Newly Completed US Pharmacopeia Headquarters Illustrates Owner’s Commitment to Environment

With environmentally friendly details both inside and out, US Pharmacopeia’s (USP) headquarters consolidation project in Rockville, MD, is a model in sustainable design and construction—fulfilling the owner’s strong commitment to the environment and to creating a healthy workspace for its employees.

DPR recently completed the $68 million project for the global, nonprofit organization that promotes the public health by establishing state-of-the-art standards to ensure the quality of medicines, food ingredients, and other healthcare technologies. The project consolidates USP’s headquarters on one site and includes three separate components: a conference center, an office and laboratory building, and an underground parking garage, totaling approximately 320,000 sq. ft.

Although the project is not pursuing LEED certification, both its design and construction incorporate numerous sustainable elements. Perhaps most striking are the green roof atop the conference center building and the courtyard, which not only beautify the project but created tangible benefits and savings for the owner.

“Because of the green roof and courtyard planters, our storm water management system is actually 25 to 30 percent smaller than it would have been without it,” commented Chris Gorthy, DPR estimator. The roof design reduced the amount of concrete needed for the storm water management tank, while also lessening the amount of water runoff that will hit the surrounding storm system during a rain event, and reducing energy consumption because of the lessened mechanical heat and cooling loads required by the space.

The conference center, office and lab building, and an existing building on site surround an internal courtyard space that brings the outside in with its gardenlike setting. Within the building, there are a variety of green features, including:

• low or no-VOC adhesives and paints.
• eco-friendly carpet and furniture.
• large amounts of organic Marmoleum flooring.
• high levels of recyclable materials (lab casework, ceiling tile, metal studs, metal panels, and structural steel).
• energy-efficient appliances and occupancy sensors for the lighting fixtures.

The building’s design maximizes the views and natural daylighting from outside, but window screens in the conference center protect the internal environment from direct sunlight.

The project is within a few hundred yards of a metro rail stop, and within walking distance of several bus line systems. This proximity to mass transit is a huge benefit to the employees of USP, and the environment. In addition, USP felt it important to provide employees with a Fitness Center and shower facilities within the new building to promote health and well-being.

In keeping with the many sustainable elements incorporated in the design, the construction process emphasized DPR’s corporate commitment to green building. Since January, DPR recycled 810 tons, or 83 percent, of all construction debris coming off the job. For the underground parking garage, more than 60,000 cubic yards of soil were reused on other projects rather than going to landfill. To mitigate indoor air quality during construction, return air fans were not turned on until the majority of dust-creating work was completed. Entrance mats were used to minimize the amount of construction debris and dirt brought into the building during construction. One major saving for the owner, resulting from the project team’s focus and experience with green projects, is the exterior curtainwall system, which originally called for nonstandard windows two feet wide. During preconstruction, the team redesigned the system in a way that retained the integrity of the original design but reduced the amount of aluminum needed by 40 percent and the amount of glass by almost 50 percent—subsequently reducing the cost and material waste. “That was a big win for us,” commented Gorthy. “The thought process was to use fewer natural resources, reduce shipping to the job, while at the same time giving the owner exactly what he wanted at a lower cost.”

Along with the sustainable successes, the team faced several challenges during construction of the project, which represents DPR’s largest mid-Atlantic self-performed drywall job to date. An extremely restricted site, surrounded on two sides by overhead power lines and an existing building on a third side, left virtually no staging area and required steel erection via a tower crane. The uniqueness of the design by architect HOK, comprising numerous intersecting complex geometric shapes (truncated cones, angled walls, ellipses, arcs, recesses), also added to the complexity of construction. Despite the challenges, as well as substantial permitting and weather-related delays early on in the more than two-year project, the team worked together to meet the owner’s critical August move-in date, two weeks ahead of schedule.