Construction on the Badlands Community Facility officially began last week with a facility ground-breaking, and it has now been announced the building will strive to reach green certification from an international company.
The sports complex design will be aimed to meet Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Silver certification.
“It’s fabulous for us to have a building at this level in the (LEED) program,” says Mayor Bryce Nimmo.
Nimmo explains that LEED is a world recognized system and was the best choice for environmental requirements.
LEED is a third-party green, non-partisan, non-profit certification system to label buildings which aim to be green.
Traits include improved performance, energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality, and stewardship of resources and sensitivity of their impacts.
It also means the building may be far more economical, as well as environmentally friendly, than another building.
An aspect the Badlands Community Facility will focus on is energy efficiency. with aims like becoming 50 per cent more energy efficient than a standard building through heavy insulation.
Bike racks will be installed to support good health and emission free transit.
The water system will use efficient-technology to reduce typical water use by a third.
Physical materials for construction will have as much recycle content as possible. Wood will be used from sustainable sources. Waste from construction will also be recycled where possible.
LEED is based on a number of credits or measures where they identify and set targets for the main environmental issues.
"We absolutely will follow this trend of building green in the future," said Mayor Nimmo.
"You'll find that every new building built will try to get some sort of level in LEED."
This specific criteria is part of the requirements for the LEED SILVER certification. The process of obtaining the SILVER certification involves the collection of information (evidence of compliance) for submission to the Green Council to achieve as many credits as possible.
There will be a third party verification and commissioning agenda that will ensure the mechanical systems work together as it should.
If requirements are met, the Town will receive a plaque with the LEED Silver designation for the facility.
The highest LEED certifications are platinum, then gold.