What is the most impressive or eye-catching ‘green’ feature of your facility?
Our one-megawatt solar array that is located on the roof of the North/South building is a signature feature of our facility. When it was installed in 2009, it was the largest solar rooftop system in the southeast United States. A total of 5,800 solar panels are divided into four 250 kilowatt sub-arrays and cover approximately 150,000 square feet on the roof of the South concourse. We also have four nominal 10-kilowatt “experimental” PV systems at the North/South building that were selected to demonstrate various promising PV technologies, including thin-film laminate, micro-inverter, bi-facial, and PV thermal.
How important do you think your sustainability elements are to groups and planners holding events there?
The degree of importance that show managers place on our center’s sustainability initiatives varies from event to event. Some show managers are extremely conscientious about mitigating any type of negative environmental impacts their event may bring, include sustainability as part of their key strategic goals, and would not even consider holding their event at our center if we were not engaged in sustainability efforts.
Groups and planners have sought sustainability related services in the past, but we are always seeking to improve and are now able to offer a more comprehensive sustainable event package. This is important to attendees and planners from a financial, environmental and social standpoint—the triple bottom line of people, planet, profit. OCCC works closely with event organizers and guests to support and execute green events, procedures, and efforts. As the Sustainability Coordinator, I am on-site, managing all in-house sustainability efforts and assisting with any client needs or requests, including researching local opportunities for carbon offset coordination.
A social example is our Reusable Donations program. OCCC works with each of our clients to ensure that any leftover food and/or products after an event or show are donated to local schools, hospitals or other nonprofit organizations to benefit the surrounding communities of Central Florida. We partner with local businesses through Green Destination Orlando, working together to enhance the destination as a whole. This effort is well received by our clients and our community.PageBreak
How can planners and attendees help in a facility’s ‘green’ efforts?
Coordination and communication are instrumental from a planner’s perspective. Responsibility for the success of a sustainable event falls not only onto a venue, but involves a team effort with vendors, exhibitors, service partners, service contractors—sustainability is an ever-evolving conversation. Attendees help by supporting and participating in the aspects that touch them. For example, we have recycling bins throughout the facility but the attendee is integral in the success of diversion efforts by placing their items in the proper receptacles.
What was the greatest motivating factor behind your sustainability focus?
Our center’s mission is economic development. By hosting meetings, conventions and trade shows the economic impact to our community is substantial. However, we also realize that if not handled properly these events can also have negative environmental consequences for the community, thus the need to mitigate environmental impacts.
Therefore, sustainability has been a focus for the OCCC for many years, and has picked up momentum from our first ISO 14001 certification (of which we were the first convention center in the U.S. to obtain that certification for our Environmental Management System) and the solar project to the initiatives we have today. This is in large part due to OCCC executive-level support, as well as countywide support at the mayoral level with Mayor Teresa Jacobs’ focus and commitment to sustainability throughout Orange County and within county owned facilities.
Anything on the horizon in terms of future green efforts or offerings?
We are on the horizon of having our first LEED certified building on-site. The North/South building is targeting LEED 2009 EBOM certification and we hope to be certified by summer. Once certified, it will be the largest LEED EBOM convention center in the world. We are also exploring and moving toward the new Green Meeting Industry Council-endorsed APEX/ASTM Sustainable Venue standard which is a Standard Specification for Evaluation and Selection of Venues for Environmentally Sustainable Meetings, Events, Trade Shows, and Conferences.