The greenest museum ever built

Day three of Roam @ Home Week, in honor of Independence Day...

This fall, visitors to San Francisco's Golden Gate Park will be able to experience a museum that is certifiably unlike any other in existance. Designed by world-famous architect Renzo Piano, the eight-year project will come to its end, having swallowed nearly half a billion dollars during its construction. It's the new California Academy of Sciences, a consortium of aquarium, planetarium and natural history museum, all housed under a 2.5 acre "living roof."

Among the top wishes of the CAS is to be the largest LEED Platinum certified building in the world when its doors open on September 27, 2008. The first guests to enter will bear witness to a tropical rainforest - enclosed within a glass dome - one of the many aspects of the museum that bring the outside in, or vice versa, depending on how you look at it.

Since the environmental savings are too numerous to list, I'll simply direct you the website. Take a glance and you'll learn of the 1.7 million plants that will be used to blanket the living roof alone, aquariums featuring saltwater pumped in directly from the Pacific, and a solar canopy that will contribute to the museum's energy expenditures.

Dying to visit? Me too. You can get the details here.