Gary Hardgrave (Moreton, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the House:

(1)

acknowledges that for the first time, Green Roofs for Healthy Australian Cities has been discussed at a conference held in Brisbane;

(2)

notes that there are 15 green roof infrastructure associations representing urban planners, educators, horticulturalists, engineers and architects, which have now formed the World Green Roof Infrastructure Network;

(3)

notes that green roofs provide a range of benefits to help counter climate change through thermal insulation, storm-water management that causes lower run-off at peak times, reduction of ambient temperatures in cities, air and water cleaning effects, direct energy savings for government, visual beauty, habitat creation, long roof life and noise insulation;

(4)

notes that green roof spaces allow food to be grown through hydroponic, aquaculture, aquaponics, vermiculture and insect culture, providing additional revenues for building owners and tenants; and

(5)

encourages businesses and local authorities to seek the triple bottom line from environmental practices, as exemplified by the Ford Rouge Center in Dearborn, Michigan, USA.

In moving this motion I acknowledge the support and advocacy of Geoff Wilson, who, with his wife Mary and a very small band of supporters it seems, has been pioneering the discussion in this country about what green roofs are about. It seems to have come a long way from when we got a small grant from the Australian government to trial, in a feasibility study with the Southside Chamber of Commerce, back in 1999, a proposal at Mount Gravatt to look at recycling of food waste from restaurants via worm farming, using the worm liquor for rooftop hydroponics and selling the green-roof produce back to the same restaurants and so forth, to see whether that could work as a business.

That was where we got to a few years ago. Where are we now? What are green roofs? Well, ironically, we are under the biggest green roof in Australia. This parliament—this building—is covered by grass. It is covered so that the people of Australia can walk upon us and make out that they are very much on top of each and every one of us in our deliberations. It is making use of the roof space of this building in a positive way.

Green roofs exist in other places around the world. The Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam makes good use of green roofs. With a 12-centimetre-deep green roof pad, it has reduced noise by some 40 decibels. There it has been used as noise insulation. In transport areas, train terminals in parts of America have green roofs above them, turning old industrial spaces into green spaces.

The biggest green roof in the world is the Ford plant in Dearborn, Michigan. It is a very famous plant next to the Rouge River in Michigan. It is simply the biggest green roof in the world, some 454,000 square feet or 10.4 acres. I apologise to the metric purists but, Mr Deputy Speaker, you and I understand that that is a very large space. Ford have covered the industrial plant where mainly trucks—but also other vehicles—are made. They have turned around what was, 50 years ago, one of the greatest environmental disasters in the world. The Rouge River was so heavily polluted next to the Ford plant that it actually caught on fire. It was so filled with a toxic mix of chemicals that it caught on fire! The Ford company have embraced the concept of green roofs.

Apart from the noise installation that is used at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam, there is thermal insulation which reduces fossil fuel energy in the heating and cooling of buildings. By using a green layer of grass or trees above the roof you are actually using nature’s own insulation—the insulation that God designed for the world. There is also stormwater management, the lower run-off of rainfall at peak times. At the Michigan plant, excess rainwater travels through a series of swales and wetland ponds where it undergoes natural treatment before it returns to the Rouge River. Green roof technology is replanting the large roof spaces in our urban environments with productive trees and plants. As I mentioned, at Mount Gravatt years ago we trialled the idea of turning the roof spaces into food productive areas. This is done in many parts of Asia where the net landmass of  spare space in cities like Singapore is very small; so you see restaurants outside on the roofs of large hotels making use of that roof space.

My ambition in sponsoring this debate today is to get the discussion going. There at 18 countries around the world which are involved in an international network dealing with this green roof technology—countries as diverse as Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Hungary, France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Sweden, the UK, Canada, the US, Mexico, Brazil, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand and, indeed, Australia. Only a couple of months ago a national green roof conference took place in Brisbane. Brisbane has a real chance of becoming the green roof centre of Australia. With green roofs there are air-cleaning and water effects, visual beauty and habitat can be created and savings for government can be delivered. In the city of Toronto, eight per cent of roofs are green roofs and this has made direct savings of some $Can12 million a year in buildings due to reduced demands for heating and cooling. Let us get the debate on green roofs going. Let us look at that as a positive and practical way to improve the environment, particularly in our urban spaces. I commend this motion to the House.

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion and reserve my right to speak.

Laurie Ferguson (Reid, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Multicultural Affairs, Urban Development and Consumer Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I congratulate the member for Moreton, the previous speaker, in his initiative in raising this matter of green roofs. The website www.greenroofs.com explains that green roofs are vegetated roof covers with growing media and plants taking the place of bare membrane, gravel ballast, shingles or tiles. The number of players and the layer placement vary from system to system and green roof type. However, all green roofs include a single to multi-ply waterproofing layer, drainage, growing media et cetera.

