By Daily Press staff
Colorado Court, an affordable, sustainable housing complex at Colorado Avenue and Fifth Street, has earned a National American Institute of Architects Award for Design Excellence. Community Corp. of Santa Monica, which owns and operates the property, will accept the award at the AIA national conference in San Diego next spring.
Colorado Court's sustainable features, a result of collaboration between the project’s architects and the city’s Green Building program, include a built-in power cogeneration capacity, using solar panels and a natural gas micro-turbine, enabling it to produce 92 percent of its own electricity, while all of its hot water and heating requirements are handled by the micro-turbine alone. Combined with architectural elements that provide natural lighting and cooling ocean breezes, the five-story building is called by some as the essence of energy efficiency, which is especially important as energy costs rise and the state’s power grid is strained.
The housing project was completed in June 2002 with construction funds loaned by the City Of Santa Monica.
For more information on Colorado Court, call the city’s housing division at (310) 458-8702.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on November 23, 2002. Read the original PDF.