Populus goes one step further in its boast of being 'carbon positive', not just offsetting the hotel’s carbon footprint but actually taking out far more carbon than it puts in – a promise few businesses would dare to make, for both financial and publicity reasons.
As a term, however, 'carbon positive' can be linguistically confusing [...] and with no clear definition of what 'carbon positive' means, there are no metrics by which to determine its validity.
— The Guardian
The project, first announced in February 2021, has since garnered skepticism amidst its developer Urban Villages' claims of being a first-of-its-kind carbon-positive American design in the typology. The true sustainability of the firm’s 2009 Aqua Tower in Chicago has been scrutinized in the past by online commenters.
The 265-room Populus, with its blinking 'lids' fenestration, opens for the first time on October 15th.
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From the article:
But just how much CO2 emissions can you attribute to any one project? Hartter admits it’s a challenge.
“You have to account for several factors: direct emissions from the hotel itself, such as HVAC systems and company vans; emissions from purchased electricity that powers the building, including lighting, heating and cooling; and indirect emissions, like the transportation of goods, the carbon footprint of construction materials, waste disposal and guest travel. In this case, you must also consider site preparation, building materials, supply chains and everything brought into the hotel – from beds and furniture to TVs. You also have to think about the timescale over which offsetting occurs,” he explains. “It’s complex, and this is what many of the world’s largest companies are currently grappling with.”
tldr: It's the same struggle as forever, the building isn't actually carbon positive as this hinges on the developer/ owner planting trees, but that doesn't mean the building isn't also doing some positive things.
The article (and most articles like this) do often fail to take on what I see as a fundamental paradox in expressive architecture - sustainability aims vs the cost and material and energy-intensive processes to create complex forms and facades.
The embodied carbon footprint of new construction is, general speaking, big enough to undermine most net-zero operational proclamations.
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