NASA Sustainability Base is nominated for a Katerva Award, designed to celebrate sustainability “game-changers” around the world

We are delighted to announce that their project, the NASA Sustainability Base has been nominated for a 2011 Katerva Award. The Katerva Awards are an annual set of awards for the very best sustainability initiatives on the planet.

NASA’s new Sustainability Base, which William McDonough + Partners designed with AECOM and Loisos+Ubbelohde and is being built by Swinerton, is at the entrance to Ames Research Center at Moffett Field and is designed to showcase NASA’s culture of innovation. The client charged the WM+P team with delivering a facility that embodies NASA’s spirit, fosters collaboration, and supports health and well-being.

For the NASA Sustainability Base project, William McDonough + Partners led an intensive fast-track effort as design architect. The three-month concept and schematic design phase resulted in an innovative approach to the building structure. The exoskeleton approach offers increased structural performance during seismic events, provides an armature for daylighting and shading strategies, and creates a column-free interior that facilitates workplace flexibility. Other project innovations range from aggressive daylighting and natural ventilation design to in-depth materials screening. The resulting building will be a flexible workplace filled with glare-free daylight, fresh air and abundant connections to the outdoors, serviced by systems that, in time, will use only renewable energy and will maintain water in closed loops.

“We’re honored to have the NASA Sustainability project recognized by Katerva,” said William McDonough of William McDonough + Partners. “This nomination marks the continued effort of our firm to create sustainable projects that are in line with our Cradle to Cradle philosophy of creating structures and buildings that puts eco-effectiveness in practice.”

Katerva is a charity organization registered out of the United Kingdom, which delivers the Katerva Awards—the pinnacle of global sustainability recognition.

The name Katerva (Ca-tair-vah) comes from the Latin word Caterva—meaning “crowd.” Katerva hopes to utilize the global community to find, refine, and broadcast solutions to the world’s greatest problems.

The Katerva Awards winners are analyzed through a rigorous review process involving 300+ individuals, six filtering phases, and 12 stages of focused review. Finalists and winners will be announced in December at Lincoln Center.

Learn more about the Katerva awards and the NASA nomination at this link.