Sustainable Design
Astorino is an industry leader in sustainable design and a pioneer in the LEED® (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification process. Sustainable design is an overarching goal of our organization. Our integrated design approach allows us to provide high quality, high performance buildings for our clients.

Sustainable design is about achieving both environmental sensitivity and bottom-line sensibility. This means that building an environmentally friendly facility is not just good for the environment—it’s also good for business. Whether designing a new hospital, school, home, office building, church, or country club, sustainable design is simply “good design.” The end result is a building that can conserve natural resources, reduce operating costs, improve occupant health and comfort, all while maintaining design excellence.

Our approach to sustainable design emphasizes the application of strategies for site development (i.e. site selection issues, erosion and sediment control); water usage (i.e. low flow fixtures, drought tolerant plants); energy efficiency (i.e. building envelope design; energy system design); and materials and resources (i.e. recycled materials, low-emitting materials). We also believe that “building green” need not translate into “building expensive.” When sustainable design principles are integrated into the design process at the earliest stages, both design and construction expenses are comparable to those of a conventional project. What follows are substantial and almost immediate operational cost savings.

Achievements

• 8.3 million s.f. of sustainable design projects completed or in progress in the commerical office, healthcare/research, retail, transportation, higher education, sports/entertainment and cultural market sectors.
• 18 completed LEED® certified projects, totaling 4.45 Million s.f.
• 21 projects registered for LEED® certification
• First LEED® Platinum building in Western Pennsylvania cerified under LEED-CS Version 2.0 (2010)
• First LEED® Silver building under LEED-NC Version 2.0 (2000)
• 18 LEED® Accredited Professionals, 2 LEED® Green Associates and 1 Estidama Pearl Qualified Professional spanning architecture, engineering, interior design, and landscape design