Sustainable Design Consulting
SDC celebrates 20 years in business!
As we approached this important milestone, we posted a weekly highlight from each year of our history, to help shine a light on where we’ve been – with an eye toward where we’re headed next. SDC is honored to have served the professional building community with consulting excellence for 20 years! Learn more about our year-by-year progress here:
As SDC settled into being a newly formed sustainability consulting firm, greening k-12 schools became an emerging industry focus. Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) in Maryland led the way by launching its own Green Schools Focus program! Over two full days in July 2003, MCPS held its first eco-charrette to establish its priorities, emphasizing development …
For a brief period in the firm’s history, SDC was based in Annapolis – Maryland’s capital city – and became active with the then Maryland Green Building Network, an indirect predecessor of USGBC Maryland. During this year, SDC began advisory work on what would become its first LEED Platinum project: Highland Beach Town Hall. Highland …
As the #greenbuilding industry kept moving forward, so did SDC – within a matter of months, the super-small business set up a DC-area regional office, while relocating its main office to Richmond, Virginia! During this year of significant transition, SDC boasted three employees, other part-time staff, and an intern in each location. Functioning very much …
Eastern Village Cohousing in Silver Spring, Maryland was SDC’s first start-to-finish consulting project. Designed by EDG Architects and developed by Eco-Housing Corporation with Poretsky Builders, this adaptive reuse of an existing, U-shaped, concrete-framed office building challenged the status quo for multi-unit residential construction on several sustainability fronts. The developers involved future residents in the design …
Having placed a strong foothold in Central Virginia, SDC began making its presence known as a Richmond-headquartered hub of regional #greenbuilding expertise. The James River Green Building Council, a direct predecessor of USGBC Virginia, recognized SDC’s impact by awarding the firm its Green Building Leadership Award, Private Sector Category! SDC was recognized for its “many …
SDC’s first higher educational project was the Universities at Shady Grove (USG) Clifford and Camille Kendall Academic Center in Rockville, Maryland, designed by CannonDesign. SDC’s LEED consulting services, delivered initially with Scurfield Architects, brought this exciting project to its LEED Gold-level certification finish line! Known as ‘the Center’, the 195,000 sf multi-purpose building now accommodates …
SDC deepened its expertise in green building certifications and LEED specifically, delivering both the first and second LEED Platinum-level certified projects to Virginia! First came the VCU Walter L. Rice Educational Center – the flagship building at the Rice Rivers Center in Charles City County, VCU’s field station for environmental research, teaching, and public service. …
YEAR 8, 2009-2010: For the first time, USGBC National Capital Region (NCR) Chapter recognized SDC as Firm of the Year! In the 2010 Awards for Excellence featured at its annual Midsummer Night’s Green event, NCR Chapter honored SDC as Designer/Consulting Firm of the Year “for their work in developing USGBC and AIA education, and for …
SDC introduced its first-generation daylight modeling services, an example of which is pictured here. Using a combination of Autodesk Ecotect and LBNL Radiance, SDC performed a false color daylight analysis to understand the potential of discomfort glare in the atrium of the University of Maryland Eastern Shore New Engineering, Aviation, Computer Sciences and Mathematical Sciences ....
As the U.S. real estate market struggled to recover from the impacts of its most recent recession, SDC leveraged renewed interest in existing building performance to deliver two Platinum-level LEED for Existing Buildings Operations and Maintenance (O+M) project certifications. First came the Blair Towns in Silver Spring, Maryland, developed by the Tower Companies. SDC had …
SDC kicked off its eleventh year with commemorations of the first ten, announcing – in lieu of a grand celebration – donations made to three high-quality environmental groups: Rainforest Alliance, Trust for Public Land, and Chesapeake Bay Foundation, the latter of which received their donation in person. Reflections on ten years in business also brought …
During SDC’s twelfth year delivering highest-quality LEED project submissions, GBCI, USGBC’s certification arm, recognized the firm as a LEED Proven Provider for the Building Design and Construction rating system family! This designation had recently been developed to streamline the LEED project review process for experienced organizations that demonstrate consistent excellence in administering LEED projects. LEED …
SDC saw its first international project achieve green building certification – LEED Gold-level, no less! Edificio Celebra was the new flagship office building at the Zonamerica Business and Technology Park in Montevideo, Uruguay. This existing campus included 25 buildings of different uses, such as offices, laboratories, light industrial and logistical activities, and support services for …
SDC had already been walking its sustainability talk across its various company-wide operations since the beginning – yet it took until Year 14 to finally start writing it down! During its 2015 Company Annual Retreat, the SDC Team broke out into focus groups to address three key topic areas: Workplace Operations and Indoor Environment Business …
Social and environmental equity had always been core principles of SDC's progressive leadership – in Year 15, with an ever-increasing level of solidity in its internal operations, the firm began to formalize this approach. A few years prior, the International Living Future Institute had launched Just as a social justice transparency platform to recognize socially ...
SDC kicked off its sixteenth year with a celebration of the first fifteen! To commemorate the occasion, SDC released its first ever team anniversary video, filled with its thanks to YOU – the firm’s clients, project teams, service providers, fellow green building advocates and more – for your part in SDC’s exciting 15-year history. Already …
According to Enterprise Community Partners, “In 2004, Enterprise created the Green Communities Criteria (the Criteria) to promote the incorporation of environmentally conscious design elements and the adoption of sustainable practices into the development and rehabilitation of affordable housing. The Criteria are organized into eight criteria categories and measures different aspects of sustainable design based on …
With a well-established track record in the higher education sector, SDC brought forth one of its most significant project accomplishments to date: LEED Platinum-level certification of four buildings on a shared master site at Washington University in St. Louis! Known as the University’s East End or Danforth Campus, this multi-faceted project featured four buildings: Henry A. and Elvira H. Jubel Hall, Anabeth and John Weil Hall, Craig and Nancy ...
SDC manifested its next-generation existing building services by partnering with ENERGY STAR as a Commercial & Industrial Service & Product Provider! As such, the firm provides services that directly aid in improving the energy efficiency of its customer's buildings, plants, or operations. SDC first exemplified this in 2021 by successfully managing both the ENERGY STAR and LEED O+M Gold-level certifications for 1875 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW.
Most recently, SDC deepened its engagement with the International Living Future Institute and its above-and-beyond programs. Attaining its third Just label, the firm demonstrated its continued commitment to and current performance in the social justice sphere. A few months later, SDC brought its first Living Building Challenge (LBC) Petal project to certification! The Fort at Williams College, which had also been LEED Gold-level certified ...
