Winnipeg-based energy utility Manitoba Hydro will move into its new 690,000-square-foot 22-story “cold-weather sustainable” headquarters this summer. The design was a focus of the Green Building North conference hosted by the University of Minnesota’s Center for Sustainable Building Research last fall. Experts say many of the building’s features could be used in the Twin Cities, where temperature extremes pose distinct green-design challenges.
Terry Brickman is a senior project manager at the Minneapolis office of Alberta-based PCL Construction, the company serving as general contractor on the Manitoba Hydro building. “We are behind the East and West coasts [in advancing green design] because we haven’t seen the dramatic effects they have with smog, air pollution, water rationing,” Brickman says. Not to say there aren’t plenty of firms already designing and building LEED-certified projects (that’s “leadership in energy and environmental design”) locally, or using ideas like Manitoba Hydro’s. Engineering firm Karges-Faulconbridge in Roseville, for instance, remodeled a former grocery store for its offices five years ago, and built in geothermal heating and cooling.
Manitoba Hydro’s project includes several cold-weather adaptations. “There’s no reason we can’t be doing all of these down here,” says Brickman.
