A new elementary school under construction in Playa Vista has environmental lessons built into its design to educate children about sustainability.

Although it is currently little more than a skeleton of steel beams, Central Region Elementary School #22 will soon have an operating geothermal heating and cooling system, solar panels and captured rainwater irrigating its plants.

The school is expected to generate 60 percent of its energy needs through bifacial solar panels, and the geothermal heating system will cut energy costs in half, but the environmental benefits will not be limited to its behind-the-scenes operation.

“Everything that is part of the sustainability features is something we want to explain to the children,” said Dawn Brisco, the on-site architect for Osborn Architects, the Glendale-based firm designing and overseeing the construction of the school for the Los Angeles Unified School District.

To create learning opportunities, the school’s environmental design components will be visible to students, such as a canopy of photovoltaic panels between buildings and a window providing a glimpse into the geothermal pump room.

“There’s a green treasure hunt,” Brisco said. “There’s a sign that leads you to search around for the elements that are environmental. I think that’s what’s going to be the greatest part of it is it that it’s going to be interactive.”

The sustainable building practices incorporated into the design earned the new school the state’s environmental certification, Collaborative for High Performance Schools (CHPS).

School #22 will also be one of the first in LAUSD to obtain LEED Gold certification, a national standard that verifies that buildings meet green standards on energy conservation, water efficiency and air quality. Only three other LAUSD schools will be LEED certified, and the Playa Vista project is the only one on the Westside.

Its location on Bluff Creek Drive, below Loyola Marymount University and adjacent to the Playa Vista condominiums, means the school is next to the Ballona Wetlands.



The school’s water system is also designed sustainably, an important feature given the sensitivity of the Ballona Creek ecosystem. The school’s landscaping will be irrigated using captured rainwater, which is then filtered before being released to Ballona Creek.



The school will also use recycled water piped in from the the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power for irrigation and for toilet flushing.

The school will have a student body of 650 children in 26 classrooms, relieving crowding at Loyola Village and Playa del Rey Elementary schools when it opens in the Fall of 2012. The project has a budget of $44.8 million, funded through various voter-approved bonds.

LAUSD deputy chief facilities executive Neil Gamble explained that the Playa Vista school is part of the district’s ongoing efforts to reduce overcrowding.


“We’re building neighborhood schools for every student,” Gamble said, adding that the additional classroom space means less forced busing and fewer year-round campuses.

Over the past decade, LAUSD has built and opened 101 new schools, with 30 more in progress, including the Playa Vista project.