Fore Solutions gains global rep as green building consultant
Photo/Mindy Favreau
Gunnar Hubbard, CEO of Fore Solutions, a green building consulting company in Portland
The new Hannaford supermarket in Augusta has gotten national attention for being named the greenest grocery store in the country, but the Portland green building design consultant on the project is already well known internationally in its field. From its Old Port office, Fore Solutions is working on billion-dollar projects around the world, from Las Vegas to Jordan.
Hannaford Bros. Co. of Scarborough tapped Fore Solutions to help manage the project, which earned the U.S. Green Building Council's platinum LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification, the highest available. Fore Solutions counts the Augusta supermarket as just one of a handful of projects around the world it is working on.
On the Hannaford project, Fore Solutions' job was to bring in green building consultants and keep all members of the design team -- from architects to engineers -- on track. Fore Solutions organized a kick-off brainstorming session for the project and brought in outside experts, including a consulting engineer from Germany and a daylighting specialist, to give advice on the project, says Gunnar Hubbard, the company's founder and principal. It also gave recommendations for go-to LEED companies in the industry, including an architecture firm with international experience.
The company helped guide the project to its completion, which included figuring out how to orient the building in the confined site space to maximize natural light and how to raise portions of the roof to let in more light while keeping steel and glass costs manageable. Hubbard even convinced Rick Fedrizzi, president and CEO of the Green Building Council and a friend of his, to come up to Augusta for the supermarket's grand opening last month. The Green Building Council developed the LEED certification system. "It made me feel good to be able to offer that to Hannaford, and I think they appreciated that little personal touch," Hubbard says.
Hubbard founded the company, which now employs seven, on Fore Street in 2003. As "keeper of the environmental mission of the project," as Hubbard puts it, the company helps developers and building owners both nationally and internationally design and construct green buildings, often to meet LEED certifications.
Fore Solutions' other projects include the East End School in Portland, a science complex at Harvard and residential towers in Amman, Jordan. The company's major undertaking has been CityCenter in Las Vegas, a $9.4 billion, 18-million-square-foot hotel, retail and residential development -- the country's largest private real estate project ever. Portions of the development are slated to open later this year with a LEED silver certification.
"We like to get on early to make sure everyone is on the same page, make sure the client is asking the right questions of the designer," Hubbard says. "We help guide them through the process and make good, cost-effective decisions."
The company uses a computer program to do energy modeling to show clients a building's energy performance. By inputting data like the number of lights, hours of occupancy and climate, the program calculates how installing things like better insulation can actually save money by allowing for a smaller HVAC unit. "You're investing a little more, but there's a long-term payback," Hubbard says.
A licensed architect, Hubbard spent four years as a LEED faculty member for the Green Building Council and has taught classes and workshops on the certification program in China, London and Dubai. Hubbard is hoping to incorporate more education into the company's work at home. "We want to balance our for-profit work and getting projects done with having time to do educational classes," he says.
He's also hoping the company can tackle more aggressive projects, like carbon neutral buildings. "We're known a little bit too much as LEED consultants because we're good at it, but we can do better, we can do more," he says. "We want to be seen as the firm that helps designers and contractors become successful and show how integrated design affects change."
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