New Cook County project asks “What could sustainable housing look like?”

A new housing organization is just getting off the ground in Cook County. The Northwoods Sustainable & Resilient Housing Project is led by Kjell Olsen and Jennifer Victor-Larsen, and over the next year they hope to connect people across the county to explore housing solutions that address four areas of focus: sustainability, resiliency, health, and affordability.

Victor-Larsen told WTIP that the project began with a conversation around a campfire, during which she and Olsen found a common passion for housing. That conversation would lead them to apply for and receive a grant from the University of Minnesota Extension’s Regional Sustainable Development Partnerships program.

The project aims to collect ideas and expertise related to housing, ultimately to compile information for those interested in trying to create housing that uses healthy and sustainable materials, is resilient in the face of a changing climate, all while staying affordable.

“We’re going to explore existing alternative housing and just kind of using that broadly, as well as new technologies, building, methods, materials, and gather the community together, just to kind of creatively rethink what’s possible in this very beautiful and unique place where we have a lot of nature, and create a resource,” Victor-Larsen said.” The ultimate goal of this short term project is create a resource for the community that showcases what is possible. ”

While the exact form of a future resource has yet to be determined, Olsen and Victor-Larsen have launched a website where they have begun to collect information related to their four areas of focus.

Choosing what to focus on

Addressing the nation-wide housing crisis can take any number of forms depending on a community’s needs and priorities. Victor-Larsen and Olsen have chosen four areas to focus on for their particular project.

Olsen explained that while many people think of “green building” being based on how much energy is required for a house to be heated or cooled and for appliances to run, when he and Victor-Olsen talk about sustainability within this project, they are considering the entire life of a building. This starts with what materials are being used, how they are produced, and how, ultimately, they might be disposed of at the end of a building’s use.

Olsen drew a distinction between the operational carbon, the energy that it takes to run a building, versus the embodied carbon, the energy that goes into materials. He said that even in some buildings designed to be efficient, and which have a very low operational carbon cost, a high level embodied carbon can outweigh the energy benefits.

“If you start with the wrong material, you can’t save yourself,” Olsen said. “You’ve bought too much negative use of energy to ever come out of it in a positive fashion, even if your building saves a lot of energy every year.”

The concept of healthy houses also related to materials. Victor-Larsen said that they are looking at materials that either have no impact or positive impacts on the health of a home’s environment and inhabitants. She said this includes water and air quality, and human health. This priority can be in conflict with some energy-saving materials. She explained that there are some building materials that are designed to create energy efficiency, but which can off-gas and create health problems.

On the topic of resiliency, Olsen said, “The world that we live in, the region that we live in, is changing, and we don’t really know what’s going to happen in the next 10 years or even longer.”

With increasing instances of climate-related disasters and emergencies, like fires and floods, many builders and housing developers are considering what types of materials will hold up to extreme events.

Finally, the project focus also includes affordability. Nothing else really matters if you can’t build it and can’t live in it,” Victor-Larsen explained. “So it has to be part of the conversation.”

What is next

The project is newly launched, but in addition to creating a website, Victor-Larsen and Olsen have already begun a larger conversation with stakeholders in the housing community. They hosted a round-table event on Oct. 14 that brought together builders, developers, homeowners, and others interested in what the future of housing in Cook County could include.

The event was a way to connect people working across sectors while specifically highlighting the focus areas. They plan to host another round-table discussion in the spring, though Olsen said there could be more events over the next few months. For the subsequent meetings, the pair hope to be able to bring in more people working in housing to continue to diversify the information gathered at the events.

In addition to the meetings, Olsen and Victor-Larsen have also been connecting with people to talk about their areas of focus at people’s homes. They have done a series of site visits, and plan to do more. The focus of those visits is to better understand how some of the concepts they are exploring function in reality, and to see different interpretations of a building technique or technology.

As they continue their existing work and look to build on it, Victor-Larsen and Olsen encouraged anyone interested in the project to contact them. Both can be contacted through the Northwoods Sustainable and Resilient Housing Project website.

“If anybody’s interested in sharing their project or, you know, something they’ve built, or something they’re living in, we would love to hear from people. That would be really helpful. Because ultimately, the more that gets shared with us, the more that becomes part of this resource for the community,” Victor-Larsen said.

WTIP’s Kirsten Wisniewski spoke to Kjell Olsen and Jennifer Victor-Larsen about the Northwoods Sustainable and Resilient Housing Project. Audio of that interview is below.

Kirsten Wisniewski October 26, 2025