Wells Fargo to Expand LEED Pre-certification Beyond New Construction
After being invited in 2007 to participate in the U.S. Green Building Council’s pre-certification program for new construction, Wells Fargo spent nearly two years re-tooling the design and construction parameters for its retail banking stores to meet LEED requirements.
By mid-2008, Wells Fargo had been awarded pre-certified LEED-Silver designation by the USGBC based on the company’s adoption of ecofriendly design parameters. Those called for a 20% reduction in energy use and 40% reduction in water consumption, long considered pivotal benchmarks for green buildings.
The bank joins more than 40 corporate members of the USGBC’s streamlined certification pilot program for smaller, new buildings based on expedited volume pre-certification for LEED Silver.
“Participating corporations in the pilot program account for 1,745 buildings totaling more than 135 million sq ft (as of summer 2009), a number likely to continue increasing,” says Deb Kleinman, executive director of USGBC’s Colorado Chapter. “It was because of organizations like Wells Fargo, which are committed to ensuring that their facilities are sustainable and which hold enormous portfolios of various types of commercial real estate, that this program came about.
“The pre-certification program is intended to streamline LEED-certification processes in order to help businesses ensure that their buildings are performing at peak efficiency and providing maximum benefits to occupants and the environment,” Kleinman adds.
“We first heard of the USGBC program through Chong Partners Architecture, San Francisco, with whom we were working regarding ways to green our new stores,” says Sheri Elbert, head of LEED standardization for Wells Fargo. “When Chong mentioned the USGBC program, we made inquiries to USGBC and were subsequently invited to join.
“I describe the driving force behind the LEED effort at Wells Fargo as a triple bottom-line: people, planet and profit. It’s a means of setting Wells Fargo apart from more conventional businesses,” she says.
Elbert says that LEED also is a way for Wells Fargo to keep ahead of mandates such as the California Green Building Code, set to become mandatory on Jan. 1. “Because none of the local standards will ever get ahead of LEED, we will always be on the leading edge,” she adds.
Wells Fargo’s first retail-bank stores completed under the pre-certification program are in Colorado Springs; Manhattan Beach, Calif., and Waco, Texas.
In Colorado, two additional stores, one in Denver and another in Boulder, are currently in design, while others are expected to follow across the state.
Two former Wachovia locations in Colorado Springs were recently re-branded Wells Fargo and retrofitted under the LEED for Existing Buildings Operations and Maintenance program.
“The pathway to achieving certification, even under volume, is quite rigorous,” Elbert says. “We needed to design internal and external design-quality assurance and education programs. Everyone who touches the project has to be educated on LEED and knowledgeable about the ways in which Wells Fargo satisfies LEED requirements.”
Compliance is accomplished by means of internal protocols involving the use of staff managers, internal and external LEED training and exhaustive documentation. Project managers are trained through USGBC workshops, while internal LEED advocates ensure compliance with all procedures, starting with project design and continuing through delivery.
All contractors and subs up through the general contractor are issued copies of Wells Fargo’s 60-page LEED-training manual and accompanying addendum, a detailed compilation of compliance procedures. Aspects of compliance covered include site erosion, sedimentation control and construction-waste management (a minimum of 50% to 75% of construction waste is recycled).
Virtually all materials, including insulation, roofing, paint, sealants and adhesives, are monitored for compliance with LEED protocols. Every aspect is documented and all documents archived for subsequent inspection.
Key benchmarks for pre-certified LEEDs require that 20% of materials contain recycled content and greater than 50% of wood components be certified by the Forest Stewardship Council. Also required are low-flow water fixtures, light-and-heat reflective roofing, light-harvesting systems that respond to sunlight fluctuations, mechanical-and-electrical installations that automatically adjust to the level of occupancy and low-VOC finishes.
Use of “cradle-to-cradle” materials (the adoption of reutilization practices, materials and products that maximize health, safety and effectiveness) is crucial. Good examples are carpeting that contains 38% recycled material, countertops with 75% recycled glass and concrete and porcelain floor tiles made up of 40% recycled ceramics.
Wells Fargo deploys its own commissioning authority to review construction documents; make revision requests; review submittals; and perform mechanical, electrical and plumbing system tests. “Third-party commissioning would make this effort prohibitively expensive; roughly $15,000 per building,” Elbert says. “But our value-engineering efforts and in-house commissioning help us maintain cost neutrality.”
Once the first three retail banks have been approved for LEED pre-certification by onsite inspections, design documents and procedures for subsequent retail stores will be vetted in-house and archived internally for review by USBGC inspectors.
Recently, Wells Fargo has shifted its focus to the LEED program for existing buildings. “LEED standards for new construction in areas such as roofing and mechanical systems are applicable to our huge portfolio of existing buildings,” Elbert says. “This will make a far greater impact on the environment than pre-certification for new buildings, not only because of our huge inventory, but because it touches on all systems within those buildings.”
Ecofriendly efforts by Wells Fargo have included the installation of energy-saving cooling systems in data centers and top-performance Energy Star ratings for a number of its administrative buildings, including its San Francisco headquarters.
