Cooper Green Design | The Blog

Wall splatter below a dryer surface mounted on painted wall board.

I spend an inordinate amount of time talking about toilet rooms at work. I’ve had meetings and dedicated to waterless urinals, pressure assisted toilets, and a variety of toilet room smells. The latest round of conference calls has focused on high efficiency hand dryers in several projects.

First, high efficiency hand dryers are the new-ish models that are popping up in restrooms around the country. They are powerful yet efficient, and dry our hands in about 10-12 seconds. Excel and Dyson are 2 of the major manufacturers. Using dryers is more sanitary than paper towel dispensers or push button dryers, and cleaning staff no longer need to clean wet paper towels off of the floors. With lower annual costs when compared to paper towels and lower energy use when compared to standard dryers, there are clear environmental benefits and they are (finally!) becoming industry standard.

Some of my clients are becoming reluctant to install them because of occupant complaints about noise and appearance. In my own travels, I’ve seen many poor installations, and I’ve witnessed quite a few small children cry at the sound of the dryer. After too many conference calls, I’ve come up with this list of easy steps to include high efficiency dryers in toilet rooms without scaring the children or disturbing the adults:

• Include the noise reduction nozzle! This is an option when ordering the Xlerator dryer, and it significantly reduces the noise.  Without it, the device is likely to frighten small children or disrupt conversations in adjacent rooms.
• Inform your users. Excel has a simple online calculator that determines annual cost savings and environmental savings. Many users who complain about the dryers are not aware of their benefits.  Use the calculator and include a small sign that shows the actual savings for your dryers. A sign may read:

“By using these dryers instead of paper towels, we eliminate 550lb of waste, save 12,331 gallons of water, save 10 trees, reduce our carbon footprint by 1278.58 kgs CO2 eq., and save $1,260.00 each year.”

I always carefully consider the tone of any signage and I craft it to be appropriate for the building, client, and users. Most occupants will appreciate being “informed” but will resent being “educated” in a public toilet room.

• Ditch the paper towel dispenser. If you include both a dryer and a paper towel dispenser, many users will choose paper towels. This can negate the cost savings that you will realize if you only install the dryer.
• Pay attention to the wall material. Many small toilet rooms have dryers that are surface mounted on painted wall board. With these dryers, the velocity of air is greater, and water from hands will splash on the wall. Some occupants complain about ‘unsanitary conditions’ when in fact, what they are seeing is this unsightly wall splatter.  I recommend including a stainless wall panel, tile, or other cleanable surface at the location of an Xlerator dryer and training cleaning staff to wipe the surface. The Dyson Airblade is self contained and usually does not have wall splatter problems, but because it is accessed from the top, different mounting heights may be needed in toilet rooms that serve both children and adults.

This paper towel dispenser is conveniently installed on a partition adjacent to the sink.

The Dyson Airblade is on the opposite side of the partition. Shame on them!

On a recent trip to Hawaii, which involved 5 plane flights, I effectively negated all of my carbon reduction efforts for the year. On the plus side, I saw some amazing things that I’ll never forget.

I took my toddler son to see the Hawi wind farm. He was amazed, I was amazed. We drove up the spine of Kohala Mountain (EL = 5,480′), then descended to the small town of Hawi. Located at the northern tip of the Big Island, this place is certainly windy. You can find wind maps on Hawaii Electric Company’s website. Dozens of cows are nestled beneath 16 wind turbines.  The wind farm is adjacent to the Upolo Airport (How do the pilots handle the wind?) and the island of Maui looms in the distance. It was a fantastic place to wander around.

There are sixteen Vestas turbines providing a total output of 10.56 Megawatts. The wind farm came online in 2006 and provides power for Hawaii Electric Light Company (HELCO). (data from the American Wind Association).

I’ve come across some pretty cool and well-designed bike products recently. My commute is now a 15 ft walk across the hallway, but I’m a recovering Philadelphia bike commuter. People often ask me how did I do it? Did you bike in the rain? What about the snow? Did you need to change your clothes?  I did bike in all kinds of weather, and I did it with minimal special gear. I looked ridiculous on my ride each morning,  then I’d completed a magical transformation into work attire in a cramped office restroom. (Plus I had quite a collection of heels to choose from under my desk). I would not have been featured on This Is Cycle Chic.

