The Sunday Tribune

Eves for Earth
Surekha Kadapa-Bose

With green being the buzzword, many women architects have
made it the cornerstone of their work

AN energy-efficient home is the new buzzword among those who want to reduce their carbon footprint on Planet Earth. The trend, which surprisingly is more popular in small towns, is also likely to impact the real estate industry in big cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and Chennai, which are facing a severe shortage of space.

Among those in the forefront of this change are some leading women architects, who are designing and building eco-friendly homes that are comfortable, easy to maintain, reduce energy-related greenhouse gas emissions, and are more easy on the purse in the long term than conventional homes.

Our Native Village, a resort built on the outskirts of Bangalore, has a pool in the foreground that uses plants to purify its water Photo: WFS

A view of the green residence of wildlife photographers,
Ashish and Shanti Chandola in Bangalore, designed by
architect Chitra Vishwanath Photo: WFS

"This trend is slowly changing and is like a silent revolution," explains Bangalore-based architect Chitra Vishwanath, 47, who alone has been responsible for designing and constructing over 600 eco-friendly houses in and around her city in the last decade. In fact, over 6,000 eco-friendly houses have come up in Bangalore and its vicinity in the past 10 years, thanks to many architectural firms that now offer clients green or energy-efficient buildings.

Eco-friendly structures mean using local materials, local skills and imply low-technological dependency. None of these buildings are more than two or three floors high and so, power is not consumed for running lifts, for instance. Most of these buildings are made up of soil-stabilised blocks, Balipatnam bricks (solid and hollow), stone masonry, tiled roofs and recycled wood. They also use biogas. Their materials include natural stones and clay tiles for the flooring. They function on solar and wind power to run fans and power the LED bulbs for light. Each one of them has a rainwater-harvesting facility as well as infrastructure to recycle the garbage. And because of good cross-ventilation through large windows and doors, these abodes don’t require air-conditioning during punishing summers.

Says architect Anupama Kundoo, known for the green homes she has built in cities across India, "Eco-friendly is not defined as a clear measurable standard. It’s more a tendency.

Architect Chitra Vishwanath

It is an effort to reduce the strain on water and energy as compared to conventional building practices. It’s an effort to consider the health and pollution impacts and focus on reducing the waste generated. As such, there is a lot of scope to improve the performance of buildings, particularly in densely populated cities. Eco-friendly doesn’t mean only mud buildings today."

Kundoo, incidentally, divides her time between India and Germany and is currently teaching architecture and urban management at the University of Technology in Berlin.

Mumbai-based architect Shimul Javeri Kadri, who has designed several energy-efficient buildings in Mumbai, Hyderabad, Chennai and Karur, among other places, puts it this way, "If buildings are constructed giving attention to the direction of natural wind flow and the angle of sunlight, a lot of energy can be saved. Of course, one can’t but consume power for the usage of lifts in multi-storey buildings. But power consumption can be reduced if the rooms are properly ventilated. Even the glass facades that are so popular at present can help reduce power consumption. But this is possible only if the large simple glass windowpanes are replaced by reflective window panes that considerably reduce the solar heat."

In support of her argument, Kadri cites an example of a building designed by Chicago-based architect Jeanne Gang. Named Aqua, Gang’s 84-storey condo building is literally making waves amongst architects the world over. The building has a protruding concrete facade resembling sea waves on each floor that controls the breeze flow in the apartments and also provides natural shade to the occupants from the scorching sun.

Kadri is presently working on a residential bungalow in Alibaug, near Mumbai, where she has shaped the roof like a peepal tree leaf, with the front of the roof tilting upwards and facing the wind flow. The wind flow is thus used to cool the interiors of the bungalow.

Architects admit that the concept eco-friendly buildings to help fight global warming could become successful only when the entire landscape of the city and lifestyle of its residents undergo a change. And cities need to be planned properly, the way they used to be in earlier times.

"You can’t commute four to five hours in your AC car to and from office and say that you are helping the planet by living in eco-friendly homes. Whatever energy you have saved in your house design goes waste. The ideal eco-friendly constructions are those where the office, schools, colleges, hospitals, and recreation centres are close by," says Vishwanath.

This is the reason why many big names in the world of construction are offering townships. Far removed from the madding crowds of the cities, these builders provide everything including recreation facilities, sports space, office space, hospitals and markets, within the cluster of buildings they build. They also provide rain-harvesting systems and many of them have set up garbage recycling facilities. In addition, many projects that are now coming up have solar panelling on the rooftops to tap the energy from the sun.

Women architects are very optimistic that within the next couple of decades, the lifestyle of ordinary people will undergo a sea change. The concrete-aluminum-steel buildings that are considered sophisticated today may soon become passé. And the mud houses, which are considered the poor person’s habitat at present, may well become fashionable in the years to come.

