The Sustainability
of Stone as a Material

Architects are turning to natural stones as an environmentally friendly alternative to synthetic materials thanks to their integrated properties, longevity, and unique strength. From limestone walls that divide spaces with rustic charm or granite columns that define grand formal entrances, natural stone can easily punctuate elegance in any structure. Investing in quality-grade stone products ensures that your designs will last for generations – providing lasting aesthetic beauty throughout the lifecycle of your projects.

Architects can help reduce their building’s footprint and enhance sustainability initiatives by using these materials instead of man-made ones in their projects. Ultimately, natural stones help ensure that each building lives up to its intended purpose without damaging our beloved ecosystems.

Many natural stone suppliers, including Polycor, provide environmental product declarations (EPDs) which make it easier to measure embodied carbon by providing detailed information about an array of materials’ lifecycles, allowing architects and designers to make more educated, informed decisions when selecting materials for a project.

With EPDs, green building codes can be more easily achieved while still meeting the necessary function and beauty that architects strive to create with each build. Natural stones are definitely worth considering as they provide much potential in the reduction of embodied carbon and embodied energy in buildings and can help achieve the targets of construction projects where cities and organizations have pledged to significantly reduce the embodied carbon of their projects.

Supporting a variety of wildlife by incorporating eco-friendly materials leads to increases in the local population of insects, amphibians and small animals which all play an important role in the local environment and contribute to a more diverse and abundant ecosystem.

Natural stone is simply a dug-up material that is a single-ingredient product made by the earth and for the earth. Unlike large-scale mining operations of other industries, dimension stone quarrying extraction doesn’t require the use of any chemicals in the process and produces greater yields of usable product. When it’s time to rehabilitate a quarry, there is no contamination to manage or remediate, and nature easily takes over. Stone itself does not emit any VOC’s, does not contain any other foreign ingredients, and is chemically inert, making it incredibly safe for both humans and the environment. In this respect, natural stone is also a smart choice for creating healthy indoor environments as it is one of the best materials for buildings that are healthy for plants and people.

And the quarries themselves, where the stone originates from, can provide magnificent and unique locations for biodiversity during and especially after extraction when new habitats can be sculpted during the reclamation phase, as an increasing number of scientific studies have shown.

Active quarries offer species opportunities through temporary habitats. These include for example, ponds for amphibians, or pioneer habitats which support species that depend on a mixture of bare ground and vegetation landscape.

Quarries contribute to large-scale restoration of biodiversity by creating areas that have been lost in the wider landscape. For example, at Polycor’s former Alberene Soapstone™ quarry site that has since ceased operations, an extensive 40-acre public garden and nature preserve, aptly named Quarry Gardens, was built among the natural ponds and around the soapstone outcrops. The gardens feature two miles of walking trails through native plant communities nurtured by the magnesium-rich soils of the soapstone deposits.

Another example is in Barre, Vermont, where many historic granite quarry pits have now become natural lakes from years of rainwater accumulation teeming with fish, as well as themselves surrounded by thriving forests that are welcomed by the local community.

This not only eliminates the need for additional resources needed to extract and fabricate new materials but is also an environmentally conscious decision.

By selecting existing stone materials for adaptive reuse or revitalization projects, architects are directly contributing to the conservation of natural resources and preserving the environment we live in. Reusing traditional stonework is also an effective way to adhere to more sustainable construction practices while at the same time paying homage to the architectural styles of the past. A combination of classical and modern design techniques can add layers of depth and character to any structure. In this way, the choice of building materials has a significant impact on the overall performance results and deserves careful consideration.