Sustainable Development Focus
Urban Land - Oct 27 A new ULI program that helps office tenants design and manage their spaces to reduce energy consumption could help the real estate industry reduce emissions that are driving climate change. But at the program’s rollout at ULI’s 2016 Fall Meeting in Dallas, panelists said that the new ULI Tenant Energy Optimization Program is likely to have a more far-reaching impact than that of many previous environmental initiatives because it offers a compelling, well-documented business case that energy efficiency can generate a lucrative return on investment. Tenants participating in the step-by-step design and construction process and the post-construction monitoring phase could see energy savings of 30 to 50 percent, and an average internal rate of return of 25 percent on their investment.
The Registry - Nov 2 The Association of Bay Area Governments and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission recently conducted public outreach meetings in all nine San Francisco Bay Area counties for “Plan Bay Area 2040.” The new plan, scheduled for adoption in summer 2017, will replace the original 2013 Plan Bay Area as the region’s sustainable communities strategy. As part of the state’s effort to achieve ambitious greenhouse gas reduction goals, Senate Bill 375 requires each of the state’s 18 metropolitan planning organizations to adopt a “sustainable communities strategy.” The targets are designed to be achieved through regional land use and transportation strategies and not to reflect changes in vehicle emissions standards or fuel economy that are expected to independently reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The current reduction targets for the Bay Area are seven percent by 2020 and 15 percent by 2035.
Bloomberg - Nov 3 FivePoint, a real estate developer whose largest shareholder is Lennar Corp., said it’s come up with an environmental proposal that should allow it to move forward with a $12.7 billion master-planned community, known as Newhall Ranch, in northern Los Angeles County. The California Supreme Court in 2015 ruled that Newhall’s environmental impact report didn’t meet state requirements for greenhouse-gas emissions and avoiding the endangered unarmored threespine stickleback fish when building bridges. FivePoint said it expects the court’s concerns to be satisfied by a new plan, announced last Thursday, that calls for zero-net-energy construction standards, electric-vehicle charging stations at each of 21,500 planned homes, electric school buses, and funding for emission reductions in California and around the world.
Proud Green Building - Nov 3 Bishop Ranch, the largest mixed-use business community in Northern California, has been re-awarded LEED gold and silver certification from the U.S. Green Building Council for 25 of its office buildings, according to a press release. One of the first LEED Block Certification projects in the world, Bishop Ranch is also considered one of the most ambitious “LEED for Existing Building” (LEED-EB) projects, with more than eight million square feet of office space. It remains the largest concentration of LEED-certified buildings outside of an urban area, officials say. Highlights of Bishop Ranch’s achievement include: achieving an average reduction of 25.3 percent for indoor water use, reporting 15,634.70 metric tons of CO2 saved compared to similar buildings nationally, and seeing a 31 percent reduction in conventional, single-driver vehicle commuting.
TechCrunch - Nov 3 The renewable energy services company Arcadia Power has just launched a new product that allows renters across the U.S. to buy renewable energy. Arcadia’s logic is simple. There are a number of renters or non-homeowners who would like to be able to invest in sustainable energy, but don’t have the means. Those people are barred from such direct investments in a solar project because they live in multi-tenant houses, and can’t just throw up a solar panel anywhere they want. Using Arcadia, these environmentally minded consumers can invest in projects across the U.S. and reap the benefits of that energy generation as if it were coming from their own home.
