Published Works

It seems that almost every major hotel brand has rolled out a green hospitality program over the past few years, and for good reason. With round-the-clock operations, utilities are a huge portion of overall operating expenses. Rarely do you flick on the room light anymore and find an incandescent bulb. That phase-out started in guest rooms years ago. From Kimpton Hotels where every property is GreenSeal certified to Element (Starwood’s new 100 percent LEED-certified brand) to IHG’s Green Engage program, the bulk of the national brands are pushing green initiatives. Study after study shows that people would rather stay at a green property, and these properties can command higher room rates. The federal government and more and more businesses are requiring employees to stay at green hotels, if available, and the conference industry is rapidly making sustainable venues and accommodations deciding criteria regarding where events will be located. Read more

Ten years ago, there was this fresh new kid on the block, one no one had seen before. Wildly different than the common way of thinking about designing and constructing buildings, this new concept was seen by supporters and critics as visionary, radical, market-changing, unnecessary, useless and industry defining. I’m guessing you won’t have to think too hard to realize I’m talking about the LEED rating system. A mere decade or so ago, LEED was introduced to a range of emotions and reactions on both sides. Indeed, while more commonly accepted today, the system still raises strong feelings, both for and against. Read more

Designing and constructing green buildings is the easy part — especially for nice, big office buildings where tenants have 10-year leases, or for retail centers with long-term clients. Or heck, even for schools, hospitals and civic buildings where the owner or end-user never changes! From a green perspective, that makes life so much easier for those who are actually managing and maintaining those projects. Turnover is low, capital improvements are way down the line, and outside of the general preventative maintenance and other daily activities, things can be pretty quiet. Read more

Green schools, what a no brainer! Of any buildings (other than hospitals), where does it make more sense to have a focus on daylighting, high indoor air quality, connection to exteriors and, of course, high-efficiency systems than in schools — the places where we educate the future of our nation? LEED for Schools has been rolled out in the past few years and has seen a good adoption rate at the K-12 levels. I’ve had the opportunity to work on three of these schools, so I’m going to pass on a few impressions. Read more

Of all the building types that should pursue sustainable design and operations, health care facilities make the most sense, don’t they? From hospitals with round the clock operations to medical offices where patients share their deepest health issues with their physicians, green health care makes absolute sense. Read more

What’s a million square feet and green? Why, a LEED-certified warehouse facility, of course! Many people can’t see how buildings with such large footprints
that disturb so much land can ever be green. But the growing number of LEED-certified warehouse facilities is helping to buck this perception.

I’m not saying that just because a warehouse is LEED-certified it doesn’t have an intense impact on the environment. But having these facilities all over the country is necessary to easily distribute the products our economy is built around. What I’m saying is: Since they are so necessary, shouldn’t we be building
these facilities to be as green as possible? Having worked on nearly a half dozen LEED-certified warehouse projects up and down the east coast (ranging in size from 200,000 square feet to nearly a million square feet), I’ve learned that creating a green warehouse is really easier than it may seem. Read more

Building a green retail facility today has become relatively easy. Not to dismiss the process or say it’s a walk in the park, but compared to building the fi rst LEED retail shopping center in the U.S. back in 2003-2004 (Abercorn Common), today’s designers, code officials and especially tenants have a much greater understanding of sustainable design, LEED certification and green building technologies. Fortunately, when we propose a grey water system that uses rainwater to flush toilets, we no longer hear, “What happens if someone drinks out of the toilet?” as the first question. Ah, how far we’ve come. Read more

Keeping VOCs out of your building isn’t easy. First, you need to be aware of and monitor the hundreds of products that are coming in and out of your building. Second, the VOC level stamped in micro-fi ne print onto the side of a product’s packaging is nearly impossible to read — if it’s listed at all. Otherwise, you’re left searching through page after page of MSDS sheets and technical data sheets. Finally, VOCs turn up in the products you least suspect. Read more

From Governor Schwarzenegger on 60 Minutes recently to the ongoing lawsuits and legislation emerging between Georgia, Florida and Alabama, the importance of wisely using our water resources has never been more in the spotlight.

Nationwide we have a water deficit of nearly 3,700 billion gallons annually — meaning we are taking out 3,700 billion gallons more water than we are returning to our rivers, reservoirs and aquifers — and that is not a sustainable path for secure water supplies in the future. Read more

I can’t speak for everybody, but I know a vast majority of the people I talk to say, “thank goodness 2009 is over.” It has been a rough 18 months for most of us in the building industry, but if you believe the analysts, at least things are supposed to get better in 2010. I sure hope so.

What has been refreshing to see is that even in these challenging times, the prevalence of green building has continued to grow. It certainly has been a buyer’s market, with new tenants in control of lease negotiations and current tenants asking for concessions. But as building owners and managers scrambled
to cut costs, hold onto existing tenants, and maybe even fi nd a few new ones, they realized greening their facility could help on all three fronts. Read more