A Golden Year for LEED at evolveEA

From its beginnings, evolveEA has provided LEED consulting services to work with design teams to attain the highest levels of LEED certification within project budgets and constraints. Our first project was certified in 2004. By the end of 2016, we had certified our 63^rd project overall including eight projects during 2016 alone. The future appears just as bright; we’re currently consulting on 34 LEED projects across a wide range of project types and LEED rating systems.
 

 

Growth in Numbers and Level of LEED Certification

In 2016, we led project design and construction teams to complete certification on a total of eight projects. Of these, seven achieved LEED Gold certification while the eighth received LEED silver. Since 2004, about half of the projects we’ve consulted on have achieved Gold or Platinum; over 90% have achieved Silver or higher. More importantly, most of our projects have achieved a higher level of certification than was envisioned at the project outset.
 

 

Increasing Diversity of LEED Project Types

Our LEED work is across the rating systems offered by the USGBC. In 2016, we completed three LEED for New Construction projects, two LEED for Core and Shell projects and three LEED for Homes projects. Overall, a little over half of our LEED consulting has been for LEED for New Construction projects; another third has been for LEED for Commercial Interiors projects. The remainder has been for more specialized systems such as Core and Shell, Existing Buildings and LEED for Homes. Our current consulting work continues to expand on these systems; we’re currently working on our first LEED for Healthcare project along with our first LEED for Neighborhood Development project.
 

 

Recent LEED Project Highlights

Highlights of our 2016 LEED certifications included:

• The first private project in West Virginia to achieve LEED Gold certification

• LEED certification for large-scale apartment buildings under both the LEED for New Construction and the LEED for Homes rating systems

• A speculative Core and Shell office building that includes a roof-mounted 34 kW photovoltaic array

 

Regional Impact

Most of the past year’s certifications were for projects located in the Pittsburgh region, where construction and real estate markets have been steadily gaining strength and many new projects aim to achieve a green building certification. We’re proud of our contributions to our hometown’s green building renaissance, and to Pittsburgh’s notoriety as a city at the forefront of the industry.
 

 
With eight total LEED projects certified, 2016 was one of our most productive years ever. 2017 should be even better with more projects achieving certification across even more rating types. We’re also excited about the innovation and integration that LEED V4 brings.