OHSU Center First to Achieve LEED Platinum

Staff -- Pacific Builder and Engineer, 5/7/2007

Portland— The U.S. Green Building Council has awarded Oregon Health & Science University's Center for Health & Healing LEED platinum certification for energy efficiency and environmental sustainability, the first medical and research facility anywhere to have achieved this distinction.

The center, located in the South Waterfront district, is one of only 30 buildings of all kinds in the country to have been awarded platinum certification and is the largest and most complex building in the country to have achieved it. The building garnered 55 points out of a possible 69 on the USBGC's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) scorecard, three more points than required for platinum.

The 16-story, 400,000-square-foot building is 61-percent more energy-efficient than required by Oregon code. It uses nearly 60-percent less potable water than a similar conventional building does. One-hundred percent of the sewage generated in the building is treated in a membrane bioreactor on-site.

Key team members, in addition to OHSU and the OHSU Medical Group, included Gerding Edlen Development, the development managers; GBD Architects and Interface Engineering, Inc., who were responsible for the design of the building and its mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems; Walker Macy, the landscape designers; Hoffman Construction Co., who built it; and Brightworks, the sustainability advisors who coordinated the green building strategies. Also involved in the project were KPFF Consulting Engineers and Peterson Kohlberg Associates.