Says Kundoo, "Cement-stabilised rammed earth walls allow a cleaner monolithic and modular solution with a minimalistic look in tune with modern trends. Five per cent cement added to the mud mix allows one to do away with the large tiled roof overhangs. This gives a rural and rustic look that is slowly becoming popular with urbanites."

People today are more conscious about environmentally sound solutions, especially young couples who prefer to have a unique house and who want to fight the battle against global warming, indirectly if not directly. They are constantly in search of green architects, who on their part go out of their way to experiment with newer technology to make a house as energy efficient as possible.

Cost wise, some of these eco-homes may not come cheap. But while many a time they are more expensive to construct, they could prove much cheaper to maintain in the long term. Reveals Sandhya Mahesh, wife of Mahesh Babu, a scientist with the Indian Space Research Centre, Bangalore, "Living in this house designed and constructed by Chitra makes us feel one with the nature. We don’t have an AC in our house plus the harvested rain water helps us water our garden."

With more and more people adopting eco-friendly lifestyles and with architects willing to experiment with building styles and materials, eco-homes are just what India and the world need in these times of climate change and global warming. — WFS

Forest cover
Chetna Keer Banerjee

The state-of-the-art green Punjab Forest Department building
symbolises a commitment to conservation

THE Forest Complex, state-of-the-art official headquarters of the Punjab Forest Department, spread over an area of 1,51,000 sq ft in Sector-68, Mohali, is an embodiment of the green wave sweeping our urbanscape, which is restructuring the edifice of architectural vision.

The Forest Complex, Mohali, resembles a tortoise from the top, denoting fauna, while its five pillars stand for Punjab
Photo: Vicky Gharu

Architect Renu Khanna says that features like double-glass windows maximise light and minimise power consumption
in the Forest Complex

An amalgamation of eco-friendly principles with the flora-and-fauna centric ideology of the Forest Department and a regional flavour has seen the creation of a sprawling complex, which is a symbol of the universal planet-conserving consciousness defining much of modern architecture while, at the same time, it possesses an individuality born of local elements and expectations.

Elaborating on the making of this marvel, its architect Renu Khanna spells out the environment-friendly features that went into it.

"The Forest Department, Punjab, had invited entries from architects for the project and mine got selected," she says about how she landed the prestigious assignment. And how did she conceive the design and did any building/s inspire it? "Yes, I was very impressed by the ITC Green Centre, Gurgaon, and drew some inspiration from it." Incidentally, even the US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton,`A0on a visit to the ITC Green Centre in July 2009, had lauded it.

Coming to the symbol of eco-construction in Punjab, Renu adds, "Since the Forest Department is all about flora and fauna, the aerial view of the structure resembles a tortoise that is considered to be symbolic of fauna, with four feet and a head. The five pillars, which stand for Punj-ab, too, have an organic design denoting trees."

The green quotient of such buildings certainly reduces the costs to our environment, but what about the actual costs? Don’t the energy-efficient features make the constructions costs shoot up?

Architect Renu Khanna

"Look, the initial cost of making a structure environment-friendly may be 10 per cent to 15 per cent higher, but in the long run, it covers up. It begins to pay back in about three years in terms of, say, lower power bills etc. And, yes, getting a building certified as eco-friendly does add 4-5 per cent to its cost, too. But the long-term savings in conserving our scarce resources make up for all this," explains Renu.

The main conservation features of the Forest complex include energy-efficient double glass windows, as the DGUs allow 85 per cent light and only 15 per cent heat to pass through. Says the architect, "This reduces the load on airconditioning and, combined with the LED/CFL lamps and solar heating, they bring down the power bill in the long run. In addition, there is an in-built forest area in the central courtyard that has a water body with a submerged bridge and a 40-ft waterfall made of ferocrete that helps in reducing the temperature by at least five degrees.

"The water-conservation elements include the rain harvesting facility and sensor taps. The building has landscaping done on every floor, has a large terrace garden on the first and the third floors, and an open-air theatre to add the cultural feel."

In short, the design integration ensures a collaboration between the five elements of Mother Nature.

So, what are the parameters for a building to be labelled as eco-friendly? Is it just a fad to incorporate some eco-friendly features in buildings these days or are there specific benchmarks to be met?

"Of course, there are the IGBC norms that govern the ratings," informs Renu.

The Indian Green Building Council (IGBC) is actively involved in promoting the green building movement in India and has launched a green building rating system for new constructions in various segments.

It defines a green building as "one which uses less water, optimises energy efficiency, conserves natural resources, generates less waste and provides healthier spaces for occupants, as compared to a conventional building."

Moving on from the Forest Complex, Renu talks of her future challenges, "The Baba Banda Bahadur Museum at Chhapar Chidi, near Mohali, is a major project I’m engaged in at present, besides the NIFT complex at Jalandhar."

The landmark Forest Complex, thus, makes green the building block for Punjab architecture, too!

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