Introducing ourselves

Good Morning!  I am honored and excited to be joining the Sustainable MEP Leaders Peer Network.  My name is Amy Pastor.  I am a Principal at EXP US Services Inc and I lead a group of individuals that focus primarily on Sustainability and Commissioning.  A Little About EXP EXP's US Group is a wholly-owned subsidiary of EXP Global.  Our Global corporation has offices across Canada and the US.  In total, we are 3,000+ professionals in 90+ offices, with our primary focus on vertical and horizontal engineering. In the US, EXP focuses on the engineering of buildings.  Our primary services are MEP, FP, Technology Design and Lighting design in the Hospitality + Gaming, Sports + Entertainment, Mission Critical, Science + Technology and Healthcare markets. A Little About My Team I graduated Penn State with a degree in Architectural Engineering (Mechanical Option).  I started my career with EXP's legacy company (GRG) in 2005, designing mechanical systems for luxury resorts in the Caribbean.  When electricity is $0.30/kWh and water comes at a premium, it was never an option to NOT design to be efficient.  This is was started my passion for doing the right thing and designing efficient buildings.  When the economy took a turn for the worst, the hospitality industry suffered and projects were placed on hold or abandoned completely.  However, projects that were pursuing sustainable certifications or projects that were using commissioning or retro-commissioning to find savings were always on our books and continued to grow during a time of recession.  I was asked to join the "Earth Team" (our term for our Sustainability and Commissioning Group) as an energy modeler, LEED Administrator and a Commissioning engineer.  Over 10 years later, I have never looked back.  I am now the Director of the group and lead up 15 individuals who sit in offices across the country. While my team provides Sustainability services for our in-house MEP teams, most of my work is with 3rd party clients.  Commissioning in many jurisdictions mandates 3rd party services.  From a LEED Admin / Energy Modeling perspective, we typically package up our services (LA, EM, CX) which leads to the large percentage of external clients for my team.  I know this business model is not entirely unique to this group, but I believe that my experience and how I operate my business model allows me to have a unique perspective on Sustainability - from the holistic approach, to the MEP-focused credits and finally to the operations and maintenance of a high performing building. I look forward to open, collaborative discussions with this group.  Thank you and have a great day!  

Amy, Welcome!  Great to hear from you! I will be in Penn State for this year's Industrial and Professional Advisory Committee (IPAC) meeting. Best,
Luke Leung

Welcome, Amy!  Excited to have you join the group! Don

Hello all, I’d like to introduce myself as I am new to the Sustainable MEP Leaders Peer Network.  Participation in this group was HIGHLY recommended to me by multiple individuals who I completely respect their opinions on all things sustainability, so I am very excited to start engaging and learning from all of you.  I am Kim Cowman, National Director of Engineering for LEO A DALY company.  LEO A DALY is a full service architecture and engineering design firm with multiple office locations across the US and a few international locations.  I am responsible for the overall strategic operations and growth of our engineering practice across all engineering disciplines which includes MEP, structural, and civil engineering.  I’ve been in this role for around 7 months where I have been working closely with our Chief Sustainability Officer on refocusing our efforts across the company regarding sustainability and high performance design…which to me is just doing good design.  I’m a licensed mechanical engineer and have a degree in Architectural Engineering from the University of Nebraska.  I’ve really enjoyed reading all of your stories on why you entered this industry.  My story is very similar, I’ve always loved architecture but I most definitely do not think like an architect.  Architectural Engineering was a natural fit for me and I have been with LEO A DALY the last 16 years where I was previously leading our healthcare mechanical engineering team out of our Omaha office prior to transitioning to my new role.  I currently am passionate about trying to get the data for our projects post occupancy to really complete the cycle of design, verification, and performance optimization.  Looking forward to engaging with you all. Kim

Kim, Welcome! I am working with Prof. Josephine Lau from U of Nebraska on the COVID-19 issues and will be working with Professor Clarence Water this semester on an AE class! Great to have you! Best,
Luke Leung  

Luke, That’s great to hear. I formerly served on the Architectural Engineering Industry Advisory Committee for the program and always appreciate how engaged they are with industry professionals. Kim [LEO A DALY] Kimberly R. Cowman, PE, LEED AP Senior Associate, National Director of Engineering LEO A DALY 8600 Indian Hills Drive, Omaha, NE 68114-4039 402.391.8111 D 402.390.4461 leoadaly.com KRCowman@leoadaly.com PLANNING ARCHITECTURE ENGINEERING INTERIORS [LinkedIn] [facebook] [twitter] [Instagram] F

Hi Amy, I was formerly with X-nth (now EXP) in San Diego. I was searching back on some old emails to see if we worked together and noticed we were invovled in a few projects together. Great reconnecting with you.