Poudre School District in Fort Collins, Colo., embarked on a mission: to work with designers in creating a high-performance school that not only set new standards in education facility design, but also stayed within the restraints of a typical school budget. To achieve this goal, the district chose to pursue Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification for its new Fossil Ridge High School. The result: A state-of-the-art, 290,000-square-foot building with capacity for 1,800 students—all of whom will learn in an environmentally responsible, healthy building that’s saving the school district money.

Its “Sustainable Design Guidelines” drove Poudre School District’s sustainable building program. The guidelines include the selection of products that consume less energy, enhance indoor environmental quality, increase recycled content and recyclability, and conserve materials and natural resources. As a result, the project team gave priority to products with high recycled content and nearly 75 percent of the construction waste was diverted from landfills through recycling.

“Eight years ago, while investigating sustainable products for the next generation of schools, one of the first products decided upon was one we had used for over 25 years,” said William Franzen, executive director of operation services, Poudre School District. “Tandus’ C&A Antron carpeting has been used exclusively in Poudre School District for its durability, appearance and the sustainable production qualities of the product.”

For Poudre School District, C&A’s product represents a best practices decision, both from a life-cycle cost and from an environmental perspective. With its Antron yarn and VCTT (vinyl cushion tufted textile) technology, C&A’s product was a key component in Poudre’s sustainability building criteria and is now the specified floorcovering in Poudre School District’s four high-performance schools, which represent approximately 620,000 square feet of floor space.

While Poudre School District is the home of additional high-performance schools (including two elementary schools and one middle school), the district wanted LEED certification for Fossil Ridge High School because of the added benefits of third-party validation. As is true in all school districts, Poudre has to make decisions based on a tight budget. LEED was able to deliver a higher-quality building for no added cost, and Fossil Ridge’s cost compares favorably with other school building projects in the region — not to mention the significant savings from reduced water and energy use.

Once completed, Fossil Ridge High School became the first LEED Silver certified high school in Colorado and only the second LEED-certified high school in the nation. Additionally, in 2006, Fossil Ridge High School, along with its architecture firm, RB&B Architects, Inc., received the James D. MacConnell Award for excellence in school building design. The James D. MacConnell Award was created by CEFPI (Council of Educational Facility Planners, International) and recognizes educational facility planning superiority.

“Winning the James D. MacConnell Award was especially rewarding for us,” said George Brelig, president of RB&B Architects and principal in charge and lead design for the Fossil Ridge project. “Fossil Ridge High School involved Poudre School District personnel from every discipline, as well as students, parents, and a very broad representation from the community and the City of Ft. Collins. The inclusion of these stakeholders was key in creating this high-performance school,” added Brelig.

Research has shown that natural lighting can improve students’ reading and math scores, so the project team focused on daylighting strategies such as placing windows on multiple sides of classrooms, roof monitors and Solatubes to bring light into interior spaces. Superior indoor air quality is also a primary concern for schools, so the building features operable windows to let in fresh air, carbon dioxide sensors and paints and furnishings with low volatile organic compounds (VOCs). In addition, the use of C&A’s Powerbond RS with a built-in tackifier, eliminates wet adhesives which can contribute to poor indoor air quality.

The design solution for Fossil Ridge High incorporated many sustainable strategies not the least of which was controlled natural day lighting throughout the school. “By introducing natural light in the classroom we were able to reduce the need for electric light, said Brelig. “This, in-turn, reduced the internal heat gain from the electric light and lowered the cooling demand. Simply put, natural daylighting has a profound effect on the performance, health and well being of the learners.”

Fossil Ridge is 60 percent more energy efficient than comparable buildings because of innovative measures that include lighting occupancy sensors, connecting HVAC coils to occupancy and heat wheels for heat recovery. Water conservation is a key concern across Colorado, so Fossil Ridge uses a water pond for irrigation and installed low-flow faucets and toilets.

Poudre’s success is a result of the collaboration of architects, engineers, teachers, maintenance staff and others from the very beginning. Through this partnership, Fossil Ridge High School has become a living resource that teaches the next generation the significance of environmental stewardship and how it can be achieved.


>> Provided By Tandus

For more than 35 years, Tandus has committed itself to the environment. In 2006, the company announced that it reached the 100,000,000-pound milestone of recycling reclaimed vinyl and vinyl-backed carpet, since introducing the Infinity Initiative 10 years ago. FLOORE, the buy-back program that offers financial incentives to recycle old vinyl-backed carpet (produced by any manufacturer), saves post-consumer product from landfill and turns it into the Tandus ER3 backing. For more information, visit www.tandus.com .