Among the many criteria you might select to benchmark your projects, one of the most helpful is an assessment of the qualities of award winning projects. To help you keep your eye on the prize, a new pocket-sized publication, available from NEEA’s BetterBricks, and a touring exhibition traversing the Northwest provide opportunities to see how your work matches up with the 2010 AIA Seattle Committee on the Environment (COTE) What Makes it Green? award winners. These projects exhibit the best in innovative, environmentally responsible design in the Pacific Northwest.

These projects were selected by a four member jury consisting of Bob Berkebile FAIA, founding principal, BNIM Architects; Don Horn AIA, Assistant Director, GSA Office of Federal High Performance Green Buildings, Claire Johnson, Associate Director, Atelier Ten, San Francisco, and Alex Steffen, Executive Editor, Worldchanging. Among the selected projects are King Street Station (Seattle) and Twelve | West (Portland), both by ZGF Architects; Vancouver Convention Centre West (Vancouver, BC), LMN Architects; Northwest Maritime Center (Port Townsend), The Miller Hull Partnership; and Common Ground (Lopez Island), Mithun.

Check out the exhibits in person at:

Boise, October 21 -  November 4, 2010
Integrated Design Lab | Boise
108 N 6th St. Boise, ID

Spokane, November 10 – November 24, 2010
Integrated Design Lab | Inland Northwest
412 East Spokane Falls Blvd., #239, Spokane, WA

Portland, December 1, 2010 – January 6, 2011
Portland State University
Suite 235 Shattuck Hall (Broadway & Hall St.), Portland OR

Bozeman, January 12 – January 31, 2011
Integrated Design Lab | Bozeman
Montana State University, 160 Cheever Hall, Bozeman, MT

NEEA’s BetterBricks was happy to be a major sponsor this program. This year the focus was on energy performance and water performance. For the first time, all projects were required to provide an energy consumption measure, the energy Use Index or EUI, which seems small but, in fact, is a huge step to getting all entrants to think about energy performance. In addition, the only other mandatory requirement was to describe the project team’s integrated design approach, a key process to achieve high performance buildings.

I’ll get to the award winners in a minute. First I want to share what I find stimulating about the awards process itself. To start, the jury consisted of leading sustainability experts, and not just architects. People like Bob Berkebile FAIA, Founding Principal, BNIM Architects and co-founder of COTE nationally, Don Horn AIA, Assistant Director, GSA Office of Federal High-Performance Green Buildings, Claire Johnson, Associate Director, Atelier Ten, San Francisco, and ALEX STEFFEN, Executive Editor, Worldchanging.  The jury was moderated by Nadav Malin, President, BuildingGreen, Executive Editor, GreenSource.

The Awards process began with the submittals but led to a public jury panel discussion that was videotaped for later posting on the AIA website, followed by a public jury interview of the finalist teams. Then the 11 finalist projects were printed on panels for public display and eventual shipment for display around the region, further extending the impact of the lessons generated by these projects. The Awards ceremony allowed a public discussion with the winning project teams and in the near future there will be a set of case studies and a small booklet and an issue of Seattle AIA Forum magazine describing the projects. So if you missed the other public opportunities you still have many options for viewing the projects. Web images and descriptions of these and all submitted projects can be found at http://wmig.aiaseattle.org/2010_gallery.

Finalists and Winners

Now for what you’ve been waiting for. The jury selected two Gold-level projects, one Silver, and two Honorable Mentions — one for Rural Housing and one for Cultural Sensitivity.

GOLD
King Street Station Rehabilitation, Seattle WA
ZGF Architects
Collaborators:  SMEP Engineer: ARUP; LEED Certification: Green Building Services, Inc.; Commissioning Agent: Keithly Barber Associates

Photo Credit: Seattle Department of Transportation; Museum of   History & Industry
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GOLD
Vancouver Convention Centre West, Vancouver Canada
Design Architect: LMN Architects. (Prime Architects: Musson Cattell Mackey Partnership & DA Architects & Planners)
Collaborators: Mechanical Engineer: Stantec Consulting; Commissioning Authority and Mechanical Commissioning Agent: KD Engineering Co.

Photo Credit:  LMN/Studio 216
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SILVER
Twelve | West
ZGF Architects
Collborators:  Gerding Edlen Development Company LLC ; Total Mechanical – M/E/P Engineers, Lighting Design

Photo Credit:  Timothy Hursley,  ZGF Architects LLP
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Honorable Mention for Rural Affordable Housing
Common Ground, A Co-op Neighborhood
Mithun
Collaborators: Lopez Community Land Trust.

Photo Credit:  Mithun, Juan Hernandez
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Honorable Mention for Cultural Sustainability
Northwest Maritime Center
The Miller|Hull Partnership
Collaborators:  Mechanical Engineering: Ecotope, Inc; Sustainability: O’Brien and Company

Photo Credit:  Nic Lehoux
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During the awards ceremony, there was an open Q&A session with project team members and the audience. Below are some of the interesting ideas from NEEA’s BetterBricks’ point of view:

- Integrated design proved to be a key process to attain high performance.

