We do a lot of business in the West Hartford, CT area, but not everything comes down to business. Sometimes, a volunteer opportunity that is just too good to pass up comes along, and that is what we'd like to tell you about this week. Two of our plumbers, along with an office staff member, have been volunteering their time in order to help with the construction of the new Jehovah's Witnesses World Headquarters. Our aforementioned employees jumped at the opportunity to help out with this incredible project. Ground was broken in July of 2013, and in the time since, over 18,000 Witnesses have come to the location in Warwick, NY, to volunteer their time.
Many of the volunteers traveled much farther than our employees had to. In fact, Witnesses from all 50 states made the trip! About 400-500 volunteers were arriving each weekend, with that number reaching over 700 during the peak construction phase. This phase lasted from August to October of 2015. All of that help, ours included, clearly paid off. 2 of the 4 residence buildings are completed, as originally planned, but the project as a whole is a staggering 4 months ahead of schedule. All in all, the headquarters is scheduled for total completion by September 1st of this year.
As exciting an opportunity as this was in general, the fact that this is a LEED Platinum project only adds to the excitement. LEED, or Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design, is a green building certification program. It recognizes the best of the best in building strategies and practice. Building projects must satisfy a number of prerequisites in order to qualify for any of the certification levels, earning points in a number of categories in order to determine which tier the project qualifies as. This headquarters reaches the top category of platinum. You can learn more about the project here, and about the LEED certification program here.
Contact Dynamic Mechanical Heating & Air Conditioning if you want us to put our expertise to work for you.