The 347,000-sf building is just the first in the 3.3-million-sfmaster-planned AMB Morgan Business Park near the Port of Savannah.It will also act as the prototype for the San Francisco-basedcompany's global sustainability initiative, Jay Cornforth, AMB'smanaging director, East region, tells GlobeSt.com. "Some of thefeatures in our first building in Savannah will be the prototypefor building designs that AMB will deploy throughout the world," hesays.

AMB turned its focus to Savannah about two and half years ago,he explains. "Savannah continues to be a real attractive port tomany customers linked to the global trade," Cornforth says. "It isa really opportunity for us to take advantage of that growth andfortunately for us, about a year and half ago we found a piece ofland that makes a lot of sense for us."

With the land in hand, AMB shifted toward development and thefirst step in green building. "The first aspect of LEEDcertification turns its focus to the site," John Morgan, AMB's vicepresident of development, East region, tells GlobeSt.com. "Forexample, if you a have a black object next to a building, much likeasphalt, it absorbs heat and requires the building's systems towork much harder and longer. What we're doing, and what we havebeen doing in our projects in the Southeast, is putting concretedown, which is a lighter reflector. And not just the 50% that LEEDrequires, but 100% for the truck port as well as the autoparking."