According to a 2004 report by Canadian landscape architect Goya Nagan, green roofs have been constructed for thousands of years, the most famous early example being the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. They have also been used in traditional buildings such as the sod roofs of rural Scandinavia. Experimentation in the early part of the 20th century found that green roofs required special waterproofing, since roots were found to grow in what were typically tar roofs. Over the past 35 years, research and experimentation has taken place primarily in Germany, where sophisticated membranes have been perfected, construction standards have been developed and the environmental, economic and social benefits continue to be studied. As in so many things, Germany, Austria and middle Europe has led the way in these matters since the 1960s. When the first generation of waterproof membranes showed signs of damage in the 1970s, techniques were documented and materials were developed to respond to building design issues. It is estimated today that 12 per cent of all German flat roofs are green, and the German green roof industry is growing at 10 to 15 per cent per year.

The best known example of this technology is the Ford motor vehicle plant in Rouge, Michigan. It includes the world’s largest ecologically inspired living roof—about 500,000 square feet—which dramatically affects the Rouge area watershed by holding several inches of rainfall. It also involves swales, shallow green ditches seeded with indigenous plants to improve the stormwater management, porous paving filters to water through retention beds with two to three feet of compacted stones helping to manage stormwater run-off, trellises for flowering vines, renewable energy sources such as solar fuel cells and the planting of more than 1,500 trees and thousands of other plantings to attract songbirds and create habitats.

I support the motion as I believe that green roofs make a lot of sense. Indeed, I believe that working on green roof projects can make a positive impact against greenhouse emissions. According to the Australian Greenhouse Office:

Commercial and industrial buildings consume very large quantities of energy and resources as their operators attempt to provide comfortable and productive environments for human activity ...

Greenhouse gas emissions from commercial buildings are projected to increase from 32 million tonnes of CO2 per annum in 1990, to 63 million tonnes in 2010 under the business-as-usual scenario ...

Buildings are important in greenhouse terms for a number of reasons:

emissions associated with their construction, operation, maintenance and demolition are large;

decisions made at the time of siting, design, construction and refurbishment have long-lasting consequences;

opportunities to capture renewable energy are often linked to the design and operation of buildings. energy are often linked to the design and operation of buildings

All of these are relevant facets of the increased interest in green roofs. As I said earlier, European initiatives led the way, but these days in Canada and the United States in general there has been a burgeoning of interest and activity on these fronts. Darebin City Council in Melbourne has also exercised environmental leadership in the design, construction and operations of the Reservoir Civic Centre.

Harry Jenkins (Scullin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is pronounced ‘Reservoir’.

Laurie Ferguson (Reid, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Multicultural Affairs, Urban Development and Consumer Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The project is based on principles of triple bottom line—that is, building social capital, environmental sustainability and financial responsibility. I gather that the member for Scullin knows a little bit about it. The building also seeks to reduce energy consumption by 60 per cent, reduce water consumption by half, use low-toxic, recyclable or renewable materials and reduce waste to landfill by 60 per cent.

In conclusion, there is increased interest in this matter. The previous speaker professed to hope that Brisbane could become a national centre for this, and we are quite well aware of the conference held earlier this year. Obviously, this is another front where, if Australia is not active, innovative or inventive, the technologies will disappear overseas, as we have found on so many fronts over the last decade in the abuse of energy and living conditions.

Andrew Laming (Bowman, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Often in this place, the rarefied atmosphere of parliamentary debate, many good ideas are canvassed only to meet their demise in the far more toxic substrate of state government regulation. Never was that more true than in the building regulations which are effectively formulated by each state and territory. The great tragedy of course is that, while those regulations are changing all the time, many great ideas and higher outcomes are sacrificed because local councils are unable to bring forward such great ideas as green roofs.

In Queensland, the state building regulations mandate minimum standards. If all you are ever doing is mandating the minima, so often those minima become the maximum that we see. This is the great challenge, as we consider changes to building codes. I for one would like to see higher outcomes in this area. I know that my council, Redland Shire Council, would also look to that. But that can only be achieved by encouragement from a distance through performance based codes. It is highly likely that we will continue to reflect on great ideas like green roofs by looking at what Europe may well be doing or what might be happening in the US and in Canada.

