Planning and Designing Housing within Planetary Boundaries
(60 minutes, 1 LU | HSW)
Course Description:
Our industry has made real progress reducing the carbon emissions from the buildings we operate and the materials we use. But emissions are determined not only by how well we build and but also how much we build. Consumption matters. How can we meet the housing needs of a growing population on an increasingly resource-constrained planet? Sufficiency – avoiding the demand for materials, land and resources while delivering well-being for all – is a critical missing tool in our decarbonization toolkit.
Learning Objectives:
- Understand the concept of Sufficiency as a demand-side approach to decarbonization of the built environment
- Be familiar with emerging international research and advocacy regarding sufficiency and the built environment
- Learn design strategies that advance sufficiency principles while meeting housing demand.
- Understand the role of architects in advocating for sufficiency-first housing policy
Speakers:
Lisa Richmond Hon AIA, Senior Fellow, Architecture 2030
As a Senior Fellow with Architecture 2030 and the Founder of Climate Strategy Works, a strategy and planning consultancy, Lisa works towards systems-level change to advance sustainability and climate justice. She has made sufficiency and culture-informed climate action her focus since 2023, and is leading Architecture 2030’s efforts to create a research hub for sufficiency in the built environment. Lisa is a founding member of the World Sufficiency Lab, and a co-author of the Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction’s recent report, “Sufficiency and the Built Environment: Reducing Demand for Land, Floor Area, Materials and Energy.”
Lloyd Alter, Adjunct Professor of Sustainable Design, Toronto Metropolitan University
Lloyd is a writer, public speaker, architect, inventor, and Adjunct Professor of Sustainable Design at Toronto Metropolitan University. He has published many thousands of articles on TreeHugger where he was Design Editor, and on such diverse platforms as Planet Green, HuffPo, The Guardian, Corporate Knights Magazine, and Azure Magazine. A former builder of prefab housing and a tiny-house pioneer, Lloyd is a passionate advocate of Radical Sufficiency – the belief that we use too much space, too much land, too much food, too much fuel, and too much money, and that the key to sustainability is to simply use less. He is the author of Living the 1.5 Degree Lifestyle. Lloyd lives in Toronto, Ontario.