Energy-Efficient Land Use: Promises and Problems

Using Land to Save Energy is one in a series of books prepared by the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) on energy conservation strategies for state and local governments. The book was funded by the National Science Foundation and will be available in June from Ballinger Publishing Company in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Written by ELI attorney Corbin Crews Harwood, this book examines one generally overlooked opportunity for significant energy savings — more efficient design and location of new residential and commercial development.

Although estimates vary, even the most conservative studies show that a significant amount of energy — up to 15 percent of the energy that will be consumed by transportation by 1985 and 11 percent of the energy spent each year on residential heating and cooling — can be saved by modification of traditional single-family, haphazard land development patterns.¹ Some optimistic studies project that 44 percent of the combined energy for transportation and heating and cooling can be saved in specially designed communities.² Realizing those savings, however, will require long-range planning and abandonment of deeply entrenched energy-inefficient ideas about development.

Land Use Planning and Energy Conservation

There are several land use strategies that state and local governments can adopt to improve the energy efficiency of new development. First, land use policies governing the location of new development can be examined to encourage concentration of moderately high density development adjacent to urban activity centers. Such concentration will shorten trip lengths and encourage use of public transportation between homes, jobs, shopping, and cultural and civic activities. If moderately high density neighborhoods close to activity centers are impossible, an alternative goal would be to disperse job and other traffic-generating activities throughout populated regions so that the length of trips between homes and jobs or other destinations can be reduced. Growth should also be channeled along both transportation lines and capital facilities such as sewer and water lines. Leapfrogging over pockets of developable land should be discouraged since it induces increased transportation energy expenditures by lengthening trips and energy waste in construction and maintenance of excessive road and utility systems.

The second major way to save energy through development controls is to shift the emphasis from single-family detached housing to attached, or multi-family housing, whose contiguous walls, ceilings, and floors decrease heat [7 ELR 10106] flow through exposed surfaces. A comparison between single-family and multi-family energy use for space heating and cooling on a square foot basis, shows that multi-family housing uses 30 percent less energy.³ The smaller units typically found in multi-family housing contribute to a total prospective energy savings of 60 percent or more per unit as compared to single-family detached housing.⁴ However, very large high-rise apartment buildings are considered energy-inefficient because of the cost of heating or cooling common spaces and providing services such as elevators. This would suggest that the most efficient buildings are those with fewer than 20 units ranging up to small high rises of 10 stories or less,⁵ but even a switch to townhouses and garden apartments can contribute to energy husbandry.

Other Design Changes

Additional energy savings can be derived from other design changes, although the savings are not as great as those anticipated from a shift to more contiguous, compact housing. Mixed-use developments where residential, commercial, and other activities are interspersed, in some cases within the same building, can contribute to transportation energy savings in the same manner (if not to the same extent) as large scale dispersal of job opportunities throughout residential areas. Cities can cut down on transportation energy consumption by clustering buildings for easy access by walking or biking, providing bicycle paths within developments to connect activity centers with residential clusters, and providing recreational opportunities within the development or close by.⁶

Working with, rather than against, the natural environment can be an important way to save space heating and cooling energy. The physical characteristics of the site, including the climate, the building shape, size, orientation and arrangement, and the landscaping, all affect energy demand and should be evaluated during the design process so that energy-efficient choices can be made.

In many instances, a framework already exists for implementing energy-efficient alterations in land development patterns. The next step is to incorporate energy considerations into land use decisions. For example, local or regional comprehensive plans, essential tools for attacking problems in the areas of transportation and air and water quality that, like energy problems, require integrated solutions, should be designed to minimize energy needs. Once the comprehensive plan is adopted, zoning ordinances, subdivision regulations, site plan review requirements, and capital facility expansion programs should be modified to conform to the energy policy decisions reflected in the plan.

Zoning Ordinances

Where a comprehensive plan calls for higher density development close to employment centers and transportation lines, the relevant zoning ordinance should be amended if necessary to permit that kind of development, the sewer and water lines expanded to accommodate the growth, and the tax assessments adjusted to reflect the increased development potential of the land. At the same time, large-lot zoning on the urban fringe, withholding capital facilities from the fringe, and imposition of preferential taxing policies to encourage open space or agricultural uses of land can discourage energy inefficient development. Many communities already combine these techniques to influence growth patterns, though often for economic reasons rather than energy conservation, but the approach is equally applicable to achieve energy savings.

