Gottfried ushers in green advancement at Mestek

Date: 9/19/2014

WESTFIELD – An inventive patent led to an expansion of one local company, putting it ahead of its competitors, but not at the cost of the environment – a statement supported by the man responsible for the term “green building.”

Dadanco, a Mestek Inc. company, celebrated its grand opening with an in-depth tour of its new facility at 47 Westfield Industrial Park Road. As part of the event, guests were treated to a demonstration of chill beams, the company’s state-of-the-art product.
   
A chill beam, which is an HVAC technology that limits the amount of reheated air promoting energy efficiency, lessens the possibility for cross-contaminated airflow and reduces noise pollution. Accompanying elements such as sensors, controls, valves, grilles and enclosures are also manufactured and sold by Dadanco. Dadanco’s slogan is “Breathing life into your building.”
   
The ribbon cutting kicked off at Mestek’s Reed Institute where guest speaker David Gottfried, CEO of Regenerative Ventures Inc., who is better known as “the father of the global green building movement,” discussed the importance of Dadanco’s commitment to the green initiative.
   
Gottfried is a founder of the U.S. and the World Green Building councils. His work led to the creation of the LEED building certification program, which grades structures on their energy efficiency.
   
“I got to see something this morning that you’re going to see a little later and it’s spectacular. Today, we’re here to learn about innovation. We’re here to learn about the future of Earth. And, on a deeper level, you’re here to learn about why we’re here. Dadanco and the new Luxton-Reed Center is really at the heart of that,” Gottfried said during his opening comments.
   
He continued, “My soul was hungry. I wanted to understand more than that equation [the double-sided equation taught in mathematics class], what was I applying that equation to? At a deeper level, perhaps you’ve asked yourself this: ‘Why am I here? Why are you here? Why are we here and what are we supposed to do with our time?’ And, even deeper, what is the impact of that time, of the things we make, of the things you design, of the things you specify are creations?  Ultimately, it’s about legacy. That became the game for me.”
   
Gottfried told Reminder Publications, “I love the new Dadanco building. When you go inside and tour it you will be extremely impressed. They not only showcase the product the chill beam, they show it in different conditions like a hospital room, a hotel room and that’s cool to see it working in real environments.”
   
He continued, “But, even more interesting is that they have this lab – a different room – where they have six sides that you can condition with a test room within a room so you can go under it, on top of it, on the sides and you can play with all the humidity conditions possible to show the condensation or not and the real efficacy of the product.”
   
Gottfried noted the systems create 15 to 35 percent better energy efficiency and improved air quality. “I was pretty impressed,” he said.
   
When asked what such advances mean to him, Gottfried responded, “It gives me hope that we might survive because of innovation; and that we’re pushing beyond mainstream to do better; and that these ideas can be elegant, make money, [and] make buildings more energy efficient and healthier for the people. I get excited like the little kid in the candy store. For me, that’s my candy.” 
   
Gottfried discussed what’s next in his career. “I am working on what is a green life and it’s brought me to neuroscience. I’ve decided [that] we know how to innovate brilliantly as humans [but] we really don’t know how to survive and we don’t know how to stop killing each other. There’s more killing in this world almost than ever and with all that innovation and technology and money and wealth, I want to know why, why do we keep doing that? And, why do even really wealthy people want to own much more than they need?”
   
He added, “I’ve gone back to our brain, in our amygdala, our survival wiring of a million years ago – to get food and outrun the tigers and kill things to eat – we can go to Whole Foods now and we can stop killing. And so, we need knew wiring in our brains. I call it ‘regenbrain’ and that’s my newest work; to create new neural networks in our brain through plasticity.”
   
During his presentation, Gottfried explained his first failed business venture, owning a 40,000 square-foot office building, and his father’s reaction to his idea to get into green building. He said that after initial silence, he father said, “Son, that’s a good gimmick. We all have dreams, some of us chase them.”
   
LEED now has 300,000 accredited professional and 80 chapters in 140 countries, according to Gottfried. “We created a trillion dollar green economy,” he said.
   
“We’re ensuring a future for our kids and our grandkids. This isn’t hug the tree, give $50 bucks to Sierra Club, get the Birkenstocks. This is up in down economy, this is a job when they’re being laid off, this is the billionaire of the future. That billionaire will not just put a book in a box like Amazon did. They’ll put a little fuel cell in a compostable box and ship it on the green highway. Gottfried said.
  
“You and I have the opportunity in the year’s we have left in our career to invent, to create and to use the brilliance that God gave all of us in our brains as engineers, as builders, as designers to do great. Great is not harming nature. Great in the full equation, where the left side equals the right, is understanding that we are part of nature, not killing it, not obliterating it. Stop the war on nature, which is killing the future,” he stated.