The images show night shot of Toronto during Earth Hour
Toronto Image source: Earth Hour 2008, Ivy Images
On March28, 2009 during Earth Hour, initiated by WWF ( http://www.earthhour.org/ ) between 8:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. the global lights-out event was observed. We all need to reduce the power we use at home to help save a planet threatened by the overproduction of energy. What we do during Earth Hour is not going to save the planet, but it is going to inspire people to make their lives and surrounding more ‘sustainable’.
The term 'sustainability' peaked on blogs, boards and discussion groups after Al Gore’s “Inconvenient Truth” took home the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature in February 2007. Per Nielsen Buzz Metrics reports, the buzz levels on this term went up by 169 percent in July 2007 versus one year ago. Innovations or actions to promote sustainability make up daily headlines, such as the following, for every newspaper or T.V. channels.
Greenest Computers Rated By PC Mag
300 Schools On Green Building Council’s Certification Waiting List
Dell To Favor Suppliers That Report GHG Emissions
NAHB Certification Program Will Compete With LEED
Target Targets Eco-Friendly Prototypes
or Mitsubishi Has Big Plans for Electric Vehicles
The question that comes to mind is whether ‘sustainability’ is for real or just another buzz word? I will like to share this educational video (click on the video below)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEFwaQej_0E
Sustainability — the ability to meet our needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs. Let us ponder for a moment and ask the question - are we really using our recourses wisely? The answer is no. The fast growth in the last few decades have left us with scarcity of natural resources, climate changes, and uncertainty for future generations. Argument here is not anti growth but how judicious we are while using our resources.
This calls for a dramatic change in our lifestyles and carbon habits to resolve this issue. As a real estate student and architect by profession, I know that real estate development has been a big contributor to this problem.
As per US Green Building Council (USGBC), buildings take up:
40% of total primary energy use
72% of total electricity consumption
32% of total CO2 emission
13.6% of total potable water consumption
Building sector leads the global CO2 emission followed by transportation and industrial
This is a huge strain on our eco system. The solution is our…. buildings need to be smarter in the use of these resources or in other words ‘GREEN’.
According to USGBC, green buildings can reduce
energy use by 25-50%,
CO2 emission by 33-39%,
water use by 40%, and
solid waste by 70%.
From the year 2006 to 2010, projected market value of green buildings is going to increase for new construction from $12 billion to $30-$60 billion and for renovations from $130 billion to $240billion.
Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards established by USGBC has set the benchmark ( http://www.usgbc.org/ ) for certification programs related to buildings and neighborhood development. There are many such certification programs, few of which are:
NAHB national green building program
( http://www.nahbgreen.org/)
US department of energy ‘Energy Star’ program
( http://www.energystar.gov/)
Environmental Protection Agency Green Buildings
( http://www.epa.gov/)
Apart from this, many cities in America adopted their own certification programs. For example, the City of Austin's Green Building Program has been implemented very successfully.
( http://www.austinenergy.com/). In our own backyard, the City of Dallas recently adopted a standard that all new commercial buildings will have to be built to meet the sustainibility standards ( http://www.greendallas.net/).
USGBC, a non-profit trade organization, was founded in 1993. As mentioned earlier, it is best known for the development of LEED rating system and Greenbuild, a green building conference that promotes the green building industry. LEED is a third-party certification program and the nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings. LEED gives building owners and operators the tools they need to have an immediate and measurable impact on their buildings’ performance. LEED promotes a whole-building approach to sustainability by recognizing performance in five key areas of human and environmental health: sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials selection and indoor environmental quality.
There are LEED projects in all 50 states and 91 countries and 81,155 LEED Accredited Professionals.
19,957 members of USGBC members includes building owners and end-users, real estate developers, facility managers, architects, designers, engineers, general contractors, subcontractors, product and building system manufacturers, government agencies, and nonprofits.
Now apart from tree hugger approach the million-dollar question for developers is does it cost more to build green and does it payback?
As per Peter Morris & Davis Langdon, the answer is yes. But most of the times the people who are green averse are happy to relate anecdotes of premiums in excess of 30% to make their case not to build green. These numbers are simply not, however, borne out by the facts, as evidenced by many studies of the cost of green building. Even though there is no one-size-fits-all answer to the cost question, it is clear from the substantial weight of evidence in the marketplace that reasonable levels of sustainable design can be incorporated into most building types at little or no additional cost.
