The new 14-story, 221,830-square-foot administration building of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SF PUC) will be built at 525 Golden Gate Avenue in the city's Civic Center area. The SF PUC has made a commitment to incorporate the principles of sustainable design in its building, one of the City's first LEED projects, and the project has been designed to achieve LEED Platinum, the highest rating. This project will set a precedent for all future municipal design and construction projects in San Francisco.

The project's design features include a highly efficient exterior building enclosure including exterior sun shades, natural ventilation with the use of operable windows, reduced lighting power densities through space planning, and solar and wind harvesting to meet a significant portion of the building's energy demand. A photovoltaic system is integrated into the building design to provide power, reduce heat loads on the higher floors, and serve as a work of art. Solar panels will be embedded in portions of the façade, and solar greenhouses are included on every floor to represent San Francisco's natural soil and vegetation conditions at the corresponding elevation. Wind turbines will be stacked behind glass along part of the façade and on the roof. Great emphasis was also placed on harnessing natural daylight, where appropriate, to reduce the electrical lighting load needed for the building. To maximize daylight from the perimeter glazing, light shelves were integrated into the window walls. In addition, waterless urinals, faucet sensors, and on-demand water heaters will be used so that each occupant's water usage should only be five gallons per day; and wastewater will be recycled through basement filters, then put to use in toilets and the cooling system.