history

THE BEGINNING

The LEAFhouse Cooperative gets its name from the name of the University of Maryland's 2007 Solar Decathlon submission house, LEAFhouse. The Solar Decathlon is an annual competition hosted by the U.S. Department of Energy that challenges teams of students and faculty to design and develop buildings that are both energy-efficient and carbon-neutral to address climate change and enhance our standard of living, while also achieving greater affordability, resilience, and high performance.

In the spirit of the competition, LEAFhouse was designed to be a fully-sustainable residential structure, with the goals of "[advancing] the sustainable design and construction industries, [creating] a center of excellence in integrated design at the University of Maryland, and [demonstrating] that solar technology is practical for everyday life" (CUSP). After construction, the structure was relocated to the Washington, D.C. Mall, where it stood on display during judging. The fruitful interdisciplinary collaboration between students and faculty on this project ended up earning LEAFhouse first place nationally and second place internationally in 2007. 

A NEW HOME

After placing both nationally and internationally at the competition, LEAFhouse was purchased by a local non-profit, the Potomac Valley Architecture Foundation (PVAF), a local chapter of the American Institute of Architects. As part of the purchase agreement, PVAF was required to locate the structure on campus and have it accessible to students for the first two years after acquisition. Thus, LEAFhouse was returned back to campus where it was installed on an empty plot of land just past the Xfinity Center. 

Observing LEAFhouse's unifying character, students from the UMD American Ecological Engineering Society Chapter (AEES) realized the benefits of having a space that could unite campus sustainability. In 2018, they began organizing all of the student organizations that frequented LEAFhouse into what became known as the Sustainability Cooperative, or SCoop for short, the first cooperative of student sustainability organizations at UMD. LEAFhouse became one of two home bases along with the Maryland Food Collective, a sustainable food store located in Stamp Student Union fondly known as the Co-op.

Between these two hubs, sustainability finally had a physical home on campus that students knew about and could frequent to meet other students who shared their passions for the environment. 

Inspired by this student passion for sustainability, Bo Green, PVAF's steward for LEAFhouse and liaison to the students, came up with the concept for SPARC, or the Sustainability Park and Academic Research Center. SPARC's vision was to showcase student and faculty innovation in the name of sustainability in one consolidated location that was open to the public and viewable to prospective students.

The name of the game was to give sustainability a more visible face at UMD. The initial plans included a circular showcase of past and future Solar Decathlon houses, a number of community gardens, and space for student and faculty projects, all in one place powered by solar energy. The idea was a big hit among the student organizations that needed space for project construction and hosting, but unfortunately, the concept was halted by alternative university land use considerations. 

Unfortunately, this was the start of a spell of bad luck. In May 2019, the Co-op was permanently shut down due to unpaid debt despite a massive protest and push to fundraise by the student body. Down one base, SCoop members flocked to LEAFhouse to carry on their community-building efforts. However, the onset of COVID in 2020 posed its own set of challenges as everyone was sent home for lockdown. The separation and graduation of the old cohort of leaders resulted in the slow death of SCoop, and by 2021, the initiative had officially faded away. During these two years, LEAFhouse sat alone, unused, unmaintained, and to some extent forgotten.

A NEW PUSH

This changed in January 2022 when the new executive board of AEES received a notice from PVAF. LEAFhouse was going to be sold and moved off-campus to recover the unexpected costs incurred during COVID. Along with this notice came a request: would AEES lead a student charge to purchase it and return it back to the student body? It was a wild notion, but we knew the value that the space gave to the community in the past and we were willing to fight to reinstate that value again for all students across campus. So a new fight began.

Between January 2022 and January 2023, AEES built a movement across campus to secure and convert the structure into a sustainability hub with the potential to mirror the original concept of SPARC. The goal was to apply to the financial grants available to students on campus to raise enough money to place a downpayment on the structure and convert it into a cross-campus student sustainability project to restore the structure to its former glory.

At the height of the movement, over 10 student organizations had signed on representing over 1,200 students across campus, notably Engineers Without Borders, Beekeeping Club, The Wildlife Society, Sigma Alpha, and the SGA Sustainability Committee. This new collective, which became known as the LEAFhouse Cooperative, would go on to form an LLC to own the structure and speak with the Mayor of College Park, representatives from the U.S. Department of Energy, leaders across the campus administration, and President Pines to gather support and convince them of the benefits a designated space for sustainability would have on campus. 

Unfortunately, the movement was not able to raise the necessary funds by the designated deadline and relinquished its priority on the house to be fair to PVAF and its other buyers. Although this reality was disappointing, it did not dampen the spirit of community that the group had developed and the vision they had for a united sustainability front at UMD.

THE LEAFHOUSE COOPERATIVE