Going for Zero

In Going for Zero: Decarbonizing the Built Environment on the Path to Our Urban Future, seasoned architect and former AIA president Carl Elefante addresses how buildings and cities can and must help resolve the looming climate emergency. For architects and the countless others who work together creating human habitation, the twenty-first century imperatives demand a profound mode shift, from an expansion mindset to one of reintegration and healing. Elefante explains that revitalizing communities by optimizing existing resources makes social, economic, and environmental sense and directs resources where they are most needed. He offers a decidedly alternative viewpoint, one informed by his career rescuing buildings from demolition and learning from the practices and wisdom embedded in built heritage. In Going for Zero Elefante offers a message of hope, with the urgency to act now.