An article in the NY Times about builder Dan Phillips ("One Man's Trash ...") cuts to one of the core issues of green architecture and sustainability: if we can't afford it, it won't be sustainable. Isn't this obvious? So in the midst of all sorts of companies producing and marketing innovative products that might even be useful, here's someone using salvaged materials for practically every aspect of the houses he builds. Beyond that, he will only work for people who work on the houses themselves--the sort of investment that keeps people connected to their places, and perhaps provides an experience of the place with an inkling of the sacred. (Here's a direct link to his website The Phoenix Commotion.)
Reuse of building materials has a venerable history. For many centuries, Sardinian builders have appropriated stones from the Neolithic nuraghe structures that dot the countryside. The boomtowns of San Francisco, Sacramento, Benecia and assorted other Gold Rush settlements began with dismantled ships that more often than not had simply been abandoned on arrival. In many parts of the world, the process is simply a given: you use what's accessible. Beyond convenience, it's a matter of necessity. But even where it's not an economic or logistical necessity, at a certain point, it's also a matter of integrity, to use what's at hand instead of generating so much waste.
Let's not forget Gandhi and Laurie Baker. Among Gandhi's dictums was the suggestion to only use materials found within a five-mile radius. (Compare that with the LEED criteria for "local sources"--their certification process recognizes a 500-mile radius as close enough. Of course, we're talking about vastly different infrastructures between India of the mid-1900s and, say, California in the early 2000s. But still, is Winnemucca, Nevada, reasonably local to San Francisco?) The British-born architect Laurie Baker accepted an invitation from Gandhi in the mid-1940s and spent the rest of his life in India designing and building structures that emphasized simplicity, beauty, affordability, appropriateness to local conditions and use of salvaged and local (in Gandhi's sense) materials. He left a legacy of devotion to Right Livelihood that deserves serious consideration.
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