Nationals Park Gets the Green Light

(Washington, DC) It’s official: Nationals Park is the nation’s greenest ballpark. Today, Mayor Adrian M. Fenty announced that the project received LEED® Silver Certification from the US Green Building Council, making it the first major stadium in the United States to achieve LEED Certification. LEED is a point-based system where projects earn points for satisfying specific green building criteria. This project incorporated enough green design elements to qualify it for a higher level of certification.

“Every resident of the District of Columbia should be proud that we not only have the greatest ballpark in the country, but also the greenest,” said Mayor Fenty. “The District of Columbia is the first in the nation to have a LEED Certified stadium and we have set the bar high for the rest of the country by winning LEED Silver status.”

By saving millions of gallons of water, using efficient field lighting, adding a green roof and incorporating recycling at the ballpark, Nationals Park is a lot greener than just its playing field.  

“Creating a green ballpark was as fundamental as any requirement when we decided to embark on this mission to build a new state of the art stadium for the Washington Nationals,” said DC Sports and Entertainment Commission CEO Gregory A. O’Dell. “We are excited to set the environmental standard for the rest of the sporting world and we are extremely proud of this achievement for the District of Columbia.”

LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) is a rating system that was designed by the US Green Building Council (USGBC) to guide and distinguish high performance buildings that have less of an impact on the environment, are healthier for those who use the building and are more profitable than their conventional counterparts.

The USGBC originally created the LEED Certification process to promote environmentally responsible design i