The Ultimate Green Building

From: http://www.vastutv.com/sustainable-living-center-at-mum/
Video also: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PcSImxHbSM&feature=player_embedded

Sustainable Living Center at Maharishi University
of Management, Fairfield, Iowa, USA

The Ultimate Green Building

A building that gives back to the environment.

Imagine a building….
With day lighting in every room.
With natural, breathable earth block walls.
Where rain water runs from every faucet.
Where waste is purified and recycled with a system of plants, algae
and bacteria, instead of dumped into sewers.
So sustainable that it actually gives back to the environment.
In harmony with nature and bringing health to its occupants.

Welcome to the Maharishi University of Management Sustainable Living Center

The M.U.M. Sustainable Living Center will be the first of its kind. It is a building that is completely off the grid, surpasses LEED platinum, the highest LEED standard, and complies with the Cascadia Living Building Challenge. These are two of the most rigorous certifications for ecologically friendly buildings.

Additionally the building will comply with Bau (or building) Biology, a German system that focuses on creating buildings that are healthy for the occupants. The M.U.M. Sustainable Living Center will be a classroom, workshop, and office building to serve the rapidly expanding Sustainable Living degree program at Maharishi University of Management. The vision for this center is that it will be a building that teaches, a building that utilizes the most practical green building techniques and show cases them through informative displays to students and visitors.

Going beyond green: LEED platinum, Cascadia Living Building Challenge, Baubiology and Maharishi Vastu Architecture

This building goes beyond the usual concept of a green building which is measured primarily in terms of its carbon foot print. The SLC is actually beyond carbon neutral, creating more energy than it uses, but the building also offers much more. A unique feature of the SLC is that it is built in accordance with Maharishi Vastu Architecture, MVA is an ancient system of architecture which uses orientation, precise proportions, and specific placement of rooms. The entance of the building is to the East to take advantage of the enlivening rays of the early morning sun. Precise proportions are used to connect the built environment with the natural environment. Specific room placement harnesses the different qualites of sun light at different times of the day, to support different types of activity. This all creates a building which is in tune with nature.

Prinicples from Maharishi Vastu Architecture, Building Biology, and guidelines from LEED and the Cascadia Living Building Challenge all come together to make this building functional, efficient, sustainable, pure, healthy, harmonious, and uplifting for everyone.

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"A building that teaches, that walks its talk": Plans for our new Sustainable Living Center, which will be a "living building." It goes beyond LEED Platinum Certification, giving back more power and water than it uses.