LEED Certification / Green Building
In this enlightened age, most human inhabitants of our Earth recognize we have been given the privilege and responsibility to protect and restore the resources and beauty of our world; we are the keepers to pass on to future keepers. The green building movement was created with the common objective to reduce the overall impact of energy consumption on our environment through energy efficient and environmentally friendly construction practices.
As part of the green building movement, many organizations were formed to identify and implement solutions for the process of being environmentally responsible and resource-efficient throughout a building’s life-cycle. One of the most recognized green building certifications systems is LEED. Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) is an internationally-recognized, third-party verification, developed by the U. S. Green Building Council www.usgbc.org.
The LEED process was developed in the early 2000’s and uses an accumulative point system to achieve the certification levels: LEED Certified; Silver Level; Gold Level; Platinum Level. The points accumulate as the project meets strict standards that emphasize strategies from the design to sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, material selection, indoor environmental quality, operations and maintenance optimization and waste reduction.
NEI Electric was the electrical contractor on a recent new medical clinic, the Peter J. King Family Health Center in Saint Paul. From the electrical side, this ‘green clinic’ uses energy efficient cooling, lighting and controls to save energy costs over the lifetime of the building. Value-engineering services provided by NEI were used to keep the project under budget and maintain the LEED Silver Certification.
NEI Electric has LEED Accredited Professionals who are able to design projects according to LEED Standards and who will generate the submittal documents needed for the certification process.
The LEED certification process can sometimes add cost and time to the front end of a project; however, there may be environmental and financial benefits to the building owner as well: lowered operating costs, increased asset value, reducing landfill waste, conserving energy and water, providing healthier & safer work and living environments and qualification for possible rebates or incentives. If the LEED process is not an option for your facility, building owners will still make a ‘green’ impact and show leadership and social responsibility by reducing the energy consumption and usage costs as well as demand costs in your facility.
We are proud to say that NEI Electric has always been actively involved with energy-efficiency and energy-reduction. We have worked with many of our long-term customers on their lighting systems to reduce energy costs by installing energy-efficient fixtures, occupancy sensors, perimeter lighting controls and sweep-off programs. With mechanical equipment, we have installed variable frequency drives (VFD’S) on motors to reduce demand charges as well as other programmable controls to monitor environmental conditions and reduce motor usage or turn the motors off completely when not needed.
We work with our customers to design the correct electrical system for a new facility or to update an existing facility. We understand that the electrical design needs to meet the requirements of the customer for power reliability, energy and cost savings as well as being environmentally responsible.
NEI Electric is a full service electrical contractor with experience you can trust and a staff with many years of experience in electrical design. We are positioned to compete on projects that are plan & specification as well as design/build, design/assist, BIM and those seeking LEED certification. We will assure compliance with the National Electrical Code, local building codes and OSHA regulations.
We welcome your inquiries and we look forward to working with you on your electrical projects. Connect with the Best…Connect with NEI Electric.