PeoplesBank’s newest office in West Springfield has been certified with LEED Gold status for environmental design achievements. 

The building is the first of its kind in the town and is one of only two community banks in Massachusetts that have achieved LEED Gold status, according to a statement from the bank.

"For years, PeoplesBank has been supporting the community in a variety of ways. That’s what community banks do," stated Douglas A. Bowen, President and CEO of PeoplesBank, in announcing the award of LEED Gold certification by the U.S. Green Building Council. "We have taken that thought – supporting the community – and extended it to the environment. The green branch is an office that has been built in an environmentally responsible way."

The green design and construction features that contributed to LEED Gold certification for the West Springfield office included diverting 95.57% of on-site demolition and construction materials from the landfill, redeveloping an existing commercial building and land rather than using undeveloped land, and ensuring that more than 33 percent of the building materials and products were extracted, harvested, recovered or manufactured within 500 miles of the project site.

This is the second PeoplesBank branch to receive LEED certification. The bank’s office at 1051 St. James Avenue in Springfield received LEED Silver certification last year. PeoplesBank will start construction on a new LEED registered office in Northampton this year. The bank has also financed more than $50 million in wind, hydroelectric and solar energy projects. Solar and hydroelectric power generation financed by PeoplesBank will help supply the energy to the Massachusetts Green High-Performance Computing Center in Holyoke.