It’s become trendy in preservation circles to say that "the greenest building is one that's already built," a catch phrase usually attributed to preservationist Carl Elifante. However, is that always the case?
Some buildings are simply poorly designed or maintained (or both) and there are plenty of existing buildings in lousy locations where transportation emissions required by driving to and fro can overwhelm whatever resource and pollution savings might be intrinsic to the building.
These issues raise the question: just how green is an older building?
Source: The Atlantic
