Painful Lessons Learned: Paving the Way for Future Innovation

The millwright bellowed at me to stop what I was doing and follow him tout d'suite. Dropping my grease gun, I hurriedly made my way across the production line as he stormed off cursing in French. He overheard me earlier at a coffee break sharing that I planned to study engineering in the fall. As I caught up with him he shouted, “@%#*& engineers need to ‘tink about ‘ow to fix de $!^# they design”. He led me to a mangled part of the mill’s debarking line. As I gazed at the confusion of cogs, buckled metal plates, leaking fluids and logs jammed together like a pine-scented cybernetic porcupine, I conceded his point. Fixing that wreck was a challenge that took most of the weekend and would have been much faster with more intuitive access panels. As I helped clear the mess assigned to me for the sin of sharing my career aspirations, I must admit I started to have unkind visions of what I would like to do to the engineers who designed it. That was probably his point.

Learning from the Past

Some fifteen years later, I had the privilege of participating in a round table on sustainability with the leaders of several international building engineering firms. Suffering an acute case of imposture syndrome, it was enlightening to see the varied approaches to sustainable design amongst industry leaders. However, it was surprising to learn how many of them hesitate or outright refuse to revisit their completed buildings to study their failures – one leader of a world-renowned firm quipped it was best to avoid potential lawsuits that may result from “poking about the wreckage”. Since that fateful day in the mill, I had come to appreciate that such an attitude is short-sighted – if we don’t learn from our mistakes, we’re doomed to repeat them. I’ve been fortunate to balance my career retrofitting buildings in addition to designing new ones, and have curated a long list of lessons learned that operators and maintenance personnel are only too happy to share – often with less cursing than a French-Canadian millwright. Here are a few that come to mind.

Hospital

Upon entering the mechanical penthouse of the 1960’s-era hospital, we discovered a large, rusted coil on the floor, and a gaping coil-shaped hole in the roof. The culprit? Maturing cottonwood trees surrounding the hospital. The "cotton" fluff from these trees regularly clogged the heat recovery coil, leading to an unconventional solution: removing the coil with a blow torch instead of cleaning it to avoid tripping the exhaust system. ?This highlighted the need for more practical maintenance plans in sustainable design (and anticipating that trees will eventually grow taller than structures); sometimes maintenance costs will exceed the value of the resource being conserved by a design feature.

Library

A signature, award-winning library and government office tower featured an innovative ice thermal energy storage system used to offset peak demand and cooling costs. Unfortunately, according to the building operations team, no one assessed whether the additional electrical energy expenditure for the phase change from cold water to ice was economically viable given the utility rate structure . The operator chose to switch to cold water rather than making ice, but freeze-thaw cycles had cracked the concrete tank, flooding the underground parking levels in the process. This emphasized the importance of thorough feasibility studies for sustainable projects and understanding demand rate structures in making similar design decisions.

Historic Restoration

A LEED Platinum heritage retrofit boasted many advanced features and achieved a significant reduction in energy consumption upon turnover. However, a change in operations personnel led to many of the advanced sustainability features being deactivated due to a lack of operations and maintenance know-how. In addition, added wall insulation resulted in migration of the dewpoint in the 1930’s-era sandstone fa?ade, resulting in spalling (freeze-thaw cycles are a pain). This case underscores the necessity of matching design sophistication with maintenance personnel capabilities, and that new isn’t necessarily better in the long run.

Solar Community

As equipment and components exceed their useful lifespans, a residential solar community is decommissioning of much of its innovative central plant due to significant repair and replacement costs - swapping many of its renewable systems for conventional energy sources and equipment. In speaking with one of the original engineers, there seems to be much finger pointing about the situation. While it was a groundbreaking and celebrated project at the time, it seems to have lacked consideration for end-of-life replacement costs, teaching us the importance of full lifecycle planning, and perhaps ensuring adequate reserve funds are established for community-owned sustainable infrastructure.

Moving Forward

These examples, while painful and perhaps embarrassing for the original design teams (assuming they are aware of the issues), also serve as valuable lessons in the evolution of sustainable design. While they highlight what some may consider failures, they also underscore the importance of innovation, continuous improvement, and the willingness to learn from past mistakes. By revisiting and understanding our projects, we can better anticipate challenges and create more resilient, sustainable solutions for the future.

The journey towards sustainable design is filled with both triumphs and setbacks. It’s crucial to remember that early attempts, even when they fall short, lay the foundation for the advancements in the built environment we see today. Reflecting on these experiences, not as critiques but as learning opportunities, helps drive the industry forward. To all the courageous engineers, architects, designers and builders pushing the envelope: be fearless, and go back to your creations every once and while. It's amazing what we can learn by "poking about the wreckage."

What are some other lessons learned that come to mind in the furthering of sustainable design?