PreserveCast

Going Net Zero at Historic Sites with Siân Phillips of the National Trust of England, Wales & Northern Ireland

When most people think of a historic site or landscape, they don’t think about the future...

Today’s guest is not most people.

Siân Phillips is a renewable energy specialist with the National Trust of England, Wales and Northern Ireland – a legendary preservation organization which is charting a new course for historic places – they’re using our past to literally power the future.

This isn’t your grandaddy’s preservation – and we’re thrilled to bring it to you on this week’s PreserveCast.

PreserveCast Ep116: [Healthy, Hip & Historic] What the Future Holds for Historic Preservation and Community Revitalization with Storm Cunningham

As this current international pandemic has changed the everyday ways that we interact with each other and our communities, it’s clear that our environment has important physical and psychological effects on us all. Preservation addresses the physical material of our built environment – and those materials’ potential positive or negative health impacts – so too, does preservation address an emotional connection to a time and place in history.

This five-part special podcast series, Healthy, Hip & Historic on PreserveCast will feature five preservation visionaries that will place our preservation work in a broader context, identify challenges, and illuminate solutions for linking historic preservation and healthy communities.

Preservation Maryland brought Storm Cunningham, an author whose work is leading the way for partnerships between preservationists and environmentalists, to our annual statewide conference held in 2016 in Frederick, Maryland. Storm Cunningham is the publisher of Revitalization News online, and the author of "The Restoration Economy," "reWealth," and the forthcoming "Planetary Renewal: A Strategy To Reverse Our Decline."

As a regional partnership planner, he has facilitated comprehensive revitalization processes, not just a vision, project or plan which help places enhance their economy, boost the quality of life and increase climate resilience by repurposing, renewing and reconnecting their natural built and socioeconomic assets.

Storm joined our group of preservationists, planners and heritage tourism and museum professionals to show the group how they can think differently about who they partner with and what benefit comes from those partnerships. If we want to make the world a better and more sustainable place, we need to breakdown the silos each discipline has wedge themselves.

One example Storm will share was a potential relationship between “water people” and “solar people.” Instead of saying “we have nothing in common,” think about your goals and how they overlap. “Solar People” want solar panels to make clean energy and “water people” want to get safe and clean water long distances. Water evaporates unless it is covered, so why not cover the water channels with solar panels? This is a win-win. More energy and less water loss.

PreserveCast Ep. 27: Energy Sprawl and Open Space Preservation in Kent County

The spread of clean energy technologies is the wave of the future, but where exactly should wind and solar plants go? Nick sat down with Elizabeth Watson and Janet Christensen-Lewis, of the Kent Conservation and Preservation Alliance in Kent County, Maryland, to discuss their experience working to find alternative locations for wind turbines away from Kent County's scenic and historic farmland. Janet and Elizabeth are tackling a difficult problem, but they believe that the necessary move to create sustainable energy does not have to mean erasing our past. 

Listen up here: https://www.preservecast.org/2017/07/10/elizabeth-watson-janet-christensen-lewis-energy-sprawl-and-open-space-preservation-in-kent-county/

PreserveCast Ep. 16: Energy Retrofitting: Windows, Blower Doors, and More

What do you do with a drafty attic? A window? The whole house? Ed Minch and Thom Marston are here with us today to talk about one approach to making homes more energy efficient and their work at the nation's first energy audit company, Energy Services Group. Stick around and learn about Ed's "p.h.d." approach, what Thom thinks you should do about that old attic, and what retrofitting can mean in terms of historic preservation. This is PreserveCast.

Listen here: https://www.preservecast.org/2017/04/24/energy-services-group-energy-retrofitting/

PreserveCast Ep. 09: A Friend of Maryland is a Friend of Mine

1000 Friends of Maryland is not an actual tally of the Old Line State's friends. It's an advocacy group dedicated to helping Maryland communities develop in ways that we can afford - socially, economically, and environmentally. Dru Schmidt-Perkins, the Presdient of 1000 Friends of Maryland, is on this week to talk to Nick about smart growth and sustainable technology in Maryland's agricultural communities and beyond. Come make a new friend, on PreserveCast.

Listen here: https://www.preservecast.org/2017/03/06/dru-schmidt-perkins-1000-friends-of-maryland-smartgrowth/

PreserveCast Ep. 05: It's Easy Being Green with Architect Nakita Reed

We're not talking about painting a roof green! Listen to Nick talk to preservationist and architect Nakita Reed about how sustainable technologies like rooftop solar panels are finding their way into the world of historic preservation. Plus Nakita talks you through some of the basic how-tos of making your historic property more sustainable, and we learn some of the challenges of straddling the two worlds of architecture and historic preservation.

Listen here: https://www.preservecast.org/2017/02/06/its-easy-being-green-with-architect-nakita-reed/