In prepared remarks, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the expansion at the Navy Yard furthers both the city's Five Borough Economic Opportunity Plan, which he announced earlier this month, and PlaNYC, a program to green the city that began in April 2007. "Part of our Five Borough Economic Opportunity Plan is to invest in the creation of green jobs," Bloomberg said. "Of the 1,700 new permanent jobs we're creating at the Navy Yard, 40% will be in green manufacturing. The sustainable developments at the Navy Yard show that PlaNYC's goals of green buildings and renewable energy make sense economically as well as environmentally."
The three-story, 89,000-square-foot Perry Building will feature both rooftop solar panels and wind turbines. It also includes reflective roofing and pavement to reduce surface temperatures, the use of recycled rain water in toilets, recycled building materials, high-efficiency lighting fixtures, natural ventilation systems and special accommodation for bicyclists and low-emission vehicles.
With a goal of achieving LEED Gold certification, the Perry Avenue property will be 100%-leased to fine arts services firm SurroundArt, which will use the space to create a museum resource center serving the art industry and institutions in New York City and elsewhere. SurroundArt already occupies 71,000 square feet at the Navy Yard.
A two-story, 60,000-square-foot manufacturing and R&D facility for eco-friendly products will be converted by Duggal Visual Solutions from a one-story, 30,000-square-foot building. Construction on the Duggal Greenhouse, which is shooting for LEED Platinum, is scheduled to begin later this spring. The $7-million project will be funded in part by Duggal, with $2 million coming from the city for basic building improvements, including a new roof and sprinkler system.
At Thursday's Navy Yard event, Bloomberg unveiled one of the 90 Duggal wind and solar-powered streetlights that the BNYDC will be installing. They're said to cost about 35% less to install than conventional lights and will save the BNYDC about $600,000 dollars in energy costs the first year and $11,000 per year thereafter.
In addition to infrastructure work related to the Perry Avenue Building and Duggal Greenhouse, the city is also financing site work and/or basic building improvements on three other sustainable building projects at the Navy Yard. Largest of these is the 600,000-square-foot B&H Photo-Video distribution center--a $75-million, LEED Silver project set to break ground in midyear. Steiner Studios is renovating a 250,000-square-foot building that dates from World War II; it's intended to provide space for entertainment and media companies. Agger Fish, a current Navy Yard tenant, will expand into a 30,000-square-foot warehouse building.
The Steiner and Agger projects are part of an initiative to create $200 million in adaptive reuse projects at the yard. According to a release, other green efforts under way there include: undertaking a major water/sewer project to upgrade the infrastructure and improve water conservation; rebuilding the road system with improved stormwater management systems; purchasing hybrid and low-emission vehicles for the yard's fleet; installing solar-powered, compacting trash cans; purchasing eco-friendly paint and cleaning products; installing bicycle racks and lanes; and providing setbacks along the perimeter of the yard to enable the first phase of the Brooklyn Waterfront Greenway for bicyclists and pedestrians.
Earlier this week, Bloomberg was on hand for another high-profile green project announcement: the retrofitting program at the Empire State Building. Along with cutting energy costs by a projected 38%, the retrofit is intended to provide a reproducible model for existing buildings worldwide.
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Paul Bubny
Paul Bubny is managing editor of Real Estate Forum and GlobeSt.com. He has been reporting on business since 1988 and on commercial real estate since 2007. He is based at ALM Real Estate Media Group's offices in New York City.
