City Officials and the USGBC joined the LEED Gold celebration and building tour
LAKE JACKSON, TEXAS — City Manager Bill Yenne and U.S. Green Building Council Vice President Gretchen Sweeney joined Kirksey Architecture and Dow on Thursday, April 20th for the unveiling of the Dow Diamond Center’s LEED Gold certification plaque ceremony, complete with a building tour to showcase the green features of the new building.
Located at the new Dow Texas Innovation Center’s Diamond Center at 270 Abner Jackson Parkway, Lake Jackson, Texas 77566, the LEED Gold plaque ceremony kicked off Dow’s Earth Day celebration. The Diamond Center is the amenities building on Dow’s new campus and is comprised of welcome space, a dining facility, fitness center, conference center, clinic, and more. The building was designed with a focus on energy efficiency and sustainability. Both the design and construction teams were very careful to protect the natural resources found on the site, which create a nature-park like setting.
Speakers in attendance included:
- Earl Shipp, Vice President of Dow U.S. Gulf Coast Operations
- Bill Yenne, City Manager, City of Lake Jackson
- Gretchen Sweeney, Vice President, U.S. Green Building Council
- Brian Richard, Executive Vice President, Kirksey Architecture
“The strong partnership among all of the stakeholders in this project reinforced the commitment to green building practices from early design meetings through the end of construction. On behalf of the project team, we are so proud to have achieved this distinction.” – Skye Smith, Senior Project Manager, Kirksey Architecture.
The building, designed by Kirksey Architecture and developed by CORE Real Estate is 20% more energy efficient than a typical code-compliant building and has 38% more water savings. The general contractor, D.E. Harvey Builders, diverted 78% of their construction waste. Here is an overview of why these LEED metrics matter:
Energy Savings
The Dow Diamond Center has an annual energy use savings of 20%.
This equates to:
- 25,133 gallons of gasoline saved every year
- 47 passenger vehicles taken off the road every year
- 33 homes powered with electricity all year
- 517 barrels of oil consumed
Water Savings
The Diamond Center has an annual water savings of 38%
This equates to:
- 748,231 bottles of water saved every year
- 3,300 loads of laundry avoided every year
- 5,743 showers (8-min) avoided every year
Construction Waste Diversion
The Diamond Center diverted 78% of their construction waste from the landfill during the construction process
Waste that is recycled instead of being sent to the landfill ALSO contributes to the reduction in CO2 emissions!
This diversion amount equates to:
- 409 tons of waste recycled instead of put into a landfill, OR 58.5 garbage trucks of trash diverted from the landfill
- 1,300 metric tons of CO2 emissions prevented from entering the atmosphere or 146,281 gallons of gasoline that were not burned
The two new research and development buildings on the campus are also seeking LEED certification.