Greening the Movable Walls

by Beth Leibson

Modular walls, AKA movable walls and demountable walls, may cost a little more green upfront, but they quickly green both the environment—by cutting down on landfill waste—and the corporate bottom line—by making it faster, easier, and less expensive to reconfigure space. The biggest sustainability advantages to movable walls are the decrease in construction and reconfiguration waste and the improvement in indoor air quality (IAQ).

Decreasing landfill waste

Construction waste is the number one for volume in U.S. landfills, says Ken Brandsen, Senior Product Manager for Walls at Haworth. The United States produces approximately 15 million tons of drywall a year, according to the California Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery (CalRecycle). About two-thirds of drywall waste, notes CalRecycle, stems from new construction (64%). The rest comes from demolition (14%), manufacturing (12%), and renovation (10%). “It is important that your office not only works for you but for the environment. With a typical office rearrangement, using drywall would create three 40-yard dumpsters worth of waste,” says Bob Trainor, CEO, Trainor Movable Walls, a unit of Trainor Glass Company, based in Alsip, Illinois. “Modular walls can contain up to 65% recycled material and almost 99% of the wall can be recycled or reused.”

The WestJet Campus Facility in Ontario, Canada includes 2,782 linear feet of Haworth movable walls, including glass office fronts; wood, metal, and whiteboard tiles; and wooden sliding doors.

The waste accumulates because drywall is, essentially, built by hand, says Kristin J. Moore at DIRTT Environmental Solutions in Calgary, Canada. “You have to build a wall then cut out the doors or windows, or other openings,” she explains. According to CalRecycle, approximately 12% of new construction drywall is wasted during installation. And that excess drywall ends up in a landfill.

Drywall is a sheet of gypsum covered with paper facing and paper backing. When drywall is put into a landfill, it can produce hydrogen sulfide gas, which emits the odor of rotten eggs, particularly in a wet climate. Hydrogen sulfide is toxic at high concentrations. As a result, several landfills in Canada do not accept drywall, according to CalRecycle, which can create disposal challenges.

Movable walls, by contrast, are unitized panel assemblies typically in a factory-baked enamel finish. In addition, most movable walls can be pre-wired for data and power, for either vertical or horizontal distribution. As a result, installation can often be completed in a single day, rather the three generally required for drywall, and is much less disruptive to employees.

Trainor Modular Walls, which became a Herman Miller Alliance Partner in February, identifies the top three reasons for growth in the modular walls market:

1. They are a better solution to construction challenges and provide a return on investment. When workspace change is required, modular walls can be reconfigured quickly with far less downtime than traditional drywall construction. With every relocation, the savings significantly increase.
2. Modular walls provide UL-approved electrical that can be integrated both horizontally and vertically. They also reduce labor costs for the carpet installation because the carpet goes in first and does not have to be cut around drywalls.
3. Collectively, modular walls manufacturers are in the process of getting contractors to understand that in the long-term, walls are less expensive. Further, the owners and architects are sharing in the education on movable walls.

“The facilities manager needs the options, and they are getting more information from architects, designers and general contractors that this is a long-term solution that is less expensive,” says Trainor.

Healthways opens up its HQ

This showroom reception area of a Herman Miller dealership illustrates how Trainor modular/movable walls integrate with existing drywall construction. Multi-lite aluminum frame panels are inset with wood veneers, creating a checkerboard effect. Textured glass panels along the sides add visual interest, while the clear glass top allows light to pass through to the adjoining room.

Healthways corporate headquarters, in Nashville, Tennessee, is a prime example, says Sue Schmidt, CPM, QOE, Facilities. “We were moving from a very traditional closed-office floor plan with about 80% private offices to an open plan with 250,000 sq. ft. and 1,100 workstations.”  The company was very concerned about the need for private conversations. As a result, Healthways designed in a good number of phone-booth-sized spaces, many using Inscape products. But as it turned out, the spaces weren’t all necessary. “Folks realized that the sound masking we used worked really well, so it wasn’t as much of an issue as we had anticipated,” explains Schmidt.

So, at various points, when departmental needs changed, Healthways relocated the Inscape walls and reconfigured about 20 small spaces into larger meeting areas. “And we found it could easily be done in a couple of days or over a weekend,” says Schmidt. “Disruption to those working in the space was minimal as there was no cutting, sawing, drywall sanding, or painting.”

Why are movable walls easier and faster to install? Because the wall product is delivered ready to install, multiple trades (such as flooring, ceiling, and HVAC) can work simultaneously. There is no cutting or construction required; many movable wall systems have no more than five to seven parts.

