PYATOK has joined a growing national movement of architecture offices transitioning to carbon-neutral building design and production by 2030. Becoming a signatory to the AIA’s 2030 Commitment reflects our dedication to strengthening sustainability and equity practices and taking responsibility for architecture’s role in combatting climate change.

The AIA 2030 Commitment supports the 2030 Challenge, aiming to transform American architectural practice in a way that is “holistic, firm-wide, project-based, and data-driven.”  The initiative includes resources and platforms through which architects can standardize performance reporting, study peer projects, and adopt best practices. We will be uploading project data to the Design Data Exchange (DDx), and have developed a Sustainability Action Plan outlining our path to achieving a carbon-neutral practice within the decade.

Buildings are responsible 40% of energy consumption in the United States and 39% of greenhouse gas emissions globally. A 2019 by-the-numbers report found that Commitment participant projects have offset carbon emissions equivalent to a year’s sequestration of a 26.4 million-acre forest. Just as PYATOK is a national leader in multifamily housing design, we endeavor to shift the national standard in multifamily housing in a more sustainable direction. Our Sustainability Action Plan explores a comprehensive transition through four key practice areas: Design and Approach; Evaluating and Reporting; Knowledge Growth and Sharing; and Office Operations and Outlook.

With this commitment to identifying the implicit and explicit sustainability of our projects and process, we aim to propagate place-based sustainability that results from well-made and well-loved places while also practicing the technical sustainability that comes with the thoughtful selection of building systems, orientation, material choice, and other consequential design strategies.