Page 115 - Green Building Through Integrated Design

92 BARRIERS TO HIGH-PERFORMANCE BUILDINGS

Our goal is to follow an integrative design process here. The state requires that we do
an eco-charrette on all of our projects. Usually, that is a two-hour session. We used to
do a full day or two days. We’ve streamlined it because we have a pre-meeting with
the architect and the project manager to really determine the low-hanging fruit. So we
don’t have to handle that in the eco-charrette. What we handle in the eco-charrette is
really high-level decision-making and problem solving about where we need to get
to, to meet our sustainable directives.
One of the things we’ve recently implemented is an energy reduction goal in these
buildings up front, for example, with the new student union building (Fig. 5.2). We
use that as a driving force for the design. In the past, we would design it and then at
the end we would look at where we were at [in terms of energy savings]. Now we’ve
moved that analysis closer to the beginning of the project. In the integrated design
process, I work with the environmental stewardship advisory committee here on campus.
That’s a committee that was developed under [University of Washington] President
Mark Emmert. We’re looking at sustainability totally on campus.

Figure 5.2 Designed by Perkins+Will, the renovated Husky Union
Building on the University of Washington campus will house offices
and meeting space for student activities, auditorium and performance
spaces, a book store, bike shop, bowling ally, billiards, conference
rooms, food services, banquet rooms, and an active outdoor area for
food vendors. Courtesy of Perkins+Will.