By Allison Maynard, Communications Associate


Congratulations to The Green Engineer, who performed essential services for their submission for the Green Building of the Year of 2015: the Summer Star Wildlife Sanctuary in Boylston MA.

The Green Engineer, Inc. is a sustainable design consulting firm, led by Chris Schaffner, P.E., LEED Fellow, a nationally recognized expert in cost-effective, high-performance design. They work with architects, builders, commercial owners, nonprofits and the government sector to provide consulting services which include LEED Certification Project Management, Life Cycle Analysis, and Energy & Daylight Performance Analysis and Modeling.


The Summer Star Wildlife Sanctuary was The Green Engineer's 91st ‪LEED‬ project and boasts a 52% energy savings. Summer Star's Trail Head House houses an Art Gallery, Studio Space, an A/V Cave, and the grand-scale glazed Sanctuary Room for story-telling and small performances. Inspired by old pioneers like Malcolm Wells, and new initiatives like the Living Building Challenge, Summer Star’s values manifest themselves in the building’s photovoltaic arrays, thermal shutters, composting toilets, rain-water pool, and elsewhere. Landscape elements include permeable parking, defined pedestrian and vehicular circulation systems, meadow planting within an existing clearing, new woodland gardens and reforestation plantings. Partially within the 100 foot setback of a river flowing to the reservoir, a number of bioretention features are located to infiltrate stormwater runoff.


Thank you to The Green Engineer for being a great firm with a mission so well-aligned with ours, and thank you for being a sponsor. Thank you also to Shalin Liu, the Summer Star benefactor, for your vision and positive energy to make this project really shine!

 



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