Rent is $1, but Tenants Have a Multi-Million Dollar Job To Do
Our Town downtown
November 20 2006
A six-person office maintains
There is a 20-foot by 40-foot shack just south of the Gulf gas station at
This building, a model of eco-friendly construction with its steeply slanted roof covered by photovoltaic panels and waterless urinal, was on display at the 2000 Earth Day Fair in Battery Park City. It was taken apart and put into storage until 2003, when it was put back together just north of the newly created
It doesn’t seem big enough to hold its own here, on what used to be the site of a concrete factory and underground gasoline storage facility. Particularly this day, when fashionable fall coats have been replaced by big winter parkas with fur-lined hoods, the stand-alone shack looks defenseless against the elements.
But it’s toasty inside, which is particularly surprising when I learn that the heat is not on. The walls, it turns out, are insulated by thick foam, and the single large room – creatively divided into office space for six full-time employees and classroom space for environmental classes that are free to the public – is warmed by the sun reflecting off the East River and streaming in through the big south-facing windows.
This is Solar One, the headquarters for the maintenance of
The others are focused on administration, public outreach and the giant project that will put this little company on the map: Solar 2.
Solar 2 will generate more energy than it actually uses, making it the first “net-zero” building of its size and kind anywhere in the northeast. The two-story structure, designed by green architects Kiss + Cathcart, will stand where Solar One now stands and serve as a environmental classroom and an example of what’s possible in green urban engineering. It will rise to the height of the FDR overpass, but no higher, and the first story will be mostly open space, so the building will not piss off Stuyvesant Town residents by restricting their views of the river. It will fill the empty blacktop with a new café (which will make Solar 2 the only place you can buy non-gas station food east of the FDR), a play area for kids, and a bigger stage than the one currently used by Solar One for performances like concerts that use solar-powered amps.
The second floor will have an “eco-apartment,” which will look like a typical New York City studio apartment, complete with its own balcony, and completely outfitted with green products, including a water-collection system and fluorescent light bulbs (they’re not that bad anymore, insists Solar One’s executive director, Chris Collins), and a see-through floor that will allow you to see what happens when you flick on a light or turn on a faucet.
The Solar One team has raised $1.2 million to date for the building that will be its new office. Money has come from the
But for now, there’s a lot of outreach yet to be done, because most people still don’t know there’s anything there on the other side of the FDR, between the Gulf gas station and the Con Ed plant.
