Syracuse Center of Excellence awarded U.S. Green Building Council’s 2010 Leadership Award

Tuesday, November 9, 2010, By News Staff

Award recognizes outstanding individuals and organizations that signify vision, leadership, commitment to evolution of green building design and construction

The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has named the Syracuse Center of Excellence in Environmental and Energy Systems (SyracuseCoE) the winner of the 2010 Leadership Award in the Non-Governmental Organization Sector.  The Leadership Awards recognize outstanding individuals and organizations that signify vision, leadership and commitment to the evolution of green building design and construction.

“From human performance to building performance, from air quality to building controls, from clean energy to renewable energy, the Syracuse Center of Excellence is working to leverage the best energy and ideas to advance the scientific understanding of the building science of green buildings, and applications to put that science to use,” says Rick Fedrizzi, president, CEO and founding chair of the U.S. Green Building Council. “SyracuseCoE has exhibited extraordinary leadership in creating innovations in environmental and energy technologies and their immediate application. Their work in the area of improved indoor environmental quality has provided an international platform that has raised this critical issue to the forefront.”

“We are greatly honored and deeply humbled to receive the USGBC’s Leadership Award,” says Ed Bogucz, executive director of SyracuseCoE. “Our organization originated in 1998, motivated largely by the pioneering vision of the founders and early leaders of the USGBC. We embraced the USGBC’s vision of transforming the built environment as the cornerstone of an ambitious plan to revitalize our region’s economy though innovation and collaboration. We are now harvesting the first fruits of our efforts, and we thank the USGBC for this recognition. Most of all, we thank the USGBC for its inspirational vision and its continued leadership in transforming the marketplace for sustainable buildings and communities.”

SyracuseCoE engages collaborators at more than 200 firms, organizations and institutions to create innovations that improve health, productivity, security and sustainability in built and urban environments. This unique model actively integrates business, science, policy and practice to conduct targeted research, demonstrate new technologies, accelerate deployment of innovations and educate the workforce and the public. Its newly opened headquarters in Syracuse—designed to achieve a LEED Platinum rating—is a one-of-a-kind test bed for environmental and energy technologies and building innovations.

The SyracuseCoE, along with five other Leadership Award recipients, will be honored at USGBC’s annual Greenbuild conference, which will be held Nov.17-19 in Chicago. This year, the awards are presented in three categories—Leadership in the Private Sector, Leadership in the Public Sector and Leadership in the NGO Sector.