Going Green

Stepping out of his Toyota Prius, Brady Hill surveys his future home nearing completion in Rogers’ Pinnacle Golf & Country Club subdivision.
Like his hybrid gas/electric car, his office and his daily thinking, the 5,400-SF house is green, an energy-saving and sustainability concept gaining popularity in Northwest Arkansas construction.
Hill, the president of Fourfrogs LLC, is helping pioneer the green movement locally with projects such as his home and a $2 million building project in Bentonville.
Fourfrogs is a consulting firm that helps area businesses and homeowners build earth-friendly homes and make eco-friendly choices.
Building green can add as much as 30 percent to the construction costs of a building, but the return on investment comes from the 20 percent or more reduction on monthly energy bills as well as increasing sustainability. Green projects in Northwest Arkansas are so new that it’s difficult to put an exact number on what the return will be, but some projects nationally have reported as much as a 200 percent return on investment.
There are also Federal tax credits available for developers building green, but it’s such a new concept that area accounting firms aren’t yet schooled in the process.
“It does cost more to build green up front, but there’s a lot of different strategies to minimize that cost up front and still capture the long-term benefits of lower energy bills and a sustainable building,” said Troy Connor, an estimator for The Flintco Companies Inc. of Springdale.
Connor and Hill are on the steering committee for the Arkansas Chapter’s Western Branch of the U.S. Green Building Council. Both also have passed the USGBC’s Leadership in Energy and Efficiency Design exam to become LEED Accredited Professionals.
Walking through his home, Hill pointed out, among other green aspects, the low-VOC, non-toxic paint on the walls and the cabinets, made of lyptus wood, which refurbishes itself every eight years, the foam insulation that completely seals out air and the two pellet burning fire places.
“When you drive by that house, you would never know that it’s a green house,” Hill said. “And you know how cold it’s been lately? We haven’t even had the heat running in there yet and the temperature stays between 68 and 70 [degrees Fahrenheit] because of all the green aspects we’re using.”
A large sign outside the site details the general rules of the job. It’s being built by Charles Benningfield, a custom homebuilder from Bentonville, and is being financed by ENG Lending of Rogers.
“There’s no smoking or eating in the house because that stuff gets in the Sheetrock. It’s there until it’s painted and then it’s really there forever,” Benningfield said. “We’ve been in a house where we’ve cut walls out and we’ve found baggies with sandwiches in them, so you don’t know what’s in your walls.”
Feelin’ Froggy
Fourfrogs also is teaming up with Benningfield on a Bentonville project, which should achieve LEED Gold status. It includes four buildings of residential/office space totaling 13,000-plus SF.
Points are earned by meeting certain energy savings and sustainability requirements to become certified. Projects awarded between 26 to 32 points can achieve certification status. Those earning 33 to 36 points earn Silver status while Gold is for projects earning between 39 to 51 points and Platinum is 52 or more points.
Only five projects in Arkansas are LEED certified. Three of those have achieved Silver level or higher and they are all in Little Rock. Just one local project, the University of Arkansas’ Innovation Center, has gained LEED certification.
“There are some prerequisites that you have to do, then you just pick your spots,” Hill said. “You have to balance the cost with the whole puzzle.”
Fourfrogs’ Bentonville projects is one of only five projects in Northwest Arkansas that are LEED registered, which is the first step toward earning certification. The others are Arkansas Support Network and the Tyson Foods Inc. Research and Development Center, both in Springdale, the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville and the Fayetteville Public Library.
There are a few other projects, such as a four-story, $14 million office building in Rogers being developed by The Benchmark Group and the 14,530-SF, $2.17 million Pinecrest Private School in Bentonville, that are taking steps toward becoming LEED registered or are using LEED products.
“It’s really just the right thing to do,” Hill said. “It’s just about making whatever it is more environmentally friendly, without costing us more money.”
Green Dixie
While only a few local developers and construction companies are looking at gaining LEED certification for their projects, a growing number are taking steps to be at least “partially” green.
Tom Damazio, the president of Dixie Construction in Fayetteville, said that only about 10 percent of the company’s current projects have green characteristics. While the company isn’t going to construct any buildings any time soon that are LEED certified, it is looking at ways to implement energy-saving technology.
“From this point forward, 100 percent of our projects will have some green,” Damazio said. “That’s our directive that’s come down from [Dixie Development] because it’s a new market and they are thinking green.”
Damazio estimates that building green can cost about 30 percent more than conventional construction, but adds that costs can be balanced with reduced energy bills and tax credits.
Dixie has two major projects in the planning stages that will meet some green requirements including a mixed-used subdivision called Albany Hills in Broken Bow, Okla.
There also is the BioBased Insulation project on Cato Springs Road in Fayetteville which will include green technologies such as BioBased Insulation in the walls, a shielded roof which is reflective and supposed to cut energy costs by 20 percent, windows allowing natural light to come in and even the way trash is sorted and hauled away from the construction site.
The four buildings planned are expected to be headquarters for the BioBased Insulation company, which is currently in Rogers.
“We’re trying to meet as many requirements as we can and work it into the cost of the building,” Damazio said. “We don’t want to do it where it’s cost prohibitive, where they can’t afford to build the building or put anything in it.”
Green Movement
Most current projects have been planned for three years or more, well before the green movement started locally. If it’s not on the original plans, going back and implementing green later in the process isn’t cost feasible.
Connor said the trick to balancing costs while building green must be tackled during the planning stages.
Connor said using sustainable technologies will allow a building to hold its value longer. He’s not saying that a building that is not being built to LEED standards will not have as much value in the future, but it will be able to maintain its class longer. In other words, a Class A office building will stay Class A longer, instead of dropping to Class B or Class C, if it’s built green.
“It’s not like, ‘Oh, we’re going to destroy the planet if we don’t go green,'” Connor said. “But it’s about being a wise steward of the resources that we have so that we don’t waste.
“It’s really common sense.”
But it’s not been too common locally. The green concept has been slow to move to the central states whereas building green has been gaining steam for years on both the West and East coasts.
Most believe it’s about changing mindsets, like the switch from SUVs to hybrid cars. Once building green becomes more popular with society, it will overflow into the mainstream of new construction.
“As the conscience level of the public gets more and more involved in the green, things will change,” Damazio said. “I don’t think the value of the building is going to fall, but it’s the end-users value of ‘Hey, I need to be in a building to where my electric bill is going to be low and overall, this is going to save me money.’
“So the way people look at value is possibly going to shift.”