OAK PARK, Illinois — Plastic pipes snake down 460 feet into the earth, drawing up enough warmth to heat a 7,700-square-foot building — even on the coldest days of winter.
There are 150 zero-energy, nonresidential buildings in the U.S., an increase of more than 350 percent since 2011. Officials expect that these high-efficiency, low carbon-emission buildings will be the norm by 2050.
Truth is often as strange as science fiction at the Park District of Oak Park’s Carroll Center, a classroom and recreation space that recently became the second building in Illinois