Jessica Glorius-Dangelo - Sustainable Architecture Begins at the Drafting Table

[00:00:10] Dominique: Hello. Welcome to another episode of Green Champions.

[00:00:13] Adam: Thanks for joining us in a conversation with real people sharing sustainability success stories.

[00:00:18] Dominique: From entrepreneurs to artists, scientists to activists, this podcast is a platform for green champions to share their stories and plant some new ideas. I'm Dominique.

[00:00:28] Adam: And I'm Adam. This episode is part of a mini-series in partnership with the Midwest Regional Sustainability Summit, which celebrates collaborative climate solutions in the Midwest region of the United States.

[00:00:39] Dominique: In this mini-series, you're gonna join us in virtually attending this annual summit and meeting a few of the over 100 speakers and key storytellers from this year's event. Today we are joined by Jessica Glorius-Dangelo. She is sustainability manager and a project manager at MA Design. So she's an architect with deep expertise in LEED, WELL and Living Building Challenge frameworks. We're gonna get into that. Today, we're diving into how Jessica is helping to build a more sustainable built environment and also how storytelling connects to the world of funding. So thanks for joining us today, Jessica. 

[00:01:12] Jessica: Thank you for having me.

[00:01:13] Dominique: To kick us off, you wanna share a bit about your personal journey, like what inspired you to get into architecture design, and then how does sustainability fit into that?

[00:01:22] Jessica: Well, my interest in architecture in general came from my father. I distinctly remember growing up and we'd walk around, he would look at buildings even though he wasn't an architect, he did a lot of his own building. So that greatly influenced me and my approach to sustainability and then in architecture.

Then when I got to school at University of Cincinnati, one of my first classes in my first year, it was about sustainable design. And I distinctly remember being like, I was learning all these wonders of it. I was like, why don't all buildings do this? This seems like this should be a no brainer to me. Like giving back more than you take, that just seems like a thing that we should all be doing. 

So I went through undergrad, through grad school at and I had six co-ops during that time. One of my most influential co-ops is when I did a coop in Beijing and while I was there, there were definitely several days where they're like, "You shouldn't go outside. The air quality is that bad. Don't go outside." And you're like, "Cool, you need an N95 masks just to walk outside, right?" And so that just kind of opened my eyes to like, that's all something that we could be living in if we're not careful.

Anyway, so through that and then when I got to my thesis year at UC, I really focused on making it about sustainability and I had some great professors that really helped to guide me along that way as well. And by the time I came out of school I started MA Design right after I graduated with my master's degree. And from there it's kind of been like it's something I knew I wanted to do. Giving back than we take seems like a good philosophy to live by.

[00:02:50] Adam: And can you just paint a picture for people who are listening of what sustainable design looks like? What's a feature of sustainable design?

[00:02:58] Jessica: so sustainable design to me it's the triple bottom line, right? So it's designing with economics in mind, with people and community in mind, but also obviously the environment, like making sure you're balancing all three of those things. 

And I distinctly remember, I think it was, I learned about the Living Building Challenge first is one of my first ones because that you have to produce as much energy or more than you need, and you give it back, and then like you have to kind of justify the building's existence in the world. 

But it's really just like that, you know, energy efficiency, water efficiency, really making sure you're being self-reliant. But also the like sustainability, equity piece and diversity piece that goes in with all of that caring the environment without also caring about the people that live there. 

[00:03:42] Dominique: If someone's listening and wanted to be more attune to noticing design that is more or less sustainable just from like the things they have available to their eyes, whether in a building or in a city, do you have any tips or any small things that like do show up and are more easy to spot?

[00:03:58] Jessica: The obvious thing would probably be like if there's solar panels or something on a building, that would be obviously a clue. To me, it's when you walk in a space and it's very well daylit. Maybe there's some like shades and stuff to help prevent the sun from getting too hot in the winter or in the summer anything like that but also when you walk in, the materials just feel like they're kind of more natural and you have that of being connected to nature. Those are always good things to keep an eye out for. Especially ones that incorporate in the space or plants or anything like that.

All those sorts of things that can give you a clue because unfortunately a lot of like super sustainable buildings, like they're doing their job behind the scenes, right? So like the energy, the water, like all of those things, there's not always readily apparent, but those other things like, the glazing and the lighting and all this is something more sustainable design. If you feel great in space sign that it's doing some good things for you on the planet.

[00:04:55] Dominique: And your role at MA Design, you're leading the internal sustainability initiative. So what does that look like from day to day?

