When aiming for LEED certification with commercial building projects, ensuring good indoor air quality for building occupants is always a high priority. It’s important to employ an effective ventilation strategy and use mold- and moisture-resistant building products with low volatile organic compound content. Though this lays a strong foundation for good IAQ, VOCs can be emitted into interior air over time by a variety of sources that occupants bring into their office space, such as furniture, carpeting and some cleaners and air fresheners. This was a concern of real estate investment and development firm Gerding Edlen as it prepared to remodel a historic warehouse in the gentrifying Pearl District of Portland, Ore., to LEED Platinum specifications.
Built in 1927, the four-story, 184,000 square-foot concrete warehouse is on the National Register of Historic Places and was owned by Oregon department store chain Meier & Frank for several years before Gerding Edlen bought it in 2006. Remodeling, however, didn’t begin until a tenant was found in 2010.