Two MHC Buildings Garner
LEED Award for Green Design
Photo by Jim Gipe ~ Blanchard atrium
The Mount Holyoke College Science Center, a new facility that reflects
the latest and best thinking in teaching and research, and Blanchard
Campus Center, an expanded and renovated building that blends the
historic with the contemporary, have both been recognized by the
United States Green Building Council for their environmentally responsible
designs.
Both Blanchard and the Science Center have been awarded certification
under the USGBC’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design
(LEED) Green Building Rating System, which was established in 1999
to accelerate the development and implementation of green building
practices. The USGBC is the nation’s foremost coalition of
leaders from across the building industry working to promote buildings
that are environmentally responsible, profitable, and healthy places
in which to live and work.
“The LEED program was a natural fit for the College, given
our longstanding commitment to environmental stewardship and the
aspirations we articulated in The Plan for Mount Holyoke 2010,”
said President Joanne V. Creighton, referring to the College’s
seven-year planning document. “We could not have earned this
important recognition without the sustained focus and hard work
of facilities management as well as many others around campus. I’m
truly proud of what we accomplished, and I hope other institutions
will follow our lead in incorporating environmentally sound practices
for the common good.”
The Science Center, completed in the fall of 2003 at a cost of $34.5
million, is one of the nation’s first LEED-certified science
centers. In fact, the Science Center and Blanchard, a turn-of-the-century
building that reopened in September 2003 after an $18.7-million,
15-month reconstruction and renovation project, were among the first
nine projects registered for LEED certification; today, there are
126 certified building projects worldwide, with another 1,453 registered
with the USGBC.
“We are on the cutting edge,” said John Bryant, the
College’s director of facilities management. Bryant noted
that the Science Center’s certification is particularly impressive
because it is difficult for a building of that size, physical complexity,
and intensive energy requirements to meet the LEED specifications.
“If you get LEED certification for a building like that, that’s
quite an accomplishment,” he said. “Every effort was
made to create a Science Center that has as little impact on the
environment as possible. We at the College are committed to being
good stewards of the environment.”
Photo by Jim Gipe ~ Kendade atrium
Bryant congratulated Cutler Associates, the general contractor for
the Science Center, and Shawmut Design and Construction, the general
contractor for Blanchard, for rising to meet the many challenges
both projects presented.
The LEED rating system allocates points in a range of categories
including water and energy conservation, recycled building material
content, and use of local materials. The system was developed primarily
to standardize criteria for green building and land use and to encourage
and showcase environmentally sound practices. As Bryant explained,
“Five years ago, if you went to a ‘green’ conference,
people could be talking about any number of things—water use,
solar power, land use, recycling. There was only a general understanding
that environmentally sound building practices were involved.”
Proof of compliance with LEED standards is extremely rigorous.
For example, Bryant explained that to earn points for environmentally
responsible disposal of demolition materials, the construction supervisor
“had to sort those materials by kind and document every Dumpsterful.”
Another LEED guideline required that a portion of the building materials
be manufactured within a 50-mile radius of the site to minimize
the environmental impact of truck exhaust fumes. Structural steel
for the Science Center project contained 90 percent recycled content.
Architect Andy Domian of Einhorn Yaffee Prescott, an architecture
and engineering firm based in Albany, New York, was instrumental
in the Science Center project, the firm’s first LEED certification.
He commended the MHC staff for their great interest in and help
in the project. “The College should be proud to have two certified
buildings,” he said. “It shows a real commitment to
the ideals of sustainable design and improving not only the environment
for the College’s population as well as the world environment
as a whole.”
“Mount Holyoke College’s interest in pursuing LEED
certification for the Blanchard Campus Center project set the tone
for the design of the campus center, and presented a design challenge
that MDS was eager to embrace,” said architect Will Spears
of Miller Dyer Spears Inc. of Boston. “LEED certification
for a building renovation and addition such as this was an unusual
situation because, at the time the building was designed, the LEED
certification process was still relatively new and untested for
existing buildings.” The added value that sustainable design
measures incorporated in the design “will manifest itself
in appreciation by the students and employees of Mount Holyoke College
for the College’s responsible stewardship of its campus, and
for a healthier environment,” Spears said.
The Science Center, completed in the fall of 2003, was designed
to foster greater interaction between departments, encouraging new
opportunities for collaborative research, pedagogical innovation,
and curricular planning. The new science facility offers adjacent
labs and offices and shared equipment for students and faculty with
overlapping research interests and common spaces for students and
faculty. The center, which contains 116,000 square feet of newly
constructed and renovated science and laboratory space, includes
a new hub, Kendade Hall, that connects three existing science buildings.
A $10-million donation in support of Kendade’s construction,
the largest single gift in the College’s history, was made
with the stipulation that Kendade be a green building. The Science
Center brings together the departments of astronomy, biological
sciences, chemistry, computer science, earth and environment, mathematics
and statistics, and physics, and MHC’s programs in biochemistry
and in neuroscience and behavior.
Blanchard, opened in 1900 as the College’s gymnasium and
converted to a student center a half-century later, was gutted and
expanded. The building has a three-story atrium lit by a 60-foot
skylight, a new, 6,000-square-foot north wing that houses the Campus
Store, and a 9,000-square-foot Great Room, a combination dining
and performance space with a curved glass wall looking out over
Lower Lake.
