At first glance, 132 Elm Street is not the obvious choice for a facility meant to expand a science department’s capabilities. For one thing it is very old, dating back to the 1880s. It is also a house meant for a family. But the environmental studies department has less than typical priorities.

“When I arrived at Oberlin in 2000, part of my contract stipulated that I be provided with laboratory facilities for teaching and research,” says Professor of Environmental Studies John Petersen. “A number of options were considered, including the new Science Center, but space constraints there and the logistical difficulty of having lab facilities removed from my office led us to the conclusion that an environmental studies facility should be located within or adjacent to the Lewis Center.

“We eventually settled on the idea of adaptively reusing the existing house. Our thinking behind this is that there are environmental benefits to reusing over demolition and reconstruction.”

This was an entirely green renovation. Technologies were chosen partly based on whether or not a typical homeowner could employ them.

“Green renovation is maximizing the sustainable qualities of the original building while bringing it up to today’s standards,” says Facilities Planner/Assistant Director Leo Evans, who oversaw the renovation.

“The best example is probably the day-lighting,” Evans continues. “They didn’t have electricity in the 1880s and you can write in here without it now. The windows are operable — they’ll let air in.”

Other examples of the new sustainable house include a composting toilet, waterless urinals, low toxicity materials, instant hot water heaters and high efficiency heating systems. Water-based finishes were used on the floors instead of oil.

“We studied water harvesting,” says Evans. “We haven’t started that yet but things are set up so that we can start to reuse rainwater.”

“We used lots of recycled materials from other campus renovations,” says Petersen. “For instance, all of the cabinets in the research and teaching labs are salvaged from the old Science Center or are surplus from the new Science Center. Doors and furniture are also salvaged from a variety of other projects.

“Green renovation of an old house would serve as a more complementary teaching counterpoint to the Lewis Center than ano-ther new building.

“Whereas the AJLC represents state of the art high-tech, office-scale modern green design, the renovated house represents a fairly low-tech, house-scale approach.”

The construction itself was used as a teaching mechanism.

“For me at least the students had a big involvement,” says Evans. “I actually worked with David Orr’s Environmental Design class in 2001. We studied the composting, dual-flushed toilet and the waterless urinal. We studied windows, finishes, etc. Items discussed in 2001 were brought into the process in 2005.”

“Students have been present all the way through,” says Chair of the Department of Environmental Studies David Orr. “It was a thinking process that began with students over 12 years ago. Planning goes back to 1995.

“The original plan for the Lewis Center had an outbuilding for storage. It changed in 2000. Since then, the students have been involved in planning, design, some management and assessment.”

The downstairs of 132 Elm includes a teaching and research lab, a greenhouse and a storage and workshop area. It is Petersen’s area and therefore set up to equip the study of his focus: the chemistry of water and soils.

“My ‘Systems Ecology’ class and research students will make extensive use of the lab facilities in this building,” says Petersen. “In addition, all of the Living Machine water quality analysis will be conducted in this facility.”

Another part of the process that was included in this extension is the construction of a new photovoltaic array in the parking lot of the new facility, to go along with the panels on the roof of the Lewis Center. The photovoltaic panel channel the solar energy that is used to power the building.

“It really completes the Environmental Science Center,” said Orr.