The Cecilian Center for Earth, Arts and Spirit fills a special role in the work of sustainability. The vision of the Center is to inspire and motivate people toward personal and public commitment to sustainability through involvement in the Arts, in Spirituality and in awareness of Earth as a living organism. The Center has engaged more than a thousand people in the struggle to create a healthy and sustainable planet.

The Center envisions an urban community that comes together through arts and spirituality to reflect upon and act upon a need to respect and protect the environment. It offers workshops on a variety of topics including organic gardening, global warming, recycling, and “Step Away for a Day,” an event for high-risk mothers and children that fosters a greater appreciation for holistic and sustainable living.

The Center has provides environmental education, advocacy, and action to a diverse audience through outreach, on site programs, workshops, and community involvement. Since 1965 we have addressed the issues of the day,Aeiclean air, clean water, endangered species, wetlands, climate change, habitat loss,Aeiand provided forums for awareness and restoration. In 1999 our Master Plan added renewable energy and sustainable development to that roster of environmental issues.

Air Products Healthcare is replacing a blizzard of paperwork with a sustainable, secure electronic process: Inscrybe Healthcare. This initiative, partnering with community based physicians across Air Products' service area, creates a sustainable health system to exchange important healthcare documentation with physicians. The system is an innovation for Air Products Healthcare, which had handled multiple copies of care documentation its patients. Air Products has significantly reduced paper and toner consumption and created a healthier work environment.

The need to maximize the recovery of good quality water from ever-dwindling and increasingly contaminated water sources has increased rapidly in recent years. Whether it is potable water or service water for industry, absence of an effective and economical means for the disposal of large reject (waste) streams has impeded many commercial and industrial development projects. Many of these limitations can now been addressed by the development of ARROW (Advanced Reject Recovery of Water), a new patented membrane based process that recovers > 95% of surface water, ground water or industrial wastewater.

Residents have been growing food at this West Philadelphia garden since the 1970’s, where 40 families have established plots on the ¾ acre farm. It is now the most visited community garden in Philadelphia, attracting thousands of people each year. In addition to organic farming and composting practices, the garden also includes a series of three ponds, featuring goldfish and water lilies.

Bala Consulting Engineers' office was the nation's first engineering firm to become LEED-CI (commercial interior) certified. Keeping with the 'firsts' theme, Bala has provided LEED Design and LEED Commissioning services for noteworthy green buildings in the region that include the 1st LEED-EB Platinum facility outside of California, and the 1st LEED-CS Platinum building in the world. Bala also played in an integral role in the development of the LEED rating system standards nationwide.

This consulting firm’s King of Prussia office was the nation’s first engineering firm to be LEED-CI (commercial interior) certified. Understandable since they played an integral role in the development of LEED certified standards nationwide. They also played a role in providing LEED commissioning and construction monitoring services to some of our region’s most noted green buildings.

S.A.V.E was established as a grassroots, non-profit community group to protect the rural community of southern Chester County by addressing expanding highways and excessive roadway creation. The group has since influenced PennDOT to pursue highway alternatives that consider local community character, promoted the use of roundabouts and preserved historic bridges.

Bel Arbor Community Garden, a quarter acre in size on the 1000 block of Kimball Street in South Philadelphia, has forty-five gardeners of all ages, 25 individual garden plots, a mini orchard area, a wildflower/perennial grasses area, and a mini woods/thicket area. Gardeners compost 3000 pounds of household food scraps and 500 pounds of leaves each year, in addition to garden debris. Goldfinches return every year and migrating warblers pass through in spring and fall.

This West Philadelphia affordable housing community will provide sustainable homes for formerly homeless teen mothers and their children upon its completion in 2008. Homes will feature energy efficient lighting, natural ventilation and daylighting, sustainable interior building materials such as paints and flooring, rain barrels, and native plant landscaping.

As a Community Supported Agriculture farm in Perkasie, local communities share in the cost of supporting the farm and reap the benefits during the harvest. Crops are grown without synthetic fertilizers, pesticides or herbicides, and are grown in soil using composting, cover crops and mulching. The farm serves as an opportunity for people to get involved in growing the food they will later eat, and provides opportunities for community interaction.

Once a blighted brownfield site of abandoned warehouses and industrial buildings; today, this community boasts 144 new, market-rate homes providing easy access to Fairmount Park and public transit stops. A diverse group of residents inhabits homes that are built efficiently, conserve open space, and fosters connections to green spaces through open courtyards featuring natural grass and plantings.

Once a blighted brownfield site, this community now boasts new, market-rate homes accessible to Fairmount Park and public transit stops. A diverse group of residents now inhabits efficiently built homes that conserve open space and foster connections to green spaces through open courtyards featuring natural grass and plantings.

I believe i was way ahead of my time in building these energy efficient homes. I learned all about energy as a cryogenic tech in the USMC. There i was taught everything about evaporation, condensation, conduction, convection and utilized it in my buildings. So far no one knows what i did but me and the people who now own and live in these homes. I also started a recycling center in 1975 76 when i got out of the Marines in N. Calif where i worked at a new contained site and separated bottles and cans etc and then came back east in 1981 telling people one day they would be separating their trash. people laughed at me and well today you know the rest of the story.

Camphill Village Kimberton Hills, a community of 110 people, fosters dignity and models community living for people with and without disabilities. It includes innovative ways of working ecologically, agriculturally, therapeutically, and financially. Incorporating a biodynamic/organic CSA garden and dairy, photovoltaics, a constructed wetlands wastewater system, and a new geothermal heating and cooling system, as well as ecologically sustainable building and lifestyle practices, Kimberton Hills is a fine example of ecological practices incorporated into everyday life.

Residents in Chester County can breathe easier thanks to an alliance that has brought biodiesdel fuel to five county school districts. Through the efforts of the Chester County Biodiesel Coalition, hundreds of school buses will switch to biodiesel. While the environmental and energy security benefits of this move are monumental in their own right, what makes this milestone most significant is how it was accomplished. The formation of the Coalition brought together all sectors - non profit and for profit, state and local government, and concerned citizens - of the community to protect students' health and to reduce reliance on foreign oil. By using the distinctive strengths of each stakeholder, the Coalition was able to secure a two-year $300,00 grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.

CAPS is a program that challenges youth the Greater Philadelphia region to “think like scientists and act like citizens.” Students use investigations, interviews with experts and cost benefit balancing to solve environmental problems in their backyards, neighborhoods and playgrounds. These students pave the way to environmental improvements such as healthier streams, greener spaces, and energy conservation.

The Community Design Collaborative is a volunteer organization that offers preliminary design assistance to nonprofit groups. In order for their work to enhance our neighborhoods and communities, nonprofit organizations need preliminary design services early in the development process, when they are refining proposals, gathering support, and raising money. The Collaborative is committed to giving more nonprofits the ability to further their projects. In addition to project-based work, the Collaborative is increasingly engaging in work that raises the awareness of the importance of design to our neighborhoods, regardless of location, and to our citizens, regardless of income level. As evidenced by its work, the Collaborative, supported by its committed design professional volunteers, is committed to the economic, environmental, and social sustainability of our neighborhoods.