[00:05:02] Jessica: As part of my internal efforts, I lead our sustainability committee and part of that we have a growing committee. We try to have at least one person in each studio across the entire firm. Because we wanna make sure that we have someone in there that's being a sustainability advocate as much as we can on a project or in part of that team. And so every year we have a whole bunch of different goals that we set for ourselves. And this year we're focused on benchmarking our projects, really making that an effort education. So we always do like internal education events, actually earth month is like our biggest months like three different events where we're trying to just educate our staff and make sure everyone's like engaged and feeling excited about sustainability. And then, we always work on our other goals this year is for our sustainability action plan because last year we renewed our sustainability action plan. We have a whole group of people of things that we're trying to do to help support that effort. So those are kind of our three main things we're focused on this year is education, benchmarking, and our sustainability action plan, moving that forward.

[00:06:01] Dominique: That's cool. And you do projects as a firm. I know on your website you talk about like carbon tracking. And like embodied carbon tracking. Can you explain what that looks like as an activity as a firm?

[00:06:12] Jessica: Yeah so part of that stems from our firm is the signatory of the AIA 2030 Commitment, which means that we have committed that by 2030, a hundred percent of our projects, our new build will be carbon neutral.

[00:06:25] Dominique: Wow. 

[00:06:26] Jessica: And so we have joined, many firms have made that agreement. So you can imagine things aren't maybe aligning as well as everyone was hoping, well everyone is trying really hard.

[00:06:35] Dominique: And a hundred percent goal is really big because that means not only are you doing everything that way, but you're getting all of your clients to be on board. That just feels like a very big goal, which I'm happy to hear. But I imagine that is, yeah, that is tough and the world is not making it easier for you right now.

[00:06:52] Jessica: No, it's not. As you can imagine, and that's part of what our sustainability committee and our sustainability service team is focused on, make sure we can educate our clients on the value of sustainability, andthat there is still a business case for it at the end of the day. Helping them understand lifecycle cost versus the upfront day one cost. that's what we're focused on.

But as part of that 2030 commitment, as part of renewing Sustainability Action Plan, we are working on our own tracking. We're approaching it twofold of like internal, like what are we as a firm doing between our two offices? How can we be more sustainable on reducing our own carbon footprints? But then our biggest impact is our projects that we design. And so that's the other parts of the benchmarking I mentioned is focused on energy, water, and carbon. 

We're gonna get all the information on the project and try to figure out what are our projects actually doing and compare that to the 2030 baseline. So that's our number one goal is figure out where our projects all stand and then we can work on how do we start resources to our firm to help reduce that carbon footprint on our projects, and educate our clients why we're doing this and why it's important. It's important to us, that's why we signed it. That's what we believe in, but making it come to fruition sometimes is always, always a challenge. we're, my outstanding team, we're up to the challenge and trying to get it to be successful.

[00:08:10] Dominique: You're saying we, I'm actually curious, like how big is the design firm and how big is your sustainability team?

[00:08:15] Jessica: I think right now our firm is at about a hundred people, maybe just a little under. And our sustainability team just keeps growing.I think it's like between eight to 10 because we have, like I said, we're increasingly adding people in each studio. And so, we're finally starting to pick up a little bit. 

[00:08:29] Dominique: That's awesome. I also noticed that you're affiliated with a lot of other organizations around sustainability. So between LEED but also the Building Council at the Green Building Council. Can you share a little bit about those organizations that you are affiliated with that work together, even just around you in the work that you do? But explain it for listeners of how some of those groups are integral to the topic of sustainable design and maybe how they work together to make this possible whether they're certifying at different aspects or providing education or community?

[00:09:01] Jessica: The one couple groups I wanna mention is the AIA Committee on the Environment committee. So both in Columbus and Cincinnati. They both are focused on like the architecture civically, like creating a community with other architecture farms and trying to figure out how do we achieve this thing together because while we like to be competitive, it really is we have to work together at the end of the day to get these things to be successful. And really they are focused a lot on education and not just for architecture, but in the community at large.

And so other groups that we've been a part of, like especially in Cincinnati, is Green Umbrella and like Greater Cincinnati 2030 District. And I think between all of those groups, like they all work really well together. They do slightly different things. So Green Umbrella is definitely more broad and not just focused on only architecture. There's a whole community to that. Greater Cincinnati 2030 District it is more focused on like buildings, but it is again, more about that community of all these building owners and professional partners coming together for that kind of greater good. 

There's a lot of different ones and I think they do work together. But sometimes they are kind of focused on their own path. I do think that's something I would like to see happen more is maybe all these groups working a little bit more together. 

[00:10:12] Adam: So bringing it back to architecture and the path that you're on I know you're working with multiple certification frameworks like LEED, WELL, Living Future. How do you decide which one is most appropriate for the particular project that you're working on?