Very frequently a comparison is made between the cost of the green project and the original project budget or the original anticipated cost of the project. Most of the studies that use this methodology report average green premiums in the range of 1% to 2% to achieve a moderate level of sustainable design, generally equivalent to LEED Silver rating. Higher levels of sustainability are usually linked to higher green premiums.
An alternative approach, also used in many green cost analysis, is to look at the cost of individual green features, effectively comparing the building to itself without the green features. Most of the studies that use this individual add-on methodology report somewhat higher green premiums, in the range of 2% to 6%, to achieve a moderate level of sustainable design (such as LEED Silver).
Keep in mind these are studies and they can be only used as a guidance in planning and budgeting the project. The real question should not be “How much more will this cost?” but “How will we do this?” Sustainability is not a below-the-line item.
But the cost of building GREEN is reducing every day mainly due to:
1.Bigger market for sustainable products, which help reduce the unit cost of these products due to, increased volume.
2.Also, new inventions and technology is making cost of the green product less. As per the studies published by Photon consulting cost of solar power is racing to be $1/W by 2012.
3. New changes at federal government has made it very clear that achieving energy efficiency is the one the main agenda of this administration. In addition, recently extended and announced tax rebates, grants and programs is the step in the right direction. Further information could be found on US Department of energy website (http://www.energy.gov/) and US EPA website ( http://www.energystar.gov/ )
4. Many state and local government run the incentive programs and tax breaks for building Green. More information is available at DSIRE (http://www.dsireusa.org/). Also many utility providers have rebates available for building sustainable products
5. Many financial institutes like retirement pension funds are asking developer to achieve certain sustainibilty standards to qualify for the funding.
6. Also private funding are demanding for green standards so that the value of their investments is maintained
All these incentives are definitely driving the cost of building green down and adding value to the real estate projects.
How does it pay back?
It pays back owner of the building by
- Reduced operating cost
- Energy savings
- Less maintenance cost due to higher standards in construction
- Owners can demand higher rents
- Fewer turnovers of tenants due to less utility bills and health benefits tenants
- Property retains more value at the point of turnover
- Marketing tool
Green buildings help the tenants or its end user in many ways. It increases the efficiency of the employees due to increased natural light, Better ventilations and less toxic material used for the construction. The students have shown better results in schools that are built based on sustainable principles. The patients have shown faster improvements in the hospitals those are certified by green building programs. The residents in the sustainable communities have shown significant improvement in their health and productivity due to change in their life styles use of environmental friendly materials during construction.
Blair Towns, Silver Spring, MD a development by The Tower Companies is a LEED Gold rated project completed in 2003. You can visit their website, http://www.blairapartments.com/ and how developer is using the LEED certification as a marketing tool.
Natural Recourses Defenses Council (http://www.nrdc.org/) has conducted a case study for this project, which could be viewed online by visiting
http://www.nrdc.org/buildinggreen/casestudies/blair.pdf
All these benefits to the tenants or end users definitely pay back developers in increasing or retaining the value of their properties.
Apart from financial pluses and minuses, the government is making sure new developments meet sustainability standards. Federal government has made it mandatory for all federally funded projects to obtain some level of LEED certification. The number of state and local governments developing or requiring sustainability standards is increasing everyday. A report published by American Institute of Architects (AIA) in mid 2008, shows that there are 92 cities with green building programs -- or to put that in perspective, over 42 million people live in cities with green building programs.
With the increasing regulations and benefits, developers need to revaluate their spreadsheets. Even if developers do not want to pay the added cost, they will still be able to create sustainable developments with better design, construction and development practices such as:
Selecting site locations near to public transport
Orientations of the building to take advantage of natural light and ventilation
Using environmental friendly and local materials during construction
Emphasis on using right construction practice
Use of native landscape
And the list can go on........
To summarize sustainable development is need of the time and is here to stay, it is in developers’ interest to start practicing it and be a leader before the competition catches on it.
Post by Yogesh Patil, REAE 5311 student
Credits and resources:
http://www.usgbc.org/
http://www.energystar.gov/
http://www.nahbgreen.org/
http://www.dsireusa.org/
http://www.earthhour.org/
http://www.energy.gov/
http://www.greendallas.net/
http://www.austinenergy.com/
http://www.environmetalleader.com/
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