Atlas shrugs no more Movers and shakers get hip to energy savings By JOHN GOLDEN

Atlas shrugs no more
Movers and shakers get hip to energy savings

“It’s like moving an iceberg,” said architect Jason Black, describing the process of going green in the commercial sector. “You want to try little small tasks and gain acceptance.”

The Clarence D. Rappleyea Building, headquarters to the New York Power Authority, at 123 Main St. in White Plains.

A regional architect at the Reckson division of SL Green Realty Corp., one of the largest landlords in Westchester and Fairfield counties, and a member of the Westchester County Global Warming Task Force, Black gently yet ardently preaches the gospel of sustainability within his own company and among building tenants and colleagues in commercial real estate. The business practices he, Nobel Prize for Peace winner Al Gore and numerous others advance seem to gain ever more converts as the global climate crisis has become as unavoidable in the public consciousness as Black’s metaphorical iceberg.

Addressing a recent meeting of the Westchester County chapter of the Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA), Black described a “major hurdle” for businesses starting “the process of green” in their offices: awareness, acknowledgment and acceptance. Yet those hurdles are falling fast in the commercial real estate industry as sustainable practices gain widespread acceptance and cut operational costs and turn profits for users.

As part of that tsunami-force sea change, BOMA International last summer during its centennial celebration issued its Market Transformation Energy Plan and 7-Point Challenge. The plan challenges commercial real estate professionals to improve energy efficiency across their portfolios by 30 percent by 2012 and to reduce their use of natural resources, nonrenewable energy sources and waste production in coordination with building management, ownership and tenants.

A 30-kilowatt micro-turbione at NYPA headquarters saves energy costs and emissions during peak-demand office hours.

To achieve that goal, the 16,500-member organization launched its BOMA Energy Efficiency Program, a six-course regimen on how to reduce energy consumption and costs with no- and low-cost strategies for optimizing equipment, personnel and practices.

BOMA officials pointed out the commercial real estate industry spends approximately $24 billion annually on energy and contributes 18 percent of carbon dioxide emissions in the U.S. Energy is the single-largest controllable operating expense for office buildings, typically one-third of variable expenses.

At the 365,000-square-foot Reckson Metro Center at 360 Hamilton Ave. in downtown White Plains, Reckson officials work with New Jersey-based Public Energy Solutions, contractor for Con Ed’s metropolitan Operation Kill-A-Watt program, to retrofit light fixtures and save on electrical use and costs. Similar lighting upgrades are being done in Reckson’s portfolio buildings, Black said. In existing commercial buildings in Westchester, he said, “There’s a lot of room to upgrade light fixtures.”

With state and federal tax incentives and rebates for lighting and other energy-efficient improvements, “You can actually reduce the payback to a matter of months, depending on the application,” he said.

“Given the abundant amount of energy” used in commercial buildings, Black said, “It needs to be seen as a small, long-term process. It’s basically a process of building momentum. I think the important point to understand about sustainability is that all effort, small or large, can make a difference. And by starting small, you can open the door for much larger things and larger opportunities.”

Joining a growing trend among commercial landlords and developers, Reckson has begun recycling construction materials following demolition to prepare office spaces for tenants. The company this year has reclaimed and recycled 250,000 square feet each of ceiling tiles and carpeting, the equivalent of 150 tons of debris, Black said. In construction projects, the company uses materials with recycled content, he said.

This cooling system accounts for the bulk of energy and cost savings at the NYPA headquarters.

In its own offices at 360 Hamilton, Reckson, like other area employers, has started a recycling program for employees. About 100 pounds of plastic, glass and aluminum have been recycled since last spring, Black said.

Among commercial tenants, demand for “green” office space has been “mixed,” Black said. “All tenants at some level are becoming much more aware of the environment and wanting to be sustainable,” he said. “Most recently, you are starting to see more requests and more inquiries about this.” For landlords, “Trying to offer that as part of your core is critical. You really have to take it on a case-by-case basis.”

Some major corporations in Westchester have taken the lead in going green. At Morgan Stanley offices in Purchase, the global investment company this year installed the metropolitan area’s largest ice-storage-based air conditioning system. The system, which makes ice at night during off-peak hours to provide cooling during peak day hours, is expected to lower the facility's peak energy usage by 740 kilowatts, reduce overall electric usage by 900,000 kilowatt-hours and reduce the facility’s overall fuel consumption by 15,000 million British thermal units, all annually.

Headquartered in Purchase, PepsiCo in October received a 2007 Green Power Leadership award from the U.S Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The company is ranked first on the EPA’s Fortune 500 List of purchasers of power generated from renewable resources such as solar, wind, geothermal, biogas, biomass and low-impact hydro, with purchases of more than 1 billion kilowatt-hours of green power annually.

In White Plains, the New York Power Authority (NYPA) has been at the forefront of the burgeoning green building movement. In January, the state agency reached the gold standard in going green, when it received the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold designation for its headquarters at 123 Main St., the 17-story, 450,000-square-foot Clarence D. Rappleyea Building. The NYPA-owned building, which has 14 office tenants, was the first existing building in the state to earn LEED Gold status and is one of only 19 such buildings in the country.

NYPA’s initial building upgrade five years ago saved $450,000 yearly in electricity costs, cut greenhouse gas emissions by nearly 2,800 tons and saved more than 7,300 barrels of oil a year. More recent improvements are expected to cut annual water use by 130,000 gallons, NYPA officials said.

In new construction, going green has become almost a competitive requirement for developers.

“Most new construction projects are utilizing some elements of LEED,” the national industry standard for energy-efficient, environmentally sustainable design, “but not all of them are becoming LEED-certified,’” said Steve Baker, a broker at Cushman & Wakefield of Connecticut Inc. in Stamford. Cushman & Wakefield is leasing agent at the 1 million-square-foot Fairfield Metro Center, a $250 million mixed-use development by Blackrock Realty L.L.C. in Fairfield, and Baker works with prospective tenants at the LEED-certified project.

“We’re using the green building as a way to attract tenants,” he said. “Corporations now have a mandate to conduct themselves in a more environmentally friendly way and one of those ways is to occupy space that is LEED-certified as greener, more efficient and thus lower cost to use.”

While construction costs are higher for green buildings, building operating costs are lower, “so the net cost to a tenant is almost negligible,” Baker said.

With more efficient design, the typical space-loss factor for a tenant is reduced 15 percent to 20 percent in a LEED building, the broker said. “Many corporations are actually well informed about this and are looking to take advantage of properties with LEED infrastructure.”

“I think it’s become the standard,” said Joseph Apicella, senior vice president at Cappelli Enterprises Inc. in Valhalla. The Cappelli company’s soon-to-open Residences at the Ritz-Carlton in White Plains is LEED-certified. In Stamford, Cappelli has teamed with Donald Trump and F.D. Rich Co. on the 34-story, $160 million Trump Parc Stamford, a 170-unit residential tower that will follow LEED standards.

“It’s something that’s no longer a luxury; it’s a necessity for a building,” Apicella said. “We think it’s part of smart growth” in downtown areas near emissions-reducing mass transportation.

“There is a premium associated with it, but I think the public is willing to pay for it,” Apicella said. “The consciousness of the buyer is at a level now where they’re willing to step up to the plate and pay more for environmentally sustainable development.”