[00:10:26] Jessica: Yeah, so if a project or a client is interested in having sustainability at all, really integrate it, we try to do a sustainability strat which is basically like a workshop where we lead the client and the project team through a whole bunch of different questions. We cover everything from like site design and different sustainability strategies there all the way through like water, energy, health, and wellness. 

So we kind of get a feel for what they're interested in and like what their goals are on the project. And then from there we tend to then, like we can recommend a couple different things. And so like we try to gauge that of, "Alright, do you wanna just do energy? Is like energy your big thing? You wanna make that the goal?" 

We don't have to do a certification because sometimes people like the third party verification of a certification and they like having that like plaque 'cause they like people to see that they've done these things. I will say why I have alphabet sweep after my name is, I like to have a understanding of all these different things that are out there. That way, in those conversations, I can best recommend the pathway that's gonna work best because LEED is kind of holistic. LEED v5 is coming out at the end of April. That's gonna have a whole bunch of impacts on the building industry. It's gonna have a whole bunch of things about decarbonization and help them.

WELL is really focused on health and wellness. So if a client really wants to focus on occupant wellbeing, that is the one to go to. Sometimes they work really well together, LEED, WELL. So that's another thing to say about those is they can be done at the same time. There is obviously a cost to that, so that's always a conversation we have to have. And then living [] is definitely the most progressive and so. And we also have like passive. 

So it kind of depends on where the client falls in that spectrum of like, where do they wanna be? Do they wanna produce 105% of their energy or not?

So it sounds like it's more about what they're interested in choosing and prioritizing, and it comes down to like then laying out funding options and different costs and all that. It's less about "Oh, your building is best suited for x, y, z."

It can be both of them or one way or the other But I will say I think it, in my experience, it helps if the client tells you what their goals are in the beginning. Because no matter what you can come back to saying "Hey, these are your five most important goals." We try to usually come away with the five most important things. And then we use that to carry through the design.

And then like when, if something comes up and we have to talk about cost or we have to talk about whatever, you're like, "Hey, these are your five goals in the beginning." So it's helpful to remind them like that's what they wanna do.

So what's the most important thing when we have to then start talking about cutting things out of the project? So I think at the end it helps to know their why and their goals because unfortunately a certification can get cut, but some of those are the things that might be able to stay in the project that are equally as good.

[00:13:09] Dominique: Well, as we gear up for the Midwest Regional Sustainability Summit, you're coming to also talk about another aspect of kind of how this stuff touches sustainability in terms of you're coming alongside some really cool folks, which I want you to talk about. And talking about how storytelling connects to funding.

Can you share a little bit about what you are coming to MRSS to share?

[00:13:27] Jessica: Yeah, so I'm joined by three other amazing women. We are gonna be focused on talking about sustainability, storytelling, and how sustainability and storytelling work together to unlock some innovative funding opportunities. So I will be kind of weaving the whole story of why storytelling is really important. 

And then we have Amy from 39Forward, she will be focusing on talking about some of the zoo initiatives and how they've been able to unlock some interesting funding through their storytelling and their narrative around sustainability. And we have Janice Moore-Webb who will talk about her involvement with starting the Green Bank and her guidance on how people can write a grant to help them, and this storytelling piece that's so critical to that. then we have Cheryl from my office, who's a innovation strategist and entertainment lead, talk about she has a really awesome project in Mexico and how they were able to weave sustainability through that like get some really awesome funding.

So we wanna leave people inspired that they can be really creative and try to find funding opportunities that aren't just maybe the IRA, Inflation Reduction Act, or anything like that. We wanna make sure people know there's a lot of things out there and different ways to fund it if we just make sure we have that right story to tell.

[00:14:41] Dominique: What does storytelling look like in terms of architecture?

[00:14:44] Jessica: Making sure you're telling the why of why sustainability is important. And it helps drive the project. So that can take many different forms in many different projects what does that look like but I think something that our sustainability world needs to do a better job at is telling the stories of these awesome things, and I think you guys are doing great at having this podcast that does that, but we need to be able to tell those stories, right?

Because other than like when we just attend a conference and hear these things, like, why is this the first time I'm hearing about this stuff? Everyone should be hearing about it, right? Because there's all these amazing things happening around the world, just no one is telling a story and they're not being heard or on the right platform or whatever but it really is an important part to sustainability and I think changing a lot of perceptions around sustainability because people just don't know there's an education component to it as well, because we have to make sure we tell all those things that way maybe someone else can learn from our lessons learned or do a better job going forward, or you know, maybe it just inspires them to approach something differently than they would've before.

