New Stanford Environmental-Science Building Uses Its Own Standards, Not LEED’s

A cutaway image of Stanford’s new Jerry Yang and Akiko Yamazaki Environment and Energy Building (Courtesy of Boora Architects)

The first building in a new Stanford University science and engineering quadrangle will open Tuesday, complete with a long list of features intended to minimize energy use and maximize interaction among scholars. The 166,000-square-foot structure, which will house environmental-science researchers, was designed to the university’s own Stanford Performance Criteria for High Performance Buildings. It is being referred to as “LEED platinum-equivalent.”

As