Eco-development

Housing developments have such a bad name. Primarily associated with oversized homes on small blocks, their garages dominating the streetscape, most can hardly be described as environmentally friendly. Are there any exceptions to this generalisation?

The concept of creating new residential communities is not necessarily incongruous with ecologically sensitive aims. In fact, many eco-friendly housing developments do exist. Unfortunately very few of them are in this country. Planning a settlement from scratch presents the opportunity to create tailored infrastructure that can significantly reduce a community’s impact on the environment. Amongst other things, the creation of shared facilities (such as laundries), holistic planning of grey water and stormwater reticulation as well as guidelines for passive solar design can actually result in a greatly reduced ecological footprint.

Most new developments are unable to make such promises. In most cases in Australia a developer’s priority with any new land release or project home is profit. As environmental considerations become more important to potential buyers it is possible that developers will begin to take these into account. Government initiatives, such as BASIX certificates, which require every new home (or additions and alterations) to achieve minimum environmental ratings, have gone some way towards ensuring that new developments are less reliant on fossil fuels. However, until potential residents place less emphasis on size and car ownership there is unlikely to be any substantial change in the character of the typical new housing estate.

Up until now it has been up to passionate individuals who, once they have managed to gain enough support and funding, have fulfilled their aims of creating sustainable communities. As mentioned earlier these are a rarity in Australia. New Zealand, the US and UK as well as Germany have successful examples of these. However, without large-scale government and community support many struggle to survive. The older, hippy-style developments also tend to be somewhat wholemeal in their appearance, which does not have mainstream appeal thus relegating them to niche communities. The key to successful large-scale development is the creation and marketing of eco-friendly housing which meets the expectations of today’s consumers with built-in sustainable measures.

The proposed community of West Stevenage in the UK goes some way towards these aims. Amongst others, some of the aims include reduced CO2 emissions, fewer peak hour car journeys, use of recycled materials, reduced water usage and waste reduction measures. Dedicated cycle and walking routes have been created and land has been allocated for community facilities as well as so-called employment land. Whether or not these measures will, indeed, be effective in reducing the impact of this housing on the environment remains to be seen.

Stringybark Grove in Lane Cove is an example of a successful small-scale eco-community in Australia. Consisting of only 10 townhouses, however, its impact on the energy consumption in one of Australia’s most affluent (and energy and water-consuming) communities is minimal and this is the case for most examples of eco-housing in Australia. To actually have an impact, eco-ideals should not be the domain of isolated communities but universal aims of all development. Grey water reuse, passive solar design and green energy should be part of everyone’s life -“ as a matter of course and enforced through government policy and funding.

Despite BASIX, Australian housing has a long way to go before the environmental impact can be significantly and effectively reduced.