Page 193 - Green Building Through Integrated Design

HIGHER-LEVEL CONSIDERATIONS: THE TRIPLE BOTTOM LINE 169

Figure 9.1 Aiming for a LEED Platinum certification, the Great River Energy
headquarters in Maple Grove, Minnesota, expects to save more than $90,000
annually on electricity costs through the use of energy efficient measures and
daylight harvesting. Courtesy of Great River Energy.

are needed to put towards solving problems and obtaining some of these goals, they
may be not truly as committed as they once thought. Especially with a Platinum or
high-level LEED-certified building, if the owner is not fully committed to the goals of
the project, it won’t happen. It cannot be left up to the rest of the project team.

There are a number of key questions that should be asked at the inception of every
green building project, considerations that help define the project’s key goals and
“must have” project elements. Some of these include:

1 What are the project’s specific goals and objectives (e.g., certification levels, meet-
ing corporate or institutional policies, marketing to tenants or prospective buyers,
creating extraordinary or landmark spaces, public relations, financial incentives)?
2 For institutional owners, the key question is: why is this building even needed? Are
there existing facilities that would serve program needs that may have been over-
looked? Can the building be smaller than originally planned? (For many green
building advocates, the most sustainable new building is the one that’s never built.)
3 Who are the key decision-makers setting the overall goals of this project and how
will we be able to reach them throughout the process? (See the Yale case study for
a classic example of how this was done well.)