Changing Skyline: An energy-saving milestone planned for Philadelphia's Kelly Drive

January 13, 2012|By Inga Saffron, Inquirer Architecture Critic

A building that runs on half the usual amount of energy? How ho-hum. These days, most new construction in Philadelphia can do that without even trying, simply by adhering to the U.S. Green Building Council's basic LEED standards. What would be really interesting is if someone put up a major building that consumed no energy at all.

Hold onto your electric bills, folks, because the first net-zero apartment house in the United States is coming to a most unlikely spot: a forlorn lot on Kelly Drive in East Falls that has languished for more than a decade. Equally astonishing is that it's being built by a first-rate local design firm, Onion Flats, under the auspices of that most ossified of city agencies, the Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority.

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