Garden Wins Intelligent Use of Water Leadership Award

Rain Bird, the leading manufacturer and provider of irrigation products and services, awarded the Garden the 2009 Intelligent Use of Water™ Leadership Award, for leadership in the management of Earth's most precious natural resource. We received $10,000 from Rain Bird and we were featured in a short film highlighting our unique approach to water conservation at a special event held at the 2009 WaterSmart Innovations Conference and Exposition in Las Vegas.

"Naples Botanical Garden is a prime example of what community organizations, especially our public gardens, can do to combat the mismanagement of water and encourage the creative processes and systems for conserving water," said Dave Johnson, Rain Bird's director of corporate marketing. "Naples Botanical Garden is vibrant proof, not only to residents of Florida, but also to home and business owners nationwide, that responsible and efficient water use can yield healthy and beautiful landscapes."

In an area with a problematic history of pollution and fertilizer runoff in communal waterways, the Garden is committed to the integration of sustainable green building practices into the design of their gardens. Having adopted the water use goals for LEED Gold Certification, we see ourselves as a leader in freshwater conservation and management and incorporate numerous water conserving features into the design of the Garden. Parking lot bio-swales capture rainwater that filters through the ground, carrying water to the giant entry feature bio-swale, the Rain Garden. Our River of Grass serves as a natural filtration system before the water is slowly released to the preserve area. The primary irrigation system for the garden implements soil moisture detectors that direct water as needed through drip emitters. The system has allowed the Garden to reduce water use by 50 percent.

In addition to creating exciting new gardens and expanded natural areas, we are also
incorporating high performance and sustainable green building practices into the design of
our new landscape and facilities. This process started when the Board recognized the
importance of the Garden becoming the model of environmentally responsible building
practices in the region. That led us to select Lake/Flato, the American Institute of Architects
Firm of the Year in 2004 to be the Garden’s architects.

The Texas firm’s architects are best known for the pragmatic beauty and sustainable design
of their buildings. They encouraged us to pursue the most rigorous national standard for
green projects, the LEED® certification process. LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and
Environmental Design Green Building Rating System™. It is the nationally accepted benchmark
for the design, construction, and operation of high performance green buildings and landscapes.

LEED ranks projects in 6 categories and assigns the number of credit points that can be earned
in each category. The categories are: sustainable sites (14 points); water efficiency (5 points);
energy and atmosphere (17 points); materials and resources (13 points); indoor environmental
quality (15 points) and innovation and design process (5 points). There is a total of 69 points available. Projects can apply for LEED Certified (26-32 points), Silver (33-38), Gold (39-51 points) or Platinum (52-69 points). In Southern Florida the climate and limited availability of locally manufactured goods generally limits projects to a maximum of Gold Certified. And, Gold is the level that Naples Botanical Garden is hoping to achieve.

This is not a simple process. Our LEED consultant, Rob Hink of the Spinnaker Group, has put together our LEED plan. It is over fifty pages in length, so here are just a few of the highlights!

• We are planning to put in an 18,000 gallon cistern to collect rainwater from the roofs for irrigation and other nonpotable uses. We are also committed to reducing irrigation by 50%. This will be achieved by efficient practices and plant selection.
• The site plan includes a green parking lot with bioswales, porous paving and extensive use of native plants.
• Over 75% of our construction waste will be recycled. Construction waste has long been one of the largest problems for landfills.
• Our electricity will be purchased from renewable sources, and hopefully, some will be produced on-site.
• Over 20% of our building products, by cost, will be made from recycled materials.
• All of the wood used in the project will be certified that it was plantation grown, not cut from rainforests.
• Indoor spaces are being designed with low volatile emission materials and lots of natural light to create healthy, comfortable environments for staff, volunteers and visitors.
• Waterless urinals!
• Finally, the buildings will have extremely efficient lighting and air conditioning systems.