Compass Datacenters has been awarded the prestigious LEED® Gold certification for its previously announced data center in the Raleigh-Durham area. The certification was awarded by the U.S. Green Building Council and verified by the Green Building Certification Institute (GBCI). LEED is the nation’s preeminent program for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings.

The 22,000-sq-ft data center facility was completed earlier this year using Compass’ unique architecture for data center design and engineering, which enables the company to build LEED Gold and Tier III-certified dedicated data centers in any location where a customer needs them. This data center facility is located in Research Triangle Park (RTP) in North Carolina, and it was built using sustainable engineering and construction practices that adhere to the USGBC’s standards for materials use, water use, energy efficiency and other sustainability criteria. This facility also utilizes Compass’ patent-pending energy efficient architecture to deliver a low power usage effectiveness (PUE) that ensures sustainable operations and low operating costs.

“I am a long-time proponent of LEED certification for data centers going back to my involvement years ago with some of the very first data centers that ever earned approval from USGBC, and I am proud that Compass has earned the first of many LEED certifications for the dedicated data center facilities we build for customers. LEED has tremendous value for the data center industry because the principles LEED is based upon are the same principles that are so important to us as data center professionals: stewardship of materials, capital efficiency, proven best practices for operations, resourcefulness, and on and on,” said Chris Crosby, CEO of Compass Datacenters. “Claims of efficient or green data centers by service providers are just claims unless they follow the rigorous process of LEED during construction. Our certification and the ability to verify our adherence to that standard at the USGBC website give our customers the peace of mind that they are getting the data center that they paid for.”