Though some legal issues, rimarily the question of taking of private property without just compensation,⁷ may be raised by this approach to energy-efficient land development, unconstitutional effects generally can be avoided if the land management regulations conform to a comprehensive plan that is based on studies demonstrating the need for energy-efficient land use, the energy-saving potential of such development, and the temporary nature of the development restrictions.⁸ In addition, the legality of the measure will be enhanced if tax assessments are decreased to reflect the restriction on use of the land, and, in particular, if the energy-conserving benefits of the regulations can be integrated with other benefits such as fiscal integrity of the community, protection of environmentally sensitive land, or maintenance of water quality.⁹

Not all energy conservation policies require as much planning and coordination. Large pay-offs can be obtained by zoning for more multi-family housing and clustered development, imposing site-plan requirements that prescribe energy-efficient landscaping and building orientation and management, mandating bike path construction, or requiring large developers to undertake energy impact analyses that examine energy requirements of the proposed development and consider mitigation measures. In addition, cities can offer developers increased densities or streamlined permit reviews in exchange for including in their projects energy-efficient design features that spur conservation.

Conclusion

The main obstacle to energy-efficient land use is neither legal nor technical but rather political. Enabling legislation may be needed in some instances to accomplish energy-efficient land use. Legal issues may arise when laws and regulations are loosely drafted, but significant reforms can be made within the existing legal framework without unconstitutionally infringing on private property rights. Similarly, though additional studies will refine what we know about efficient uses of land, studies already available¹⁰ point to valuable conclusions regarding [7 ELR 10107] the most energy-efficient land use practices. The real problem lies in convincing the public that it is better to make necessary lifestyle changes now to deal with the energy shortage than to wait until we must react hastily in a fullblown crisis for which we are ill-prepared. President Carter's recent energy messages have publicized the seriousness of the problem. Economic realities that remove detached single-family housing and many energy-wasteful practices from the reach of many citizens will give another boost to efficient land use.

Yet, there is another more positive side to the energy crisis that should assist in the adoption of energy-efficient land use policies. Though energy shortages may lead to changes in lifestyles and necessary sacrifices by everyone, alterations in land development patterns also offer the potential for a cleaner and healthier environment, preservation of prime agricultural land and open spaces now being consumed by sprawling development, increased leisure time, and financial savings for consumers. In short, energy conservation through land use planning is not a radical idea but rather an echo of land use proposals that planners and environmentalists have endorsed for years.

1. Keyes & Peterson, Metropolitan Development and Energy Consumption 72, 79, THE URBAN INSTITUTE (Sept. 1976).

2. REAL ESTATE RESEARCH CORPORATION, THE COSTS OF SPRAWL: DETAILED COST ANALYSIS 21 (1974).

3. Keyes & Peterson, supra note 1, at 69.

4. Id.

5. Id. at 62-63.

6. See BURBY & WEISS, NEW COMMUNITIES U.S.A. 338-39 (1976)

7. See D. GODSCHALK, D. BROWER, L. McBENNETT & B. VESTAL, CONSTITUTIONAL ISSUES OF GROWTH MANAGEMENT (1977); F. BOSSELMAN, THE TAKING ISSUE (1973).

8. See, e.g., Golden v. Planning Bd. of the Town of Ramapo, 30 N.Y.2d 359, 285 N.E.2d 291, 334 N.Y.S.2d 138, 2 ELR 20296, appeal dismissed, 409 U.S. 1003 (1972), which upheld temporary development restrictions based on a comprehensive plan designed to manage growth.

9. Id.

10. For a review of land use and energy conservation studies see Keyes & Peterson, supra note 1; W. PRIEST, AN OVERVIEW AND CRITICAL EVALUATION OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN LAND USE AND ENERGY CONSERVATION (1976); W. PRIEST, THE ENERGY VISTA: POLICY PERSPECTIVES ON ENERGY CONSERVATION THROUGH LAND USE MANAGEMENT (1976). See also J. ROBERTS, ENERGY, LAND USE, AND GROWTH POLICY: IMPLICATIONS FOR METROPOLITAN WASHINGTON (1975); REGIONAL PLAN ASS'NS & RESOURCES FOR THE FUTURE, REGIONAL ENERGY CONSUMPTION/SECOND INTERIM REPORT (1974) (the final results of the regional energy consumption study are published in J. DARMSTADTER, CONSERVING ENERGY/PROSPECTS AND OPPORTUNITIES IN THE NEW YORK REGION (1975)), HITTMAN ASSOC., RESIDENTIAL ENERGY CONSUMPTION/SINGLE-FAMILY HOUSING (1973); and HITTMAN ASSOC., RESIDENTIAL ENERGY CONSUMPTION/MULTI-FAMILY HOUSING, FINAL REPORT (1974). In addition, the Urban Institute in Washington, D.C., has received a large grant from several federal agencies to look at, among other things, the impact of land development patterns on energy consumption in metropolitan areas. Also, James S. Roberts of the Real Estate Research Corporation is preparing for the U.S. Council on Environmental Quality a report summarizing land use and energy conservation studies and their policy implications.