Big Apple Buildings to Benefit from Energy Efficiency Retrofits

At the seventh annual meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative in New York City this week, former President Bill Clinton took the podium to announce an agreement shaped by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) that is intended to improve the energy efficiency of commercial buildings – and in doing so, to boost the market for commercial space – in the Big Apple (News - Alert).

The mission of the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI (News - Alert)) is “to inspire, connect, and empower a community of global leaders to forge solutions to the world's most pressing challenges.” To date, CGI members have made nearly 2,000 commitments geared to alleviate poverty, create a cleaner environment, and increase access to health care and education in more than 180 countries worldwide. When fully funded and implemented, these commitments will be valued in excess of $63 billion.

Now, NRDC has teamed with Clinton's global consortium to get more commercial buildings to weatherize and improve performance. Clinton said several major commercial tenants in the city – including Bloomberg (News - Alert) LP, LinkedIn, and Jones Lang LaSalle – already have agreed to comply with the program, which will replicate a $550 million energy efficient retrofit project at the Empire State Building that has reportedly cut electric bills by more than 40 percent (and gained LEED Gold for Existing Buildings certification).

“By making commercial buildings more energy efficient, we can not only reduce harmful air pollution; we can save property owners and tenants serious cash,” said Yerina Mugica, associate director for NRDC’s NRDC's Center for Market Innovation. “By bringing together the right mix of stakeholders –building owners, managers, occupants, financiers, and efficiency experts – we can clear the roadblocks that are keeping the building sector from taking advantage of major savings in energy costs. The Clinton Global Initiative is connecting the dots to provide more access to these economic benefits within the commercial real estate industry.”

The three-year project is being underwritten by Goldman Sachs and the Rockefeller Foundation. Mugica said that, together with the other participants, NRDC might push the commercial real estate market in the direction of improving efficiency for buildings – which are responsible for 80 percent of the city's carbon output.

Each participant’s strengths will contribute to the collaboration:

• Jones Lang LaSalle will identify potential tenant and owner participants, and will propose cost-effective efficiency measures for these participants;
• Johnson Controls will also advise on potential efficiency improvements, and will help develop and implement the measures to track actual energy savings;
• Vornado Realty and Malkin Holdings will help identify project opportunities, and provide data from their portfolios that demonstrate how efficiency upgrades to building central systems can enhance the benefits that accrue to tenants ;
• YR&G will assist in the development of materials that support a broad range of designers, tenant facility managers, and executives in their respective understanding of the process and opportunity for high performance build-outs;
• Goldman Sachs will identify financing options.

NRDC’s Center for Market Innovation will ensure robust and transparent measurement, verification, and reporting of energy savings from the improvements, as well as work with project partners to develop a blueprint for replicating successes from the initiatives; and

Greenprint Foundation will assist with the design of data collection methodology for the demonstration projects’ measurement and verification protocols, integrating these with existing Greenprint data collection and reporting procedures.

The goal is to help other tenants nationwide to identify the savings potential efficiency can offer, and provide a roadmap they can follow, in order to boost the market for energy efficient commercial building space. While many people are trying to accelerate the growth of this market, the project is unique for two reasons: It focuses on tenant demand for green buildings as the driver for increasing the energy efficiency market. And the expertise in the project team includes industry leaders from every aspect of the market.

“Bloomberg's commitment to sustainability is central to our values and retrofitting our space with a focus on energy efficiency makes strong business and environmental sense,” said Bloomberg President and CEO Dan Doctoroff. “We have nearly 50 percent of our employees working in LEED-certified buildings around the globe and our strategic approach has driven operation costs down, growth revenue up and ultimately encouraged greater sustainability awareness for our employees and customers alike.”