There are great benefits to certifying a building as "green." One overriding characteristic though is that certified buildings make headlines, attract tenants, and save money on utility bills and can command higher rents. The areas of benefit are environmental, economic, and social and we explore those further below. Let's look at them in more detail.
Environmental
There are many aspects to the environmental impact of buildings that can be studied with some being explicitly measured and others that are hard to quantify but are intuitive to sound practices. There are also some aspects that are more imminently critical to our global health. Energy and water use are two of these aspects and they also happen to be the easiest to quantify and reach across the fence into economics and social issues. Improvements in these areas also provide instant benefits to the environment. This is why Green Space Project™ focuses so heavily in this area. These are also areas in which we have finite resources. For all practical purposes we can’t “make” energy or water. Our supply of both is limited¹. The soft impacts of a Green Space Project™ certified building are also significant by reducing commuting, healthier work environments, recycling, and material reuse. All of these have far reaching and significant impacts on the environment in ways we don’t yet fully understand.
All Green Space Project™ certified buildings make a positive, measurable impact on the environment by reducing energy and water usage in key areas by a minimum of 25% over their existing baselines. Consider this:
According to the CBECS Electricity Consumption (kWh) by End Use for All Buildings, 2003, lighting accounted for 37.7% of all electricity used or 393 billion Kwh of electricity2. The generation of that power produces around 644 billion pounds of CO2 every year. On average each building uses 80,800 Kwh per year on lighting. Reducing that by 25% reduces CO2 emissions by 15 tons per year per building (by the way there are over 4.5 million buildings in the U.S.). This is the equivalent of removing 3 cars from the road or 30 cross country flights. You can see the dramatic impact this can have and it's just on lighting alone. Now add in the remaining efficiency and sustainability aspects of the Green Space Project™ certified building and you have a tremendous impact on the environment immediately.
Economic
The economic benefits to a Green Space Project™ certified building are quantified by real dollar savings on energy and water usage reductions and do not depend on ethereal measurements of carbon footprints and the like. When a building is certified Green Space Project™ Green Diamond, the owner can be assured that the changes made will have the desired outcome and can verify it by examining utility bills. We don’t endeavor to put a dollar figure on that as it is impossible but percentages are not. A building owner who reduces his lighting load from 1000 Kw to 750 Kw can be assured that he has reduced the lighting cost by 25%. This holds true for other energy sources as well. If the sources of all water use in a building are flow reduced by 50%, the owner can be assured of a 50% reduction in the water bill. That math works every time. There are also economic impacts that are accepted as valid but are not measurable such as employee retention, increased productivity, less sick time, lower insurance costs, and the like that are byproducts of a healthy building design.
Another key component for a property owner is the economic impact of marketing the property as a Green Space Project™ certified building. There has not been incontrovertible evidence that “green” buildings will command higher rents. Some do and some don’t so we will leave that as a possible economic benefit to the owner. The marketing and public relations impact is significant to the desirability of the property and the owner’s image in the community. Business has always recognized this as having a positive economic benefit in the marketplace. A Green Space Project™ certified building will produce lower utility bills for the owner (or tenants if separately metered), a positive impact on human resources, and a tremendous amount of public relations and goodwill.
Social
A Green Space Project™ certified building has many valuable social impacts to the community it serves. Although we can’t put numerical figures on these impacts, they are generally accepted as valid. Green Space Project™ certified buildings enhance occupant comfort and health, they tend to tend to enhance the aesthetic qualities of life, minimize the strain on local infrastructure to support them, and improve the overall quality of life for those it encounters.
1We acknowledge that those versed in thermodynamics can likely argue this as being incorrect from a purely scientific perspective but hold that it stands true in practicality.
2Document Link