Following the best available environmental practices is part of the mission of Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens. The Conservatory has taken a national leadership role in the environmental design of its facilities with the completion of what is likely the most energy efficient greenhouse in the world. evolveEA is working closely with Phipps to extend its visionary efforts by assisting in the greening of existing buildings (including the iconic 1893 glass house) and with the design and construction of the Phipps Center for Sustainable Landscapes. When construction is completed, this will be an unprecedented net zero energy water and waste building and pilot project for the Living Building Challenge rating system.

Phipps Conservatory is an iconic, regional treasure and evolveEA is involved in analyzing building systems and operations and in re-thinking the building processes for the facility, staff and visitors.

Buildings in Operation

For the existing Phipps campus, evolveEA is managing the LEED EBOM (LEED for Existing Building Operations and Maintenance) process to achieve originally established goals such as reducing energy usage by 20% over average, the installation of appropriate measurement and verification submetering, identification of more efficient equipment, re-organizing and re-systematizing Phipps Green Team initiatives, improving organizational sustainable purchasing, and optimizing waste collection streams.

evolveEA has been involved with continually improving energy and water measurement monitoring throughout the Conservatory since 2008, and is helping to formalize its building management systems and best practices. Through assistance with hiring a commissioning agent for ongoing building analysis support and energy audits, the Conservatory has formal practices and a 3rd party perspective on these important issues.

Phipps has also asked evolveEA to help create a survey of other conservatories to create legitimate energy comparisons, enabling benchmarking against other facilities. We have found that this cohort data did not exist and so needed to be compiled for this particular building type.

Sustainable Strategies

Since early 2007, evolveEA assisted with the new Center for Sustainable Landscapes project by collaboratively developing a Project Statement that helped define the project issues, parameters and process. evolveEA then led and assisted the project team selection process, and have been an active part of the project since its inception.

Phipps has now started construction of this 24,500 s.f. Center for Sustainable Landscapes. In its pursuit of becoming the conservatory with the world’s highest green standards, this new building is being designed and built with the goal of receiving a Living Building Challenge certification, a LEED Platinum certification and a four star certification in the new SITES landscape rating system. The design will treat stormwater in a lagoon, treat sewage in a constructed wetland, have a geothermal well field, extensive photovoltaic arrays, and is being designed as a “living” (or zero net energy consuming) building. The entire design and construction team is from Pittsburgh and Pennsylvania. evolveEA is currently managing the LEED and Living Building Challenge certifications for this beyond-LEED-Platinum project.