[00:15:44] Dominique: Thinking about like you as an architect and as a designer, creating spaces for people to like enjoy and be a part of or to choose because they're the client. 

Can you just maybe share from your perspective, what would a successful storytelling look like? What outcome does successful storytelling have? What are you seeing?

[00:16:02] Jessica: I think it would be in my mind if someone that didn't know anything about the project could walk into the space and understand what the main goals the project were and why it was important to that client and their story behind it. 

If people can walk in and they don't know what's happening or what the goals for the project, I don't think that's successful. So it has to be kind of honestly in your face, something that's really obvious to people that didn't work on the project. But if at the end of the day a client or a visitor can just walk in, understand the goals, I think that would be a success in my mind.

[00:16:32] Dominique: So if the visitor can see the why behind each design choice?

[00:16:36] Jessica: Yes. 

[00:16:37] Dominique: That is really cool and I think that that reminded me of maybe the feeling you get when you go into someone's house they just built. Like a friend's new house. And they get to point and show you all the features that they put in because of X Y Z. So it's almost like as if in more of a commercial setting, being able to feel the same intentionality.

[00:16:56] Jessica: Yeah, like I love when I walk into a sample building and you just if you go on like a tour or something, like when I go to conferences, you get to all these crazy tours of these awesome sample projects. And once you realize "Oh, this thing is here because of that", you're like, "wow". You have a whole different appreciation for what it is and what that building is doing, what the systems are doing. I will say my favorite space ever that kind of embodies that experience you're talking about is when I went on a tour of the Amazon Spheres and there's just like all those plants and there's amazing, that's kind of what I feel like you should be able to walk in with kind of a sense of awe. Then when you learn more about it, it just increases that. Such a detail on your appreciation of the space.

[00:17:34] Dominique: On the same note of storytelling, you talk about how storytelling drives funding. So if you do good storytelling and showing the purpose of the work, it can create space for like buy-in and investment and all that.

But in architecture, you also talked earlier about how like funding can drive design choices, like choosing to be LEED, choosing to be like making more energy than a building consumes. So is there any kind of explanation you can offer around the connection between funding driving storytelling? Have you seen putting an investment into a project create the space for storytelling because now there's a story to tell and maybe that has other positive outcomes? 

[00:18:19] Jessica: Yes. in my experience, it can come from a variety of different ways, but it tends to come from my experience projects that are pursuing like a tax abatement. And sometimes if they know they're doing that in the beginning, that will obviously drive a lot of decisions that happen and it didn't maybe come out as organically in the beginning, right?

Where you're trying to create that story. in my mind, both things are valid and they kind of are situations that happen on a lot of projects. I will say when this funding comes first, I think that can open up opportunities for clients to feel more open to different conversations 'cause they know they have that funding to use and they can use it for something like going for a certification or pursuing different strategies that maybe they wouldn't have because of the cost factor to it. 

Something that comes to mind is like the Ohio Air Quality Development Authority has the Clean Air Act, which is a tax waiver program. I'll say that like those conversations have to happen so early especially if you're going for a tax abatement like that. You have to know you're gonna have it and you have to make sure you're doing the things that you know you're gonna be doing. But I think that could equally leave a story. In our sustainability world, I'm sure you know, like cost is the number one question I get on a day to day basis of trying to talk about sustainability on our projects. 

Like what's the cost of that? What's the lifecycle cost of a thing? Like how is that gonna impact their operations? And that's something that our team is doing, trying to do a lot more, is trying to find those answers of "Okay, if you do this and this, you'll be able to save that much money or that much carbon or that much energy down the line." 

[00:19:47] Adam: Yeah. how how do you navigate that? So when you've got these budget issues that are coming up, how do you stay grounded and work through that?

[00:19:54] Jessica: To me it's knowing when to be flexible, but also knowing when to like, try to hold to those initial goals as much as possible and remind 'em that those goals were there in the beginning. And those are still things that they really wanna do. And so when it comes down to talking about budget, 'cause we are in a really budget conscious society right now with things increasing in costs every day. So we just have to try to stay strong through that and hopeful and just remind everyone of their goals and maybe something else will give I guess, on the project to allow the sustainability aspects to remain in as much as we can. 

[00:20:28] Dominique: And we saw that one of the firm's values is like designing for impact. You mentioned earlier about there's a goal of reaching eventually, and a hundred percent of projects are going to be carbon neutral.

Can you explain like how that works? What does that really mean? Does that mean are you offsetting things? Is it, is it all through measuring the design components and the ways that they like power the building?

How does that actually show up?

[00:20:52] Jessica: We are still working to get our projects carbon neutral, but for those that might not be aware, that means that as much carbon as we're putting into the environment we're removing. At the end of the day, the goal is to be net zero or better.