- Thermal comfort expectations can and should vary by seasons, by use and by zone.

- Green BIM tool advances are really helping.

- District-level awareness and connections are key to advanced sustainability.

- It is important to explore all the energy options early and seeing where they might work or even influence the design scheme.

- Some new products were developed or introduced into the US via some of the projects thus making it easier for future projects to take advantage of.

- It was essential to either have a client that was interested and even aggressively pushing the energy and sustainability goals or have the architect effectively convince the client of the importance.
So go check out the detailed project information at the Seattle AIA website, and look for the video trailer http://wmig.aiaseattle.org/2010_gallery.

Portland is once again on the national stage, but this time it’s not the New York Times touting the city’s epic eateries (thanks for the nod, but enough already).  Architect Magazine released its second annual ranking of green architecture firms and two of the top ten firms call Portland home.

Sera Architects and Zimmer Gunsul Frasca (ZGF) Architects both earned a well-deserved seat among the nation’s most sustainable-focused firms.  Sera, coming in at No. 3, is behind the city’s greenest projects, including the Oregon Sustainability Center, which aims to be a net-zero high rise and is catching the attention of designers and developers the world over.  ZGF, coming in at No. 10, gained acclaim for its commitment to sustainable projects like the rain gardens at the Oregon Convention Center and its own offices at Twelve West in downtown Portland.  Perkins + Will came in as the number one green architecture firm according to the magazine.  While the firm is based in Chicago, the work coming out of the Perkins + Will Seattle office is on the cutting edge of green design (and of course adds to the sustainable cache of the Northwest).

On a related note, Clark Brockman of Sera Architects and a cadre of current and former ZGF architects, including Amy Cortese, John Breshears and Naomi Cole, have all been recognized with a BetterBricks Award over the years.

The other eight firms that made to the list include:

Perkins +Will , Chicago (No. 1)

EYP Architecture & Engineering, Albany, N.Y. (No. 2)

PGAL, Houston, (No. 4)

Cook+Fox, Chicago, (No. 5)

HOK, St. Louis (No. 6)

FXFOWLE, New York (No. 7)

Anshen + Allen, San Francisco (No. 8 )

DLR Group, Omaha, Neb. (No. 9)

The fifth annual Puget Sound BetterBricks Awards wrapped up a few weeks and ushered in a new batch green building overachievers.  The aim of these Awards are to both recognize energy efficiency achievements in commercial buildings as well as inspire others to embrace high performance buildings.

This year’s Award winners and finalists were honored at a reception of  nearly 200 people the evening of the 25th at Seattle Art Museum’s Olympic Sculpture Park.  The award winners and finalists are listed below.  For more information, visit www.BetterBricks.com/Awards, read the press release or download Seattle Business Magazine’s special report.

Owner/Developer

Those who make decisions about strategic direction regarding investments in high performance buildings. These executives, developers, owners and managers support, authorize and generally enable high performance building to be built and operated.

Winner — Kevin Brown, Senior Vice President & Chief Administrative Officer, Swedish Medical Center

Architecture

Those who design buildings and lead the design team on projects that consistently achieve high levels of energy efficiency in both new construction and major renovations.

Winner — Margaret Montgomery, Principal, NBBJ

Finalists — Chris Flint Chatto, Sustainable Designer, ZGF Architects

Design Engineer

Those who design buildings and lead the design team on projects that consistently achieve high levels of energy efficiency in both new construction and major renovations.

Winner — Tom Marseille, Principal, Stantec Consulting Services, Inc.

Finalist — Peter Alspach, Associate, Arup

Facility Manager / Building Operations

Open to a team or an individual who operates and manages the facilities of a building including facility directors, managers and building operators.

Winner — Unico Properties Energy Management Team: Clarence Clipper, Brett Philips and  Mike Bedsworth, Unico Properties

Finalists — Mike Anderson, Buildings & Grounds Manager, Bellingham School District; Earl Wayman, Senior Property Manager, GVA Kidder Matthews

Service Provider

Those individuals who provide services to the efficient operations of commercial buildings including mechanical contractors, control companies, equipment manufacturers and commissioning agents.

Winner — Danny Miller, Managing Principal, Performance Mechanical Group

Advocate

Those who advocate for and support the design and operation of high performance buildings including consultants, government, non-profit, educators, and others.

Winner — A-P Hurd, Vice President, Touchstone Corporation

Multi-Disciplinary Team

A team of professionals for integrated design on a specific high performance building project or projects that includes three or more of the following professionals: an owner/developer representative, architect, engineer (mechanical, electrical, structural), consultants, and building contractor (if involved during design).

Winner — NetRiver Phase II Expansion Team: Paul Harris & Adam Vierra, NetRiver; Dave Mackenzie, Design Real Estate; Neil Bavins & Al Thompson, Puget Sound Refrigeration; Randy Valerio, D. Hittle & Associates; Todd Brunner, Brunner Construction.