Jeangoldstrom
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I Love AR
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Here is a news story that sounds like science fiction, but isn't. From Thursday's Post Gazette, here in Pittsburgh PA; "...the Center for Sustainable Landscapes, which held its grand opening Wednesday, is drawing attention for qualities less obvious than its old-barn wood sising, lots of windows and a rooftop garden. Situated on a 2.65-acre brownfield site, it represents America's largest green building at 24,350 squaqre feet that can claim net-zero energy and water usage. It also stands as America's current best example of green-building construction. Once fully operating, the building will be completely off the utility grid. Fifty-three employees will move into the building in June, and it opens to the public in July. The center will capture rainwater, then process it in wetland lagoons with sewage retained in wetland pits and then processed through sand filters, allowing the water's reuse inside the building. With ultraviolet technology, processed rainwater will be distilled to 100-percent pharmaceutical grade, but be used to water Phipp's orchids. It cannot be used for drinking water. The education, administration and research complex features a $500,000 solar-photovoltaic panel array with ground-mounted panels and others atop various Phipps buldings. The solar-photovoltaic panels will produce 124 kilowatts of electricity with additional power generated by the 5-kilowatt vertical-axis wind turbine and 14 geothermal wells. Electrical production on the Phipps campus will equal what's used to 10 aypical american homes..." (Note: The Phipps Conservatory, of which this new building is a part, houses a huge variety of plants on public display.)
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