Looking at things like our systems and our projects, the HVAC design, the lighting, building envelope, right with the skin, how tight and thermally efficient is that? 

It's all of those things that have to come together. Then usually you have to partner a super energy efficient building with something like a renewable energy source. There's many different ways to achieve that. 

 We have embodied carbon, which is all the carbon that went into every material, what it takes to get from where it was mined and extracted, made, and then how it got to your site, how it was constructed.

What happens when that building gets taken down or that thing is thrown away, what happens at the end? So then we have to measure on every project what is that embodied carbon of it. But then we look at the operational carbon, all the energy used on the project. So we have to get that measure.At least getting a good estimate, might not be fully perfect, but just having a good, you know, order of magnitude, whatever projects we are doing. 

And then from there, have to start working on those strategies to like, recommend that we use maybe less carbon intensive materials that we use more efficient, make systems in the project, better glazing, better installation. We have to look at the whole thing holistically.

And then what are the things that we can start recommending our project teams to do to help improve that. And it is a lot of times, unfortunately, for the renewable energy part, that is where we rely on funding to help offset that cost. 

 setting it up and making things electrified, removing fossil fuels from sourcing a project, sourcing a building, and being able to prepare for that future where hopefully everything is more cost effective and solar and everything keeps coming down a cost, and then it'll be the no brainer to help offset all that.

[00:22:41] Adam: So looking ahead, what excites you most about the future of sustainable design?

[00:22:45] Jessica: Oh gosh. You guys keep asking me these tough things. I am just looking forward to the day where it's not viewed as much as an add-on, right? As something that's separate from how a project is designed. It should just be how it's designed like with those things in mind.

That would be my pie in the sky dream, right, of just be part of what we do and it needs to be common practice. 

Like it's the best practice a lot of in the sustainable design and so, but the onus is always on and more sustainable project to prove that it is better. And I think that also needs to change. I think every building needs to prove that it has a right to exist sometimes. So I think by making it more sustainable and you're giving back more than you're taking, that's where we start to kind of rectify that kind of discrepancy in my mind.

[00:23:30] Adam: Beautiful.

[00:23:31] Dominique: I've heard something to the effect of " the most sustainable thing a city can do is pause or be conservative about development". If we just do less that we don't need to be doing, then, duh, we have less carbon emissions.I like the sentiment though that you just gave of every build needs to prove that it has a right to exist. I think that's a good way of thinking, the fact that we should think twice or three times about how and why we do projects.

But it's really cool to hear that from an expert in this space talking about there are ways to do it right. We need to think more thoughtfully about it. But , obviously we don't want a world that it never develops.

 We need buildings to be worked on and improved, and there's so much art to that too. I really appreciate that. I also think that you're leaving me with the sentiment of wanting to be more of an active visitor, understanding the intentionality of the design choices. I think that's something I'm gonna come away with of pushing myself to see if I can detect good design. I like the way that you have given some ways for like us to think about it, and I'm very glad that you do the work that you're doing because one key component of that I think is some of these changes for sustainable design are easier to make now than later.

Yeah, I would like to add that most sustainable building is one that's already built as well. And so there is a call that we have to able to renovate and take on making existing buildings more sustainable as well. It's not just about building new ones. We have to be able to find a ways thatall these buildings that already exist, like we need to make them more sustainable and more efficient as well. So that is the other part of that is when we're considering new builds, yes, we definitely need to do all these things, but it's equally as important to understand our existing building stock has to be upgraded as well. How can listeners connect with you and support the work that you're doing?

[00:25:11] Jessica: Yeah, so people can connect me. We have our MA Design website, www www.designwithma.com. And on there we have a whole list of stuff. Our sustainability team loves to write things, so we tend to have a lot of different articles that get posted on there a lot. You can also find my contact information on there. Then also LinkedIn. All those wonderful things can be found there. Then, of course the Midwest Summit, if anyone wants to come and listen to our wonderful storytelling piece, you can come find me there as well.

[00:25:41] Adam: Thank you so much for joining us. As always, our guests have found a unique way to champion sustainability. We're here to put real names and stories behind the idea that no matter your background, career, or interests, you really can contribute in the fight against climate change.

[00:25:53] Dominique: You can find our episodes and reach us at thegreenchampions.com. If you wanna stay in the loop, give us a review and follow us your favorite podcast platform.

[00:26:00] Adam: Our music is by Zayn Dweik. Special thanks to the Green Umbrella hosts of the Annual Midwest Regional Sustainability Summit. And thanks for listening to Green Champions. We'll dig into another sustainability success story in our next episode. 

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