‘This is a wonderful book that should be on the desk of every architect and planner. It shows how

Why hasn’t green, let alone sustainable, design caught on yet on a large scale?
It was suggested earlier that one of the reasons for the persistence of old design models is ‘input–
output’ thinking. Even green design reflects this dominant reductionist form of problem solving 
[Chapter 3]. The implicit goal in design has been mere ‘eco-efficiency’, through optimizing energy, 
air and water inputs and outputs at the building envelope. This does not encourage re-thinking 
design purposes or adding value to ecological and social goods and services.
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That is to say, mere 
eco-efficiency gains are not likely to enhance the conditions for whole system sustainability. Designers 
– and we are all designers – need to question our own tacit assumptions.
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Here we will examine the 
lack of whole systems thinking still apparent in ‘green’ building design, due to:
•
Vestiges of conventional design methods
• 
The old industrial frameworks in which buildings are produced 
• 
Unquestioned dogma about durability and efficiency
Then a new design method will be proposed. It challenges the focus on the building envelope in both 
light green and non-green design typologies. This alternative ‘flows approach’, inherent in design for 
eco-services, would integrate ecosystems into the building structure itself. The concepts of ecological 
space, Green Scaffolding, Green Space Walls, provide examples of how this can be achieved. 
Besides rating tools, what has been done to promote green building design?
There have been many green building workshops and think-tanks for built environment professionals.
However, they seem to always get stuck at the ‘identification of barriers and weaknesses’ stage. It 
is easy to get bogged down in the impediments facing green designers. The author has convened 
courses and workshops aimed at trying to leapfrog from ‘light green’ to deep sustainability through 
built environment design.
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One of these workshops (in 2003), for example, consisted primarily of 
green building practitioners, selected for their expertise and advocacy of eco-logical design. The task 
before them was to explore new strategies to foster deep green design and eco-retrofitting, and find 
opportunities for real change in the construction industry. The express purpose was to go beyond 
standard notions of green design, and avoid ‘re-inventing the wheel’ or listing impediments. Several 
devices were employed to try to start from where other green building workshops tend to leave off.
One such strategy was having potential ‘solutions’ to debate. These included: 
•
Articulation of a new paradigm: design that reverses the environmental impacts of existing 
development and increases natural capital and biodiversity (ie Positive Development)
• 
Possible incentive schemes to implement the eco-retrofitting of suburbs, utilizing design
teams and performance contracting, etc

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Design Methods
•
Group critiques of proposed eco-retrofitting technologies (such as the Solar Core, the reverse 
Trombe wall, greenhouse terrariums, and integrated sprinklers from water tanks in homes
and landscapes for cooling and fire mitigation, landscaping, etc)