Deconstructing for dollars: Recycling building materials can mean more than simply salvaging light fixtures

Puget Sound Business Journal (Seattle) - by Brad Broberg Contributing Writer

To Thomas Nielsen, an old 2-by-4 is a terrible thing to waste -- or even recycle.

So when workers begin removing hundreds of timeworn public housing units to prepare for redeveloping the High Point community in West Seattle, Nielsen hopes to dismantle -- not destroy -- as many buildings as possible.

"No one's really tried it at this scale before," says Nielsen a project manager with the Seattle Housing Authority.

The process is called deconstruction. And while selective salvaging and/or recycling have long been part of the demolition process, total deconstruction is the latest -- and greenest -- way to go.

"The essence of deconstruction is to extract the embodied energy of all of the materials you encounter through the course of a demolition project," says Jim Primdahl, a deconstruction consultant from Portland.

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