Oregon's built environment relies on materials from many parts of the world. It isn't easy to determine the different environmental and social issues that are connected to material supply and use.
To improve overall understanding and to better represent the priorities of environmental and social justice associated with placemaking, we have initiated research that will give us much needed insights.
There are four layers of knowledge objectives:
- Understanding the environmental footprint of the materials themselves. This exercise will gather the best available information about such things as the carbon footprint, resource demand such as water, and energy profile.
- Where do the critical materials we rely on in Oregon come from?
- What are the immediate and long-term ecological impacts on those places?
- What are the current issues and historic burdens that the people who live in those places face?
Life cycle perspective
Another way to look at this information is what we call a life cycle perspective. A life cycle of a material or a product starts as soon as some raw resource is taken from the Earth (extraction), then turned into a usable material and product (production).
For example, sand and gravel is mixed with chemicals, cement, and water to make concrete. In the construction phase the concrete is used to make a structure such as a bridge or a building. Both the concrete and the structure have their own life cycles as many components come together to create the final usable item.
In this research we want to organize the information we find for the four aspects above into the life cycle perspective to better understand what sorts of environmental impacts are occurring where, and then to know what are the effects on those place and the people who live and work there. With this kind of structured analysis we can get closer to answering important questions including: 'What does it take in terms of environmental and social effects to maintain our way of life?' and 'Who is burdened, where and for how long, to uphold our own well-being?'.
These are critical questions in the quest for a more just and equitable built environment in Oregon. And to better understand the question: 'How just is affordable housing?'.