Mid Atlantic Real Estate Journal — Owners, Developers & Managers — July 26 - August 15, 2013 — 13B A RCHITECTS & E NGINEERS
www.marejournal.com
By William Amann, P.E., DCEP, LEED AP, M&E Engineers Hurricane Sandy disaster recovery action plan is green
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t has now been 10 months since Hurricane Sandy tore apart parts
Dutch started a little settle- ment on the Island of Man- hattan, the Lenape Indians spent summers at the NJ shore fishing and collecting shellfish. But their accom- modations were mobile, and they moved their tepees off the barrier islands when storms approached. My suggestion that we only allow mobile homes on the islands has not received a lot of support. But the point is that when we built
where we did, we knew we were building in harm’s way. The question before us now is if we rebuild, do we re-build the same way, and suffer the consequences? Or do we rebuild in a sustain- able fashion that can with- stand the storms that will undoubtedly reoccur? Sustainable; Resilient; Green Building; are not ex- actly interchangeable terms, but they all share the notion that we have a choice. We
can build to minimum code requirements; or we can build to best practices. We certainly know better than we did when the Parkway was built in the 1950’s. We have satellite imaging and computer analysis of storm surge. We have better building techniques, in some part due to the adoption of LEED and other green building standards. But the ques- tion remains whether we
will rebuild as cheaply and irresponsibly as possible, or take the longer view and rebuild sustainably. The Sandy Recovery Action Plan is starting off with the right intent. I hope that we are smart enough to see it through. William Amann, P.E., DCEP, LEED AP is presi- dent of M&E Engineers, Inc. & is chairman of the Somerset County Energy Council. ■
of the shore in New Jer- s e y a n d New York. A l t h o u g h m a n y o f the board- walks and some of the houses have been rebuilt,
William Amann
there is still a lot of work ahead to fully restore these areas. Fortunately, the plans to rebuild are a lot smarter than the plans that allowed many of these buildings to be built in the first place. Leading the effort to de- velop a strategy for rebuild- ing in New Jersey is the Department of Community Affairs, which developed the Superstorm Sandy Di- saster Recovery Plan. This plan has been submitted to HUD for approval and associated federal funding through community develop- ment block grants. It can be downloaded at the NJ.gov/ DCA website. I was delighted to see that the plan incorporates Green Building practices and requires Energy Star certification. It encourages the use of the New Jersey Green Home Remodeling Guidelines, which were de- veloped before Sandy with broad participation by an advisory group composed of residential building and remodeling professionals, in- terior designers, landscape architects, and experts in the field of green building and energy-efficient design. Further, New Jersey has had several meetings with various agencies includ- ing the U.S. Green Build- ing Council (USGBC), New Jersey Chapter of USGBC, International Code Council, Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnership and New Jersey Chapter of American Insti- tute of Architects (AIA) to develop a plan for encourag- ing sustainable community initiatives and implement- ing green building, energy efficiency and storm hazard mitigation measures.
For centuries before the
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