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Nissan touts 'green' headquarters

The new 10-story, S-shaped, Nissan headquarters in Franklin, Tennessee, is pictured on Jan. 25. PHOTO: AP

Nissan wants to talk about more than a way to drive at its soon-to-be-finished headquarters in North America.

The Japanese automaker is showing off "green" features of the US$100 million project as a kind of image signpost for car and truck buyers increasingly focused on environmental concerns.

The 10-story, S-shaped, headquarters opens in July, eventually for approximately 1,500 employees. Nissan North America, which increased annual sales by 4.5 percent to more than 1 million vehicles and a market share of 6.6 percent last year, is moving about 32km from a Nashville high-rise to a 20-hectare campus with a restored wetland.

After relocating to the south from southern California, Nissan's own facilities engineers developed the headquarters with features aimed at showing a concern for the environment beyond stretching miles per gallon and cutting exhaust emissions.

A sci-fi sounding "light harvesting system" automatically dims or turns off interior lights in the 43,000m2 of offices. Sun shades outside -- sort of like reflective visors -- with computer-designed blades direct sunlight to reduce glare and heat in the southern summer.

Air conditioning and heat are controlled through outlets at each work station.

"You heat the people and not the space," said Rob Traynham, the company's director of corporate services.

Nissan engineers say the headquarters should consume about 35 percent less energy than a conventionally designed building. Citing fluctuating energy costs, the company declined to estimate how long it will take for savings in energy bills to offset the cost of the environmental features.

Outside the glass-covered building, Nissan is restoring a 1 hectare wetland. Tens of thousands of native Tennessee plants, including iris, button bush and rushes, are already growing there.

And there's greenery almost everywhere else on space that would have been paved if not for a parking deck tucked at one end of the 100m-long building.

David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research in Michigan, says carmakers share a zeal to show customers they are "green" on and off the road and a new headquarters is a good place to show their commitment.

"Particularly in the current environment, where it is much more fashionable to be green in everything you do, that's a big deal," Cole said.
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