Sustainability efforts will continue to make progress in 2012, according to a report from Jones Lang LaSalle. Here are four major trends expected to shape the sustainable development of commercial buildings, including hotels:
Transparency: Buildings, companies and cities are measuring and disclosing energy usage, carbon emissions and other information relating to sustainability. Commercial building owners don’t always have a choice: Five major U.S. cities and two states have enacted energy performance measurement and disclosure policies to date, and nine more cities and states have bills under considerations, to help tenants and investors make better informed decisions. Buildings in Europe are required to display energy performance certificates, and Australia is implementing similar requirements.
Corporations don’t require legal mandates to encourage disclosure. In 2011, more than 3,000 companies, including 404 Global 500 firms, voluntarily reported their carbon emissions, water management, and climate change policies to Carbon Disclosure Project in 2011, perhaps swayed by CDP’s 551 investor members, who use the information in deciding where to place more than $71 trillion in investment capital.
Global consistency: Deeper sustainability reporting by cities and multi-national corporations has intensified the need for consistent ways to measure the effectiveness of energy, water, and other sustainability strategies on a worldwide basis. Given the wide regional variation in environmental priorities around the world, the end goal may not be a single global standard but a way to translate local government and business practices into a common global vocabulary for measuring effectiveness and recognizing achievement.
The U.S.-based LEED system is now frequently pursued in many countries with their own systems, as owners seek to attract international tenants. Energy Star will soon be able to provide accurate ratings across North America, thanks to a new cooperative agreement with Canada. And in 2011 the International Organization for Standardization released the ISO 50001 standard for energy management systems, which includes specifications for measurement, documentation, and reporting on energy consumption.
Consistent measurement is important to corporations as they focus on sustainability not only in their own operations but, increasingly, throughout their supply chain as well.
Public/private collaboration: 2011 stood out as a year when government and business organizations explored their shared green goals and realized that public-private partnerships and collaborative initiatives are often the best way to overcome obstacles to sustainability. For example, a $4 billion energy retrofit commitment by the U.S. federal government and 60 CEOs, mayors, university presidents, and labor leaders was announced in December. Called the Better Buildings Challenge, the eight-year initiative includes $2 billion in energy upgrades of federal buildings and another $2 billion of private capital to improve energy by 20 percent in buildings totaling 1.5 billion square feet.
In addition, groups ranging from the World Economic Forum to Greenprint Foundation have called for changes to loan underwriting guidelines set by governmental bodies to facilitate financing of energy retrofits. More directly, U.S. states have found they can increase renewable energy installations at buildings by offering incentives that would make solar power cost-effective for owners within a relatively short period.
Focus on solar energy: More than 1 gigawatt of photovoltaic solar energy capacity was installed across the U.S. in the first three quarters of 2011, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA). By comparison, 887 megawatts came online in all of 2010, which represented a doubling of the total installed base at the time.
Solar energy installations at commercial properties drove much of the market growth in 2011, but the pace of new installations dropped significantly in the third quarter, SEIA reported. The big story going into 2012 is the unprecedented rise in utility-based installations, which jumped by 325 percent from the second to the third quarter.
The strength of the solar market in 2012 and beyond will be affected by several variables, including basic supply and demand economics, technological improvements, and the amount and type of available incentives. Interest in solar energy continues to grow as payback periods grow shorter and fossil fuel costs continue to rise.
