EA Engineering Celebrates a ‘Green Groundbreaking’ in Hunt Valley

When a groundbreaking ceremony is held with a background of bulldozers, diggers, trucks and men in hard hats, you know the real groundbreaking already started.

“This, by the way, was supposed to be the groundbreaking, so I don’t know if it’s proper English to call it the ‘groundbroke,’ ” Lou Boeri joked on Tuesday. Boeri is the co-manager for leasing and development at Merritt Properties, LLC.

Merritt Properties officially broke ground in Hunt Valley, on July 26, to build Schilling Green II, a four-story, LEED (Leadership in Energy and Design) platinum-certified office building, which is the highest rating for sustainable commercial construction.

To name just a few of its planned environmentally-friendly assets, the building project calls for solar flush valves, a waterless urinal, drought-resistant landscaping, and bicycle racks and changing rooms to encourage commuters to leave their cars behind.

It’s a fitting building for EA Engineering, Science & Technology, Inc. to call its global headquarters.

EA, originally called Ecological Analysts, has been in business since 1972 and has completed more than 100,000 environmental projects, according to Ian MacFarlane, EA’s president and CEO. EA is an environmental and engineering firm that works with a wide range of government and industrial clients. 

“Both nationally and locally throughout Maryland, we are helping to harness renewable energy, restore streams, create wetlands and clean up blighted and abandoned properties so that they can be reused,” MacFarlane said. “Our motto is to improve the quality of the environment in which we live, one project at a time. Our future is bright.”

Inside the event's tent, a sustainability showcase highlighted various green building strategies that will be utilized in Schilling Green II.

EA operates 23 offices across the continental United States in addition to Hawaii and Guam. County Executive Kevin Kamenetz, who was present at the groundbreaking ceremony, was feeling the July heat inside the event tent and wisecracked about the similarity to a Pacific island’s summer.

“I understand that EA already has offices in Hawaii and Guam,” he said. “Perhaps Baltimore County can offer a location that’s both sunnier and steamier than those two. We’ll give it to you six months a year.”

The new building, at 225 Schilling Circle, is slated to be completed by August 2012.

“It’s an aggressive time frame,” said Boeri. “We’ll get there. We believe in sustainability, we believe in the environment, we believe in supporting this, and that’s where all of our efforts are today. EA Engineering shares our philosophy, and they’ve committed to this building and this area for a long, long time, so we’re in this together, and we’re proud to be their partners.”

Boeri also mentioned a plan that was a surprise to some.

“Where we’re all standing and sitting, we are also building a 10,000-square-foot world-class lab for EA to do all their testing on this site, ready at the same time,” he said.

According to a news release from Merritt Properties, EA has “nationally accredited ecotoxicology and biological testing laboratories.”

For EA to consolidate its headquarters, laboratories and regional operations at the Hunt Valley business park means about 40 jobs will become available over the next several years.

EA will also relocate 200 existing jobs from four other offices — three in Baltimore County (Edgewood, Sparks, and the current one on McCormick Road in Hunt Valley) and one in York, Pa.

“It's just a great thing where you are going to consolidate over 200 workers in this location in one beautiful building,” Kamenetz said, “but most importantly, we’re hopeful that you’re going to be adding 40 new jobs right here in Hunt Valley. It’s here in Baltimore County that EA has found the technical talent, the business environment and innovative thinkers that they need to thrive.”

Boeri said that even the groundbreaking was a "green" event.

“This is a green groundbreaking, in that typically you shovel dirt from the property and take a photo,” Boeri said. “The good news about this is our shovels will be filled with pulverized construction debris from the demolition of the prior building. Instead of all that headed to a landfill, we’ll use that for some of our foundations, the parking lot area, and the rest of it.”