Duke University's Environment Hall Will Aid Sustainability Research
A space that was once a parking lot now houses one of the most energy-efficient, eco-friendly buildings on Duke University's campus. A fitting home to the Nicholas School of the Environment, the five-story, 70,000-sq-ft Environment Hall is designed to be the first programmatic building on the Durham, N.C., campus to achieve LEED-Platinum status. Housing classrooms, laboratories, offices and computer labs, the sustainable building features a green roof, solar hot water and photovoltaic systems, a 25,000-gallon rainwater-harvesting cistern for irrigation, a 12,000-gallon gray-water-harvesting tank, a 4,000-sq-ft green roof and a chilled beam system for air conditioning.
Efforts to reduce the project's local impacts included using signage and operator training to curtail unnecessary truck and equipment idling, a major source of community complaint. Also, concrete wash-off water was treated before being discharged in an effort to protect neighboring water bodies.