Month: May 2013

Founder and Executive Director, The Plant and Owner, Chicago Sustainable Manufacturing Center

John Edel is both an eco and social entrepreneur.  His most recent endeavor, The Plant, is a project combining adaptive industrial reuse and aquaponics to create the nation’s only net-zero vertical farm.  Located in a former meatpacking facility in Chicago’s historic Stockyards, The Plant will be powered entirely by the waste of neighboring businesses.

John also is the owner and developer of the Chicago Sustainable Manufacturing Center, a green business incubator in the Stockyards Industrial Corridor.  As General Contractor, Edel took the facility from a burnt-out shell to 100% occupancy while using a mixture of waste-stream recycled materials and leading edge technology to make the building exceptionally energy efficient and pleasantly non-toxic.  The renovation was assisted by a core group of volunteers and by bartering with suppliers, tenants and scrappers.  The building’s green roof is a photo of Edel’s daughter Zoe rendered in 9,600 sedum plants, each of which is a pixel in her image.

In previous careers, Edel taught computer graphics, designed sets for broadcast television, art directed video games and worked as a chef on private railroad cars.  He has a lifelong dream of combining industrial preservation, agriculture and job creation in a sustainable fashion.

Founder and Executive Director, Rebuilding Exchange and Managing Director, Delta Institute

Elise Zelechowski leads social venture strategy for the Delta Institute, and also serves in a dual role as Executive Director of affiliate organization, Rebuilding Exchange. She provides expertise and technical assistance to a range of Delta’s programs including economic and workforce development, green building and LEED, sustainability planning, policy development and analysis, waste management and recovery, and sustainable building deconstruction.

During her tenure at Delta, Elise has spearheaded a number of high-profile green building projects including the LEED Certification of the 4.2 million square foot Merchandise Mart Properties, the largest commercial building in the world. She has facilitated multi-stakeholder policy dialogues for the Environmental Protection Agency on market barriers to green development, sustainability planning and building deconstruction. She has written numerous technical and policy guides for clients such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Chicago Community Loan Fund, has consulted on sustainability to the Chicago 2016 Olympic Committee, Hostelling International, and Cook County, and launched the region’s first social venture dedicated to building a market for reclaimed building materials Rebuilding Exchange.

Elise is a TEDx speaker, was awarded the 2012 Green Entrepreneur of the Year award by Chicago Magazine, is a Chicago Community Trust fellow, sits on the Illinois Task Force on Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship and is a Board Member of the Building Materials Reuse Association.