San Francisco State University
IN-25: Innovation B

San Francisco State University created a Sustainable Development Framework (SDF) to support the achievement of its campus-wide sustainability goals. This framework delineates SF State’s sustainability mandates and expectations for all: planning, design, major renovation and construction projects undertaken by and for SF State. The SDF describes specific performance requirements – from energy and water efficiency and reuse, to renewable energy production, and more – and provides guidance and tools to assist project teams in meeting them. In the past, the campus had not established a green building program and efficiency upgrades were done in a piecemeal fashion. There was no campus wide policy that set goals for building projects and a voluntary California State University-wide policy that was often ignored. In many cases, these performance based design requirements reach beyond current local and state building codes. For project teams to succeed, the Sustainable Development Framework needs to be considered in full before the design process begins. One of the goals of the SDF is to promote, build and support more collaborative design processes and more integrated project teams. The SDF is here to do more than encourage industry standard sustainability best practices. If used properly, the SDF will help each project team understand how its design and performance requirements fit into SF State’s overall strategy to be a more walkable, livable, zero net energy and net zero water campus. This extends beyond building systems level thinking. It connects performance with beauty and, where possible, includes considerations of shared risk, shared reward, and contract delivery methods, specifically the use of performance based design build processes to secure large-scale low energy buildings. With SF State’s ambitious sustainability goals, working at SF State requires real estate and design teams to think beyond current building industry norms and code minimum design. Each project team should take to the time to understand how to meet those goals on budget and on time using creative, cost effective architectural and integrative building systems solutions. Every submitted proposal or qualifications document will include a summary of how SDF requirements will be achieved, including a statement of the submitting organization’s qualifications to meet the stated performance requirements relevant to the project in question, examples of similar project work and the resources the organization will utilize in meeting SDF guidelines. Upon commencing a project, performance requirements – including this SDF – will be incorporated into the project’s Basis of Design and Owner’s Project Requirements, as specified in the applicable LEED rating system. Project teams will report on progress towards meeting the Framework’s performance targets at established project milestones.