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THE GREEN INSTITUTE
HISTORY
Implementing Practical Solutions Since 1993: A Brief History of The Green Institute
The Green Institute was founded by community activists as the positive vision and solutions-oriented response to a proposed garbage transfer station in South Minneapolis.
The Phillips neighborhood of Minneapolis is a low-income community of renters with a population representing diverse ethnic groups and an industrial past that left it scarred with a legacy of brownfield soil contamination. In the late 1980s, Hennepin County decided to build a high-volume garbage transfer station on a ten-acre site in the Phillips neighborhood. The proposed facility was designed to receive 280 trucks and up to 1,800 tons of solid waste per day, a 90% increase in capacity from the average urban transfer station. It was planned for a site within blocks of a nursing home, high school, neighborhood, restaurants and family housing in Phillips.
Opponents argued the facility “would stigmatize an already disadvantaged area and hinder its chances for development.” But Hennepin County exercised eminent domain and razed four blocks of modest homes and businesses for the construction of the transfer station. Community activists organized in opposition to the garbage transfer station. A grassroots political battle waged over the future of the Phillips neighborhood’s environment. In 1993, Hennepin County dropped its plans for the station and instead made grant funds available for the development of a building materials exchange and re-use facility that would create jobs. The Green Institute was founded to help realize this dream of a better environmental way that would also create jobs.
The Green Institute initiated its first program, the ReUse Center, in 1995. At the same time, founders envisioned a specific use for the land, for which they had fought. The Phillips Eco-Enterprise Center (PEEC) was to be a model for environmental and social justice -- an incubator, research and development center, job training complex and home to progressive tenant organizations where all endeavors addressed the principle of sustainability. The project became the focus of national attention when the American Institute of Architects challenged architects and engineers to design a model building that was sustainable and functional. Today, the 64,000 square foot office/commercial facility features:
- Reclaimed, bio-based and low-toxic materials and finishes
- Directional mirrors that make skylights better sources of light;
- Geothermal heating/cooling and an energy recovery unit, which help to regulate temperature throughout the building;
- A large solar photovoltaic array;
- A green roof featuring native river bluff plants;
- As well as sophisticated design strategies to reduce the energy needs of the building.
The building was a pilot for, and helped inform the creation of, the United States Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (USGBC’s LEED), which has, in the last ten years, risen within the green building movement as the preeminent national green building standard.