PUBLIC Bikes - mmm, juicy

I suspect that many people don’t bike to work because it doesn’t “look” cool. Enter PUBLIC Bikes. They are releasing a new line of European style urban-cool bikes. I haven’t been able to try one out yet, but they do look juicy… as in a sweet drippy tangerine or kiwi.

If you are in San Francisco, you can test ride one at their shop. Bikes can be pre-ordered, and the line will be available online this month and at Tretorn in Soho. By the way, if you will be in New York for Metropolis’s ICFF 2010 (International Contemporary Furniture Fair) May 15-18, join PUBLIC on their Design Ride Manhattan celebration on Sunday. The ride travels from the ICFF to the Tretorn Store.

Yakkay Bicycle Helmet & Cover

Keeping your pretty little heads protected is a must, and now there are a few options for doing so in style. Yakkay has been getting lots of press for their Danish designed helmet covers. Very cute, but they come at quite a price. If you are one of those people that can handle  riding in a suite, it makes for a perfect accessory. A DIY option that is actually quite easy is to personalize a Bern bike helmet (Bern helmets are shaped like french motorcycle helmets) with paint or decals. See an example here. Bern’s Watts helmet is pretty sleek on its own.

“It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn’t feel like a giant. I felt very, very small.” — Neil Armstrong

“We can see our planet earth with detachment, with tenderness, with some shame and pity, but at last also with love.” — Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Earth Shine, 1969.

Earth - NASA satellite image

1946 was our first glimpse of the earth from space. Grainy black and white photos were taken with a 35 millimeter camera on a V-2 missile. (Smithsonian Air & Space has a great description along with a photo gallery and video). These images and others taken in the following years had a profound impact on how we view ourselves and our home.

The above image is one that I’ve used for years in education and training workshops. It is a NASA satellite image that was given to me by a colleague from Australia. I love using it in the United States because the image is so dynamic, allowing North Americans to view it without the distraction of identifying our own geographical home on the Earth. (This image shows Africa, the Middle East, and Antarctica.)

For more earth day eye candy, check out NASA’s Visible Earth site, which contains a catalog of images and a composite Earth: The Blue Marble, a composite image with exceptional detail and color. For more quotes, check out this site.

Happy Earth Day!

On a separate note, Cooper Green Design | The Blog has a backlog of posts, including the remaining posts in the World Expo Series. I’ll correct this soon and have them up this week. Thanks for your patience and as always, thanks for following.

Israel's Pavilion at the 2010 World Expo

Rendering of the Whispering Garden

Israel’s Pavilion is the feature of part 2 of my series on green design at the Shanghai World Expo 2010.

This is Israel’s first pavilion in a World Expo. The theme is “Innovation for Better Life,” and the design by Haim Dotan brings natural features and technology in harmony with one another. I find the form quite elegant, with the glass (Hall of Light) and stone (Hall of Innovations) volumes in a twisting embrace: a nod to the Taoist Yin and Yang. Architect Haim Dotan is the designer of the AORA solar flower,  a 30m tower ringed by mirrors, which generates 100kW of power at Kibbutz Samar. Here again, he is a master of efficient use of materials.

In the Hall of Innovations, hundreds of “light-sphere” stations will demonstrate Israel’s technological innovations in solar & green energy, science, music, agriculture, medicine, and security. Visitors can have a virtual conversation with Israelis.

What appears most intriguing is the Whispering Garden, with over 50 orange trees and a meandering covered pedestrian path. The garden will showcase Israel’s irrigation technology, which is one of the most advanced applications of drip irrigation in the world.

The construction and activity budget is $6 million.

For more info:

• Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs
• Haim Dotan Architects Israel Pavilion Site

CGD’s Score: +4

+3 Sustainability is evident in the design

-1 Many materials are not recyclable

-1 No onsite renewable energy

+3 Exhibit them focuses on efficient irrigation and science & technology

In 85 days, the 2010 World Expo opens in Shanghai, China. For the next 10 days, I’ll be featuring some of the more interesting pavilions under construction, and their green features.
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