LEED award in green building practice

The US Green Building Council has awarded Hypertherm’s Heater Road Facility with a LEED Gold designation, Bread Loaf Corporation of Middlebury and Hypertherm Inc of Hanover, NH, have announced. LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design and represents the best in class green building practices measuring the design, construction, maintenance and operations of green buildings.
Hypertherm is the world leader in plasma cutting technology and the Heater Road facility in Lebanon is the newest of their seven facilities in the Upper Valley.The project transformed a previously disturbed 23 acre site along the Interstate into the 160,000 square foot research, manufacturing, training, and office building.
In 2010 Hypertherm and Bread Loaf’s project team set sustainability goals to achieve LEED Silver status which would require a total 50 points. However, as the team focused on solving building problems and meeting Hypertherm’s business needs, the team developed innovative solutions exceeding expectations and thereby achieving a total of 62 points and the LEED Gold status.
Sustainable achievements include the diversion of 90% of the construction waste from landfills, a reduction in water use of 47% and a reduction of process (manufacturing and testing) water use of 100% through a recycling system saving 70,000 gallons per day of municipal water. The project protected the existing wetlands and maintained 58% of the site as vegetated open space. The building uses 25% less energy when compared to a base line building of similar use and climate category.This energy efficiency was achieved through a well-insulated and air tight building enclosure, by providing skylights and strategically located windows for day lighting, by selection of highly efficient mechanical systems and providing controls for the building occupants to monitor energy use.
The Hypertherm Project is being presented at the Efficiency Vermont BBD Conference on Wed., February 5th at 10:20 am, please come and join us.
Sustainable Design Features:
· Natural habitat restoration
· Wetland protection
· Water protection through use of rain gardens and pervious paving
· Heat island reduction with shade trees and a reflective roof
· Exemplary construction waste landfill diversion
· Provision of a public shuttle to support regional traffic reduction goals
· 47% potable water use reduction
· 100% process water use reduction
· 25% overall energy efficiency in integrated systems design
· Systems and envelope commissioning
· Systems measurement and verification
· Passive day-lighting
· 10% high recycled content materials
· 10% regional materials
· Use of low or no VOC emitting materials
· Establishment of a Green Housekeeping Program
· Provision for future on-site Photovoltaic Roof Panels
· Purchasing of off-site Renewable Energy or Green Power
The USGBC just celebrated its 20,000th LEED commercial building. These commercial buildings are broken down into different building type categories for which Heater Road is represented by the Commercial Office, Industrial Sector. Worldwide there are 414 buildings in this category. Of all the building in the Industrial Sector there only 15 buildings which received the Platinum status and 107 received Gold status, which places this project in the top 30%.
Bread Loaf and Hypertherm acknowledge the contribution of the following consulting firms in achieving this LEED Gold award:Engineering Ventures, Salem Engineering, Cx Associates, Zero by Degrees, Pathways Consulting, Saucier + Flynn, and Chase Engineering.