The truth is that green roofs have many direct benefits for application right here in Australia. I, as self-styled member for Moreton Bay, will speak on behalf of Brisbane, together with the member for Moreton. We both have an outer metropolitan interest in the fast-growing population that has an enormous urban sprawl. I am sure everybody would agree that, as you fly over Brisbane, there is an enormous amount of roof space per capita. Not only is this a challenge but also it is an opportunity. If the roof space is amended effectively we can look to not only reduced cooling bills in summer—and air conditioning is by far the most expensive form of power in Queensland homes—but also an amenity for the many people who work in medium- and high-rise buildings. We can reduce stormwater run-off, not so much in the city but in country areas, which is often responsible for washing away very fertile soil. By capturing a lot of that rainwater and picking up the heavy metals and the pollutants, green roofs can actually hold that water and have it returned in the form of condensation and evaporation.

There are challenges with green roofs. Of course they will be heavy. You cannot simply place one on an existing roof. The weight will often mean that a significant superstructure will be required in the roof. But for a cost of $50 to $100 per square metre what can be created is not so much vegetation but an entire ecology on these roofs, improving amenity for those who live there, evaporative cooling and a reduction in the urban heat island effect that is well described. We know that an innovation such as green roofs would reduce not only the amount of energy required to cool that building and keep the temperature stable, up to seven degrees Celsius movement due to poorly insulated roofs, but also the heat around the buildings themselves. Green roofs are just part of a great package that I think householders should be encouraged to adopt. It includes an AAA rated shower rose that reduces water use from 25 litres per minute to single-figure litres per minute. It also includes the use of dual-flush toilets—an Australian invention—again reducing water use, by 60 per cent; greenhouse energy efficient hot water systems, by putting in modern hot water systems, reducing the high water pressure that can lead to water loss with the simple use of a water-saving disc; and energy efficient lighting. We in Australia are moving very fast towards using efficient fluorescent lighting.

Green roofs come as part of a package. But, as I said in my introductory statement, it will not happen as long as our building codes, particularly in Queensland, simply dictate minima. There will be very little incentive for innovative and forward-looking councils, such as Redland Shire Council for one, to encourage these roofs, other than through basic performance based codes. We need an even greater adoption of fantastic ideas like green roofs, which have already captured the imagination of both Europe and North America.

Harry Jenkins (Scullin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I support this quirky motion moved by the member for Moreton. As we attack many of the environmental problems that confront our nation, especially our metropolitan areas, we should look at ideas like this. It is appropriate, as the member for Moreton indicated, that we should be debating this matter, where we see an exemplar of a green roof covering this building, even though it used to be thought of as an architectural artifice. One thing we need to consider is the potential to look at spaces that make up the roofs of our cities. We need to look at the examples we see in cities such as Toronto and those mentioned in the motion to see what can be achieved. We also need to give due credence to what Australia can do.

For instance, I think it is important that we look at Australian native plants and the various Australian xerophytes that could be used, because they are not as dependent upon water as other species. We could then use our great mechanical and engineering knowledge to overcome some of the problems that have already been outlined in the debate about weight upon roofs and things such as that. The development of appropriate membranes and appropriate filtration systems is well within the capacity of Australian thinkers.

Another concern has been raised in this debate. I go back to my experience during the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Environment and Heritage inquiry into sustainable cities. One thing we need to do is sit down with the states and territories to achieve a set of building codes that take into account the potential that arises for these types of environmental aspects. The codes are completely silent on that. That should not be used as part of a blame game in pointing our fingers at the states and territories. It needs to be seen as an add-on. Once you do that as an add-on, we then have to sit down with the building industry and think of innovative ways in which we can decrease the cost to people. That will be used as an argument for these not to be built into codes. The Australian government and the parliament can play a role by having a debate such as this to encourage people to look at these ideas.

The Australian community foods alliance appeared before the sustainable cities inquiry. They were looking at encouraging the use of green roofs in Australian cities for food production. You have this complete development—the add-ons—and also the psyche, the fact that gardens have been replaced by buildings which, in turn, can be replaced by the use of building spaces. We see a lot of innovative developers throughout our major cities that indeed see the positive aspect of this and can use it as a marketing tool. We see such developments as the Mirvac development in Melbourne, the Four Tower Yarra Edge development, where a green roofscape has been created using a combination of native grasses, crushed recycled glass and decorative pebbles and things like that. They create an atmosphere in which people can relate to the environment that they are living in and that adds to the sustainability. Mention is made of triple bottom line reporting not only for businesses but with respect to the way our cities work. One of the great things that we should be talking about in any idea like this is the social consequences. We can talk about the environmental consequences, and I think people can understand that: if you make green spaces using the roof. We can look at the economic benefits because that, in turn, reduces the cost of insulation and the like.

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! It being 1.45 pm, the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 34. The debate may be resumed at a later hour and the member will have leave to continue speaking when the debate is resumed.