You, too, can build green

Hi. My name is Linda Beeman. I'm a 60-something native of the Pacific Northwest committed to doing what I can to preserve our environment. Welcome to my building green blog, which I hope will inspire people planning their own construction projects. Often we want to build in an environmentally responsible way, but just don't know where to start. Perhaps this chronicle of my garage/studio apartment project -- we hope it's going to be the first 5-star BuiltGreen project in Island and Skagit counties in Washington State -- will offer you the encouragement you need to begin one of your own. Maybe you're just remodeling. If so, you can pick and choose from the elements we used to try to achieve that rating.

Let me tell you a bit about myself and then explain the Skagit Island County Builders' Association (SICBA) BuiltGreen program.

My commitment to green building was reinforced by my move to Whidbey Island -- a 50-mile long amoeba squiggle in Puget Sound -- in 2002. For the first time in my life I owned acreage. With it came the realization that I was personally responsible for the animals and plant life on my land. Since the beauty and quiet of the forest drew me here, those were the elements I most wanted to preserve. I built small, using energy-efficient systems, appliances and recycled materials wherever possible.

Three years of coordinating an alternative house tour on our island kept me abreast of new developments in green building. Like health food, green houses used to be preachy, clunky structures that saved on energy and resources, but that few wanted to call home. They were the unadorned tofu and sturdy Birkenstocks of the 1970s and 80s. Advances in technology and new thinking about design changed all that. Now green building sings of its connections to the earth, safeguards our health and increases resale value. It's the perfect way to do well by doing good.

Our island has the potential to become a showcase for environmentally-sensitive building. As a realtor and a certified EcoBroker, I'm excited about encouraging my clients to go green.

Enough about me. In the next post I'll tell you a little about SICBA's BuiltGreen program. Succeeding posts will take you step-by-step through the process I'm experiencing -- the choices and trade-offs that I make -- to construct a project that's both visually exciting and environmentally innovative.