We had some good news around healthcare this year. In February, we were told it achieved a rating of Gold for a hospital we helped design. Way back in 2010, chambersdesign started working with WakeMed, a healthcare provider in Raleigh, NC to create one of the greenest hospitals in the world. With the news about our LEED rating we found out that the project is now one of only 15 to score so high on the planet.
Back in 2010, my team started working a team of architects, engineers and healthcare providers to make one of the greenest hospitals in the world. We used the LEED rating system to show just how eco-friendly the project was. This was the fourth healthcare project we had worked on, and we brought many lessons learned to the table.
Hospitals are complex buildings. They use lots of energy and perform very specific functions. The process of making them sustainable is as complex. It’s nice to have a system like LEED to help translate all of the technical stuff into easy to understand goals.
What is LEED?
LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) is the most widely used green building rating system in the world. Available for virtually all building project types, from new construction to interior fit-outs and operation & maintenance, LEED provides a framework that project teams can apply to create healthy, highly efficient, and cost-saving green buildings. LEED certification is a globally recognized symbol of sustainability achievement.
Gold is Good
We achieved a Gold rating for the hospital. That means for all the ways LEED determines if a building is green or not, we had to do more than half of them. We brought more daylight into the patient spaces, reduced the energy consumed, created places of respite and used recycled materials (to name a few). For the full picture of the green features, you can see the project here on the USGBC website.
First Impression
When the news first came to us, WakeMed issued a press release about the project. You can read the entire release here. The highlights of what they said is that they see the value in innovation and sustainability, and that they are proud to have had a vision to do something more than just status quo. I would second that notion. It was a really amazing project and shows that green healthcare is a choice.
Hospitals are complex buildings. They use lots of energy and perform very specific functions. The process of making them sustainable is as complex. It’s nice to have a system like LEED to help translate all of the technical stuff into easy to understand goals.
What is LEED?
LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) is the most widely used green building rating system in the world. Available for virtually all building project types, from new construction to interior fit-outs and operation & maintenance, LEED provides a framework that project teams can apply to create healthy, highly efficient, and cost-saving green buildings. LEED certification is a globally recognized symbol of sustainability achievement.
Gold is Good
We achieved a Gold rating for the hospital. That means for all the ways LEED determines if a building is green or not, we had to do more than half of them. We brought more daylight into the patient spaces, reduced the energy consumed, created places of respite and used recycled materials (to name a few). For the full picture of the green features, you can see the project here on the USGBC website.
First Impression
When the news first came to us, WakeMed issued a press release about the project. You can read the entire release here. The highlights of what they said is that they see the value in innovation and sustainability, and that they are proud to have had a vision to do something more than just status quo. I would second that notion. It was a really amazing project and shows that green healthcare is a choice.
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