction, said Linda Brazdil, director of the elementary school, which already has an environmental focus. The school plans to expand, and fundraising efforts are in the works for a second green building.

Brazdil says they are considering adding a geothermal heating system, for which 35 wells, 150 feet deep, would be dug near the school. Water would circulate through the wells, collecting the heat of the earth.

That method cuts energy costs but is expensive to install.

"I would love to be able to use that to teach students" about physical science, Brazdil said. "The more environmental we could be in our building, the more that we could say to our community that we believe in this. ... We are not just teaching this. We really live it."

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Building a `green' school

Tarkington Elementary School is being constructed with

features that make it environmentally friendly. The $23 million

facility is set to open in the fall of 2005.

KEY FEATURES

Storm-water management system

Runoff from the site and roof will be fed through pipes, cleaned and sent to the lagoon. This will help replace water levels in the lagoon, which are constantly lowered through evaporation.

Green roof

Plants will absorb rainwater and reduce the amount entering the

city's sewer system. The roof`s mass will provide an insulation layer to moderate temperature changes in the building.

Solar panels

Panels will capture sunlight and create an electric current. The

current is used to provide extra electricity to the building.

Reflective coating will lower roof temperature, decrease the amount of heat transferred into the building and reduce air-conditioning demand.

Rooftop view of school

(Map) Site of Tarkington Elementary School

Source: OWP/P Architects and City of Chicago

Chicago Tribune/Haeyoun Park and Terrence Horan

FRONT VIEW OF SCHOOL Image courtesy of OWP/PArchitects