If you’ve spent any amount of time in buildings with historical significance (and you probably have), you recognize that such structures are more than the sum of their physical parts. The confluence of design, material, and human action that occurred in those buildings allow you to step out of time momentarily, and experience how past generations imagined the combination of form and function as they created a built environment.
Now, imagine those same buildings with solar panels on the roof. Does that take away from the experience?
- » See also: Low cost solar panels and energy efficiency retrofits through group purchasing.
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The New York Times‘ Green Inc. blog dove into that question this morning, and attempted to dissect a hot debate among preservationists. From Al Gore’s Nashville mansion to a Frank Lloyd Wright-designed cottage in Wisconsin, the preservation community is wrestling with “where the line is between acceptable and unacceptable green improvements.
Read the rest at the Sundance Channel’s SUNfiltered blog.
Image credit: Bill Fitz-Patrick and whitehousemuseum.org
DIY Solar Panels
Great combination between art and science. I think not only set up solar panels on historical building like those is a good idea but I want to see this on all government’s place also.