This is a potato chip story
Thinking beyond LEED®
We owe a debt of gratitude to the U.S. Green Building Council and the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers for codifying the measures by which energy efficient building design can be objectively distinguished.
However—and we don’t think we’re straying from the spirit of the USGBC mission by saying so—LEED® is just a starting point. Every building presents a distinct set of circumstances and opportunities and, accordingly, distinct objectives. By identifying, assessing, and implementing strategies for their unique optimization, a LEED® rating is not a goal but an outcome along the path to larger solutions. Like any building, the Kettle Foods Manufacturing Plant occupies a given set of bio-climatic circumstance. Unlike most buildings, however, it produces potato chips, and that is its dominatingly distinct set of circumstances, opportunities, and objectives. Having implemented the potato chip processing unit’s automation system, AEI identified process wash water as an opportunity, subsequently designing a collection, filtration, and recycling system that has now been adopted by Kettle facilities around the world. Should the USGBC wish to develop a LEED-PP rating system (potato processing), we would be glad to help.
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