Green building

Yesterday at City Council's committee meetings I urged my fellow council members to lead the way in green building with the new downtown library, and expressed my hope that any building constructed by the City of Pensacola going forward is built with green standards in mind.

Also check out Mark O'Brien's blog today: "Environmental awareness may be part of new library"

Green Design: Launching LEED for Retail

For retailers, very little other than the product or service being sold can say as much to their customer about their environmental commitment than their retail space. In an increasingly environmentally-aware world, savvy retailers understand how buildings can add value to their brand and are also wary of compromising the brand with greenwashing claims. These retailers are turning to green building strategies and the LEED green building certification system to demonstrate and support their corporate social responsibility commitments, educate their customers and verify their accomplishments through third-party certification.

Green building is not a new concept – but it’s relatively new to the retail market. LEED was developed by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) in 2000, and for the last several years, USGBC has been working with the retail industry and a committee of industry experts to develop LEED credits that are more specific to retail building types. LEED for Retail New Construction and LEED for Retail Commercial Interiors, built on the experience from 95 pilot projects, is currently undergoing member ballot. Once the system passes ballot, it will provide certification paths for both ground-up retail construction and retail commercial interiors.

LEED for Retail is aligned with the new LEED 2009 rating system and is anticipated to be available for use in July 2009. The 100-point scale covers the same key environmental areas as the LEED 2009 rating system. Key technical differences in the rating system include adaptations to account for both employees and customers in transportation and daylighting strategies. Additionally, LEED for Retail addresses process water and energy, both of which now have baselines created with the help of retailers and the food service technology industry.

Despite the economy and the slow-down of construction in the retail market, there is tremendous market transformation occurring within the retail sector. A number of retailers have already built LEED into their standard prototype designs and plan to seek certification on future stores. Since 300 retailers are already in the process of using LEED, the scalability of this market provides huge opportunities to minimize this sector’s environmental impact.

Marc Heisterkamp

Director of Commercial Real Estate

U.S. Green Building Council