Kirksey Issues Green Lifestyle Challenge to Employees and Community

HOUSTON--Kirksey, leader in sustainable architecture and design, today has issued a challenge to employees and the community to encourage them to live a greener lifestyle. Developed by The Kirksey Center for Sustainable ArchitectureSM, The Kirksey Carbon Copy^™ is a guidebook detailing this challenge and outlining simple measures for companies and individuals to undertake to reduce our collective carbon footprint. For a complimentary copy of the Kirksey Carbon Copy, go to www.kirkseychallenge.com.

The Challenge

Many struggle with the question, what can we do? The Kirksey Carbon Copy guidebook offers 5 simple suggestions for individuals and companies so that if 20 percent of the businesses and individuals in Texas accepted this challenge, it would be the equivalent of taking 9,834,595 cars off the road and winding back the carbon clock by seven years.

Employer Challenge	Impact (offset of cars)
Purchase Renewable Energy	50.10
Shut down your office at night	22.14
Create a program to reduce individual employee vehicle travel by 20 miles per week	6.25
Give each employee 8 CFL’s	3.11
Update to Energy Star Efficient Equipment	1.44
Employer Total	83.04
(Note: based on 100-person firm over 1 year)
Individual Challenge	Impact (offset of cars)
Purchase Renewable Energy	118.35
Turn your thermostat up by 2 degrees	26.72
Inflate your tires properly	4.57
Drive 10 fewer miles per weekend	4.33
Shop at your local farmers market	1.43
Individual Total	155.40
(Note: based on 100 people over 1 year)

Kirksey Headquarters

Kirksey has undertaken this challenge, as well as retrofitted their headquarters to become the first LEED® EB (Existing Building) certified building in Texas. A video tour of the Kirksey building is available at http://www.kirksey.com/leedmovie.asp. Take this challenge and tell Kirksey you are joining in by going to www.kirkseychallenge.com.

Kirksey is a team-based architecture firm in Houston, Texas serving Commercial, Community, Education, Science and Technology, Government, Healthcare, Hospitality, Industrial, Interior Architecture, Religious, Renovation, Residential and Retail markets.

With more than 4 million square feet of LEED® projects certified or underway, Kirksey has achieved major milestones within the community, including the 1st LEED certified building in Houston (Silver, New Construction), 1st LEED CI in Houston (Silver, Commercial Interiors), the 1st LEED EB in Texas (Existing Building), and the 1st LEED CS (Core and Shell), which is also the 1st Gold certified building, in Houston.