Published: February 12, 2008 10:53 am         

Merry Lea’s Rieth Village honored for its environmental design

WOLF LAKE, Ind. — Goshen College received an award from the U.S. Green Building Council Monday for the design and construction of the Merry Lea Environmental Center’s Rieth Village.

The award is actually a type of certification, the highest of its kind, called the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, or LEED, Platinum certification. Only 42 other new structures have received this certification in the United States.

According to the U.S. Green Building Council’s Web site, the LEED system is “the nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings.” The five overarching criteria for the ratings are sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials selection and indoor environmental quality.

Rieth Village is an area within the 1,150-acre Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center, located on the north side of Wolf Lake, consisting of two dormitories and an educational building. The site, which the college plans on expanding, is used as an educational center for Goshen College students.

But greenness, according to Lisa Zinn, an environmental educator at Merry Lea, doesn’t just refer to buildings, but extends also to how landscaping, planning and wastewater management are carried out.

For instance, Zinn said, the village’s parking lot isn’t asphalt, but instead a mixture of gravel and grass. This allows water to percolate into the ground, and eliminates the heat absorption that accompanies asphalt. The same approach was applied to the sidewalks, which are all permeable. The objective is to cut down on fast-moving water, which leads to erosion. In terms of wastewater, the village has a constructed wetland. Wastewater filters through the wetland, where specific plants break down the various nutrients. The water eventually travels through a sand filter. The village also has a 500-gallon cistern.

However, the buildings, Zinn admits, are what impress most people. All three are made from local tulip poplar trees, reducing the use of fossil fuels. The roofs collect and funnel rainwater, which is filtered and used for toilet and laundry water. Solar panels on the roofs help to heat the water and provide other electricity. Combined with the village’s wind generator, these approaches in the last year have generated 40 percent of the buildings’ electricity.

In terms of the buildings’ interiors, all the carpet was made from recycled materials, and is recyclable. The cupboards were actually created from leftover sunflower parts. The decks are made from recycled plastic. The list goes on.

One statistic Zinn highlighted was that 97 percent of the waste produced during construction was recycled. She said this is an option every contractor has.

Statistics aside, many of the speakers at Monday’s ceremony referred to the nature of the project, which runs deeper than numbers. Luke Gascho, executive director of Merry Lea, said, “We’re here on earth, and have a great deal of responsibility. We’re called to care for the earth and everything that lives on it.”

Holly Hunter, chief executive officer of the contractor Hamilton Hunter Builders Inc., said that to reduce the project to a list of fulfilled criteria “is like describing art as paint on a canvas.”

U.S. Rep. Mark Souder, R-3rd District, also made an appearance, and congratulated Goshen College for leading by example.

“Everybody wants a quick solution to our environmental problems,” said Souder, “but it’s hard.” He pointed out that many people expect a single piece of legislation to remedy these problems, when in fact, significant change is made up of many smaller decisions.

“How do we change investments that are oriented toward short-term returns to long-term investments?” he asked.

He also posed the question of how to move this kind of thinking into the industrial sector.

All of the speakers, including Hunter, Gascho, Michael McKay, the lead architect and partner with the architectural firm Morrison Kattman Menze Inc., and Jim Brenneman, Goshen College president, agreed that the educational thrust of the project, and the willingness of all parties involved to learn during planning and construction, made the project a success.

Souder said, “I hope part of this is your explaining what you did.”