LEED-Worthy Before Its Age
If you’ve kept an eye on energy in your designs, LEED certification could be just a few documentation changes away
By Layla Bellows
How do you . . . identify and attain sustainability ratings for buildings that were built before such rating systems existed?
Summary: While LEED for new construction continues to gain popularity, its younger sister, LEED for Existing Buildings: Operations and Maintenance, is also gaining ground. An example is Securian Financial Group’s 401 Building, whose owners and operators are finding they can attain it without retrofits as long as the building was designed to a high-efficiency standard to begin with.
Amid the seemingly endless barrage of news about global warming, carbon-neutral goals, and the stimulus package’s support of efficiency efforts, it seems every day new companies are announcing goals to go green. Efficiency, however, is not a new phenomenon and is very far from a fad. Building operators have long known that after employees, their buildings represent the second major cost of doing business and that money can be saved if the building requires less energy. Energy efficiency might be the hot phrase on everyone’s lips, but it’s nothing new.
Securian Financial Group’s 401 Building in St. Paul, Minn., is a case in point. At nine years old, the building just barely predates LEED ratings. It was built, however, with every attention given to best practices in energy efficiency and the indoor environment. As testament, the building was awarded LEED for Existing Buildings: Operations and Maintenance in April this year. The certification didn’t require a single retrofit.
Efficient by design
“For us, energy efficiency and environmental stewardship go hand in hand,” Julio Fesser, Securian Financial Group’s director of facility services, says. “One leads to the other. The way I like to put it for people is: ‘We’re sustainable because it makes good business sense.’”
Securian’s sustainability strategies come from a place of responsibility. The company and its partners—Architectural Alliance and McGough Construction—didn’t set out to build a green building when the project first began 12 years ago. Rather, they wanted to build a high-quality structure that would last long into the future. The 401 building uses T8 fluorescent lamps, and smart controls adjust both light and temperature according to daylight levels and occupancy. Boilers and chillers are not needed on site because of its proximity to District Energy St. Paul in the downtown area, which operates the largest, most successful heated and chilled water distribution system in North America.
Tom DeAngelo, FAIA, principal at Architectural Alliance, believes the 401 Building’s success stems in large part from the design process, which from the outset included the architect, engineers, owner’s team, and contractors. “We weren’t doing things after the fact,” he says. “We talked about systems they wanted to use from day one, and their operating team was interacting with the architect from the beginning of the project.” Solutions to practical problems—such as on-demand elevators and a floor-by-floor air handling system—were part of a collaborative process.
Preventive maintenance of HVAC systems is the rule at Securian, which keeps the building performing at optimum levels. Sustainability plays out on the more human side of the equation through the company’s commitment to recycling, using environmentally sound cleaning products, and promoting carpooling and mass transit.
Securian’s 401 Building. Image courtesy of Securian.
It’s environmentalism by default, but its conception was human in mind. It might be cliché, but Fesser explains that Securian really does view employees as its greatest asset. “The design of our workplace recognizes that,” he says, “so things like access to daylight, thermal comfort, indoor air quality, and other such priorities were established early on as very important principles and attributes of this building.”
DeAngelo sees it all as stemming from the operational perspective Securian’s team brought to the table during the design. “It was very natural for them to submit what they had done for LEED because they were already doing a lot of those things in the late 1990s,” he says.
It all aligns with the features of LEED EB: Operations and Maintenance. Reducing commuting transportation, sustainable purchasing policies, and green cleaning policies all earn LEED points, as does a high Energy Star rating—the 401 Building obtained a 96 percent in 2007, again, without systems upgrades or retrofits. This high score was the driving factor in seeking out LEED EB certification.
“We knew intuitively that our buildings would be grouped in that best-in-class Energy Star category, and we just took the time to gather the data and submit it,” Fesser says. After learning that the 401 building was in the top 4 percent of the country’s energy efficient buildings, they began looking into LEED and learned that Energy Star ratings can earn up to 15 credits. “We decided to build on that and go after additional recognition that would affirm our operating efficiencies and environmental sustainability,” he says.
All ages access
Securian’s 401 Building is a standout example of a sustainable building that happened to be designed before LEED was created, but it’s far from alone. The JohnsonDiversey headquarters in Sturtevant, Wis., was designed by Zimmerman Architectural Studios in Glendale, Wis., and HOK and built in 1997. It achieved LEED EB Gold with just minimal changes in how it documented procedures.
In buildings that are already highly efficient, building owners and managers seeking LEED EB: Operations and Maintenance certification might find themselves altering operations more than the systems. Instituting sustainable purchasing policies for items such as recycled paper and toner cartridges earns one credit, as does using the least toxic pesticides possible. And documenting the impact on building cost earns two credits. Smaller alterations in internal practices tend to be the most common changes made among companies seeking out LEED EB certifications for their buildings.
“Clearly these buildings were built well in terms of energy use, water use,” says Melissa Gallagher-Rogers, the U.S. Green Building Council’s [http://www.usgbc.org] manager of the government sector. “You need a building that’s built well to begin with, and then if you already have that baseline, you can go forward and green your operations and practices.” She adds that the process doesn’t have to be this linear for every candidate, “If your building’s not performing, you can still green your practices and then get to the point where you have a more energy efficient, water efficient building.”
In general, commissioning the existing building will establish what systems need upgrades—and help meet LEED EB prerequisites, but it doesn’t end there. Companies that get LEED for Existing Buildings: Operations and Maintenance are paying as much attention to the materials they bring into the building as they are the electrical bills, and they’re monitoring those utility bills to make sure their building is staying efficient.
Although both JohnsonDiversey’s headquarters and Securian’s 401 Building are contemporary, one of the most striking features of LEED EB is that buildings of any age can achieve it.
“We really see buildings across the age spectrum,” says Gallagher-Rogers. “The Colorado State Capitol, which is a historic building, was one of our first EB: O&M certified projects.” As a historic site, the 1894-built capitol building (originally designed by Elijah Myers) came with significant challenges (modified lighting, for instance, couldn’t significantly alter the mood of a lit space). To obtain LEED EB certification, the team, which included Lance Shepherd, AIA, of the office of the state architect, retrofitted water fixtures and lighting and instituted a green cleaning program and recycling program and made its lawn maintenance and landscaping practices more environmentally friendly.
“It doesn’t necessarily need to be a brand-new building or a building that was built recently,” says Gallagher-Rogers. “Most historic buildings perform really well.”
And that means there are probably more LEED EB-ready buildings out there than anyone realizes. Whether built with best-practices in mind or simply built at a time when things had to be well-built, a building that’s already running at top-flight efficiency ought to be given a second look when it comes to sustainability ratings. |
