What happens when a building dies (aka is abandoned)? In most cases it's demolished and tons of usable lumber, bricks, and metal become trash in our landfills. According to the reuse advocacy website Waste to Wealth, "The construction and demolition (C&D) industry disposes of almost 65 million tons of waste annually, much of which is reusable or recyclable." The wastefullness of demolition is compounded when fresh materials are made for a new construction project using up valuable resources and draining energy.

One solution to construction pollution might be Deconstruction; a process by which a building is taken apart piece by piece and then the materials are prepared for reuse or recycling. An estimated 24 million tons of materials could be reused and 6 million tons recycled by utilizing deconstruction. A few organizations are spearheading this reuse movement including Buffalo Reuse in New York and Beyond Waste in California.

Buffalo Reuse was founded in 2006 in response to the city of Buffalo's plan to demolish 1000 buildings a year. Buffalo suffers from urban abandonment due to a population decline from 500,000 in 1950 to 290,000 today. This mass exodus left 23,000 homes vacant and rotting. So far the mostly volunteer run Buffalo Reuse has been able to salvage 25 houses. With just two home deconstructions, they kept 30 tons of debris out of landfills, and now have 10 tons of lumber for sale at their ReSOURCE shop of salvaged goods. Buffalo Reuse believes, "The decision to deconstruct a building becomes an opportunity to reinvest in our communities to create opportunity from what otherwise would be thrown away." Logically, deconstruction does seem to make economic sense. 1) It makes construction less costly by providing low cost building material for new structures. 2) Deconstruction is an excellent and inexpensive training ground for the construction trade - by pulling something apart you can learn how to more effectively put it together. Buffalo Reuse envisions a street full of small businesses housed in recycled buildings built by the youth of the city.

Beyond Waste, located in Northern California, is a sentimental organization trying to bring back the value of material conservation. Their website points out that Deconstruction is not a new concept in construction, the bulldozer just changed the way we took apart buildings. Beyond Waste also claims that their method of bringing down a building costs virtually the same amount as the bulldozer method. Like Buffalo Reuse, they also offer job training and resale of the salvaged goods, however they go a step farther and also produce beautiful "new" tables, benches, and flooring made from reclaimed wood they cultivate.  

Clearly these two reuse organizations and their brethren need the word spread. I firmly believe that more people would use salvaged goods if they knew the materials were available since they are generally a better quality and cheaper than materials produced today.