The Coca-Cola corporate building in Mexico has received gold certification under the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED for Existing Buildings (EB) rating system, according to Hines, the international real estate firm that developed the building.
It is the first property in Mexico to attain the gold level and the first existing office building in the country to achieve any level of certification, according to Hines.
Edificio Coca-Cola is a 151,936 sq. ft. Class-A office property in the Polanco submarket of Mexico’s capital city.
Hines developed the property in 1997 as a part of its Del Bosque project, which includes two 30-story condominium towers. Edificio Coca-Cola was designed by Cesar Pelli & Associates, and is managed by Hines.
Its energy-saving features include the use of low-mercury lighting, rescheduling of power loads, replacement of high-efficiency motors for the HVAC system, and rebalancing of electric panels to reduce heating losses.
The building conserves water through waterless urinals and the re-use of rainwater for landscaping irrigation. Chemicals used for pest control and housekeeping are green-label products.
“International tenants and owners like Coca-Cola have experienced the benefits of green building elsewhere and are attempting to expand those benefits to include their global portfolios,” says Hines vice president Palmer Letzerich.
“As a firm, we are enthusiastically pushing forward with our leadership in sustainable building management and LEED certification services across Mexico,” he adds.
Houston-based Hines, which is privately held, participates in the U.S. Green Building Council’s programs, with 202 projects representing more than 107 million sq. ft. in various LEED rating systems. It is also involved with the EnergyStar program.
The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE: KO) is the world's largest beverage company,
Worldwide offices go green
All 203 global offices of Hines have achieved the company’s HinesGO green office designation for sustainable operations and performance. Located in 100 cities in 17 countries, the offices have undertaken measures to reduce environmental impact of their buildings.
The program, created by Hines in 2008, encourages building occupants to identify and implement no-cost and low-cost alternatives to operating in a standard indoor office environment. Scored on a scale of 100, offices are evaluated in seven categories, from remodeling to commuting.
In 2009, the program was offered to Hines’ tenant base representing 120 million sq. ft. of managed office space around the world. Since then, more than 700 tenants, such as Bank of America, Deloitte & Touche, JPMorgan Chase, KPMG, the San Diego Padres, Shell, Verizon and Wells Fargo, representing more than 36.3 million sq. ft., have achieved the designation.
The largest facility to receive the designation is ExxonMobil Corp. with more than 1.3 million sq. ft. in Hines’ Greenspoint Plaza campus near Houston’s Intercontinental Airport.
“Expanding the program to our tenants has been a real value-add,” says Hines president and CEO Jeff Hines. “We were completing buildings at the top of the sustainability spectrum, but had no great way to influence what happens inside tenant spaces.”
Hines is a privately owned real estate firm with controlled assets valued at approximately $23 billion.