Marine Camp Houses Military’s First LEED Mess Hall

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The French Creek Mess Hall at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune is the military’s first LEED Platinum-certified dining facility.

The mess hall opened on May 20 and serves up to 22,000 meals per day. The base and surrounding community is home to a population of about 170,000 people, including active duty, dependent, retiree and civilian employees.

Richmond, Va.-based Moseley Architects and Columbia, S.C.-based Enviro AgScience Inc. led the design and construction for the 21,000-square-foot facility that features high-efficiency kitchens, a salad bar and a bakery. The two firms previously worked with the Navy on the MCIEAST Regional Brig, a military correctional facility that earned LEED Gold certification in 2013.

Additional team members on the project included Foodesign Associates, based in Mint Hill, N.C.; S&ME, Inc., based in Raleigh, N.C.; SGM Engineering, based in Orlando, Fla.; and Timmons Group, based in Richmond, Va.

“This project was truly an integrated team effort,” said Bill Laughlin, a vice president with Moseley Architects who worked on the project, in a statement. “Early in our planning process we saw the potential to earn LEED Platinum. When we reviewed the final energy saving numbers, we were ecstatic.”

In order to earn the maximum number of points for LEED’s Optimize Energy Performance credit, project designers used a number of strategies. These include the use of ground-coupled heat pumps that are linked to 78 geothermal wells, as well as an outdoor air system with energy recovery, LED site lighting, variable air volume kitchen exhaust hoods, spray foam exterior wall insulation and an air barrier system.

The project also incorporated increased insulation and LED lighting in freezers, as well as energy-recovery devices in dishwashers and ice machines to reduce the high levels of process energy used in dining facilities. Hybrid solar panels integrated with a thermal energy loop were also used, and will contribute to the facility’s predicted 54.6 percent energy savings by generating both electricity and hot water.

The facility has integrated energy efficient technology, including heat monitoring; highly reflective skylight tunnels; geothermal plumbing; airflow control systems; and lighting sensors and timers both inside out outside of the buildings.

It was important to recycle waste during construction, and project team members were able to divert 82 percent of construction debris from landfills. This reduction exceeds Camp Lejeune’s current recycling goals and will help the camp meet the standards set by Executive Orders 13514 and 13423.

“The project team is very proud to have incorporated such high energy-saving measures into the project while staying focused on our customer’s needs and delivering a state-of-the-art Mess Hall to our warfighters,” NAVFAC MIDLANT’s Marine Corps IPT Mess Hall Project Manager Carl Tarkenton said in a statement.

French Creek Mess Hall marks the 60th LEED certified project for Moseley Architects.