The Väla Gård office building in Helsingborg

The Väla Gård office building in Helsingborg, southern Sweden, is Skanska’s greenest office building to date. The building achieved LEED Platinum and became Sweden’s first Deep Green building by achieving net zero energy, and by being constructed with zero hazardous materials and with zero waste sent to landfill.

The Väla Gård office building in Helsingborg, southern Sweden, is Skanska’s greenest office building to date. The building achieved LEED Platinum and became Sweden’s first Deep Green building by achieving net zero energy, and by being constructed with zero hazardous materials and with zero waste sent to landfill. The Väla Gård office was constructed on the site of an old farm, and is located 5 km northeast of Helsingborg. Phase 1 of Väla Gård involved the construction of a 1,777 m2 office building, which was built between October 2011 and October 2012. The building has around 70 workstations and is Skanska’s regional office in Helsingborg. Various Skanska divisions relocated to the office, which almost halved Skanska’s regional office space costs. Phase 1 of Väla Gård was a new construction, but the site includes several existing farm buildings that may be incorporated in subsequent phases of the project. The site has beech and oak forests, park-style outdoor areas, and is adjacent to a nature reserve. Väla Gård is the Skanska Group’s greenest office project to date and is the first to achieve the Deep Green level according to Skanska’s Color Palette™. A Deep Green project must achieve three of the following six objectives: net zero primary energy, zero waste, zero unsustainable materials, zero hazardous materials, near zero embodied carbon and net zero water. Väla Gård achieved zero energy, zero waste and zero hazardous materials. The project also achieved LEED Platinum, and the highest LEED score in Europe and the third highest in the world to date 1. LEED is a voluntary U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) certification process intended to encourage and guide the construction of more sustainable and energy efficient buildings. The Väla Gård project received financial support from LÅGAN – Sweden’s program for buildings with very low energy use. The US$ 75,000 award is to support a thorough evaluation of the energy system and indoor environment for the first few years of operation. In May 2013, Väla Gård won the Solar Plant of the Year 2012 award from the Swedish Solar Energy Association (Svensk Solenergi) for its solar electricity system. The jury concluded that the building is an excellent example of how to combine building energy efficiency with an integrated solar electricity system.