Consider the WestJet Campus facility, in Ontario, Canada. The project includes 2,782 linear feet of Haworth movable walls, including glass office fronts; wood, metal, and whiteboard tiles; and wooden sliding doors. “We’re in a gold LEED building,” says Dennis Dowling, Sr. Manager, Corporate Real Estate at WestJet. “And that is important to us.” Using Haworth’s movable walls helped the health services company stay focused on sustainability.

Seeking LEED

Unfortunately, buildings do not accumulate many LEED points as a result of using movable walls. Currently, buildings with movable walls can often collect LEED points for construction waste and construction indoor air quality (IAQ). Last year, three major movable wall manufacturers, KI, Haworth, and DIRTT, petitioned the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) to consider increasing the LEED points associated with movable walls. The manufacturers wrote: “We implore the USGBC to consider rewarding strategies for ongoing, long-term sustainability.”

The Burnaby Hospital Optimization Clinic for hip and knee replacements in British Columbia selected DIRTT's movable wall for its entire space from reception to patient care because of the flexibility and sustainability. The customizable finishes are added bonuses.

The USGBC is considering the suggestion. However, in one of its website research documents, the Council outlines concerns that it is difficult to design for energy-efficient lighting and for occupancy sensors and controls in a space that has movable walls. At the moment, facilities managers should probably consider movable walls for the sustainability benefits they offer, not for the LEED points that may or may not accrue.

Flexibility is inherent in walls

The Spivey Station Surgery Center in suburban Atlanta uses KI’s Genius® architectural walls to add flexibility to its 12-person conference room. The space can expand to a 100-person area or can supplement the facility’s waiting room.

“There are two different approaches to selecting walls,” says Inscape’s Vice President of Marketing, Sharad Mathur. “Tenants and landlords. Tenants look for the most beautiful walls. They don’t care if the walls are there for five years or for 35 years.” However, says Mathur, tenant spaces tend to turn over every three to five years. “What that means with drywall is that the space must be gutted and rebuilt regularly. This is more expensive—for the landlord as well as the environment—than moving around pre-fabricated walls. Peter Hamm, at DIRTT, agrees. “Companies don’t know where they’ll be in five years, much less ten years, much less 15 years,” says Hamm.

“We don’t know the size and shape of changes to come. But a movable wall system will be nimble, will be able to accommodate changes in technology.” Moore, also of DIRTT, agrees, pointing out that with movable walls, facilities managers can pop out a tile and have direct access to the electrical system. This flexibility requires less energy and labor.

Further, the impact on the bottom line is significant. “The commercial real estate revolution has made movable walls part of the solution. Landlords and companies are saving millions annually by using modular walls,” says Trainor. “For landlords, it’s easy to upgrade, move walls around and employ a variety of options.” As a construction solution, users can store walls, add new materials and textures and reinstall them elsewhere. Trainor adds, “Because they are manufactured off-site, walls are a fabricated solution that qualifies for accelerated depreciation that reduces costs up to 20 cents on the dollar.”

Some companies aren’t waiting several years, though, to see the benefits of movable walls. At the Spivey Station Surgery Center in suburban Atlanta, the conference room uses Genius architectural walls from KI for easy reconfiguration. The walls, which are up to 99% recyclable and up to 99% reusable, are configured to offer a semi-open L-shaped space to supplement the healthcare facility’s waiting room. With only 4.5 basic parts, the walls can also provide an intimate space for up to 12 participants or can become a large area for100 people. “Genius walls showed us how we could use this space in various ways to get more for our money,” says Melody Mena, director of the Center.

Improving IAQ a wall at a time

Another advantage to movable walls is the issue of indoor air quality (IAQ). Building, or renovating, with drywall inevitably leads to off-gassing and, even more troublesome, dust and debris.

Installation of drywall leads to off-gassing which occurs because of chemicals in the inks from the recycled newsprint that comprise the drywall paper as well as the adhesives and other additives that are sometimes included for moisture and fire resistance. As a result, drywall can be a significant source of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that off-gas into the indoor air.  Construction workers who sand drywall joint compound are often exposed to high concentrations of dusts and, in some cases, respirable silica. Drywall joint compounds are made from many ingredients (i.e., talc, calcite, mica, gypsum, silica).

Inscape movable walls are easy to install, reconfigure, and integrate with systems furniture. Not only are they 98% re-usable, but they make an esthetic statement as well.

Some of these have been associated with varying degrees of eye, nose, throat, and respiratory tract irritation. Over time, breathing the dust from drywall joint compounds may cause persistent throat and airway irritation, coughing, phlegm production, and breathing difficulties similar to asthma.

“It doesn’t matter how large an area you isolate,” says Healthways’ Schmidt. “The dust and dirt gets everywhere.” In the end, movable walls serve their users well. “For us,” explains Schmidt, “it’s about making decisions that are sensitive to the environment.”