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LECTU R E 6

Green Building Decisions and Ethics

Green Building Decisions

 Impacts on climate change:

 selection of energy systems; planning; transit; fostering bicycling

 Dwindling resources:

 fossil fuels, metals, potable water

 Impacts on natural systems:

 construction process; building location; product manufacturing

 Buildings as resources for future generations

 As in other sectors, it comes down to ethics

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Ten Ethical Principles Underpinning Sustainability

1. Intergenerational Justice and the Chain of Obligation

2. Distributional Equity

3. The Precautionary Principle

4. The Reversibility Principle

5. The Polluter Pays Principle

6. Protecting the Vulnerable

7. Respect for Nature

8. Sustainable Decision-making versus Once-Off Decision- making

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Intergenerational Justice and the Chain of Obligation

 The choices of today’s generations will directly affect the quantity of resources remaining for future inhabitants of Earth, and will affect environmental quality.

 This concept of obligation that crosses temporal boundaries is referred to as intergenerational justice.

 Furthermore, the concept of intergenerational justice implies a chain of obligation between generations that extends from today into the distant future.

 Parental responsibility for enabling their offspring to meet their moral obligations to their children and beyond.

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Distributional Equity

 There is an obligation to insure the fair distribution of resources among present people so that the life prospects of all people are addressed.

 Based on principles of justice and the reasonable assumption that all individuals in a given generation are equal and a uniform distribution of resources must be a consequence of intragenerational equity

 The principle of distributional equity can be extended to relationships between generations because a given generation has moral responsibility for providing for their offspring

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The Precautionary Principle

 Requires the exercise of caution when making decisions that may adversely affect nature, natural ecosystems, and global, biogeochemical cycles.

 “When an activity raises threats of harm to human health or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken even if some cause and effect relationships are not fully established scientifically.”

 Examples?

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Outcomes of Decisions

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Precautionary Principle’s Four Tenets

1. People have a duty to take anticipatory action to prevent harm.

2. The burden of the proof of harmlessness of a new technology, process, activity or chemical lies with the proponents, not the general public.

3. Before using a new technology, process, or chemical or starting a new activity, people have an obligation to examine a full range of alternatives including the alternative of not doing it.

4. Decisions on applying the Precautionary Principle must be open, informed, and democratic and must include the affected parties.

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The Reversibility Principle

 “Do not commit the irrevocable.” Arthur C. Clarke

 Making decisions that are able to be undone by future generations.

 Examples: nuclear energy; GMOs

 Related to the Precautionary Principle but less stringent

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The Polluter Pays Principle

 Addresses existing technologies

 The onus for mitigating damage is on those causing the impacts

 Compensation to those harmed

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Protecting the Vulnerable

 There are populations, including the animal world, that are vulnerable to the actions of portions of the human species.  Destruction of ecosystems under the guise of development

 Introduction of technology (including toxic substances, endocrine disruptors, genetically modified organisms, nanotechnology, robotics)

 People who are essentially powerless due to governing and economic structures are vulnerable to the decisions of those who are powerful because of their wealth or influence

 This asymmetrical power arrangement is governed by moral obligation.

 Those in power have a special obligation to protect the vulnerable, those dependent on them.

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Respect for Nature

 Basis of an ethics of respect for nature: 1. Humans are member of the community of life

2. All species are interconnected in a web of life

3. Each species is a teleological center of life

4. Humans are not superior to any other species

 Same evolutionary process, governed by the same laws

 Humans are utterly dependent on other species for survival

 Other species are to be respected and humans should not compromise their survival

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Sustainable versus Once-Off Decision Making

 The issue is examining the temporal impact of decisionmaking

 Example: the built environment

 Buildings as waste or resource for future generations

 Energy efficient versus less efficient structures

 Life cycle analysis

 Life Cycle Costing

 Life Cycle Assessment

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Closure

 Sustainability is a complex issue addressing the sustainment of human quality of life

 The foundation of sustainability is ethics  The ethical principles of sustainability provide a

sound basis for decision-making but require courage in their application

 The principles should be comprehensive, covering human and non-human worlds

 Time horizons are crucial and must also be addressed