Committee on the Environment

Design Datamap background

AIA COTE® Top Ten Awards program was launched in 1997 to recognize exemplary projects across the country that integrate design excellence and environmental performance.  Since then award winners have submitted a large swath of data on project designs and particularly pertaining to the top ten measures defined by AIA COTE®.  This is an extraordinary set of data resource on exemplary sustainably designed projects over a course of two decades. In 2016, Lessons from the Leading Edge (published by AIA COTE with research efforts led by Lance Hosey) offered a detailed analysis of general patterns and trends of these projects over the past two decades. Understanding overall trends are relevant to keep the the awards program abreast of evolving performance of such projects - for example, knowing that the energy efficiency has improved 10% in a single year, from 2015 to 2016, may be relevant when drafting future top ten measures.  Given that an important step to collating all the information from these projects has been accomplished, it is time we utilize this data intelligently and disseminate this information in a more useful, fluid, additive way so it may be beneficial to the larger architecture and design community as well as affiliated professionals, clients, government agencies and the public. This database will connect valuable project information and case studies from the last twenty years. 

You can access the Design Datamap here. 

Using the Design Datamap

Square boxes on the geographical map represent all AIA COTE Top Ten award winning projects thus far.  The size of the square represents the relative size of the project and the color represents the project type (refer to legend to the right of the map).  A series of filters are also provided on the right of the map including;

1. Country
2. Climate Zone
3. Site Context
4. Project Type
5. Gross Floor Area
6. Net predicted Energy Use Index (pEUI)

When you click on any of the projects’ square box, the link will take you to the project sheet with detailed information about the project.  The intent of the Datamap and filters is to allow the users to find projects with specific characteristics and use the information as a knowledge tool.  Let’s assume that an architect is working on a K-12 project in climate zone 3, they can filter through this Datamap, find relevant projects and study successful sustainable design strategies for these projects.

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