Seminar on Profitable Green Building

The Consulate General of Sweden arranged a seminar on green building in cooperation with Skanska on October 14. The seminar featured prominent speakers Tim McEnery (Vice President, US Green Building Council), Olle Cyrén (Head of Department, Stockholm City Development Administration) and Kevin Kampschroer (Acting Director, Office of Federal High- Performance Green Buildings, US General Services Administration), discussing the business case for green building in the US.

Tim McEnery stressed US Green Building Councils' mission to marry the green sustainability objective with financial viability and noted the great international interest in the LEED certification of green buildings. Currently around 30 per cent of LEED certifications come from outside of the US, despite virtually no marketing effort from USGBC. McEnery estimated the green building market in 2008 to 12 billion USD and predicted no less than a five-fold increase until 2010. McEnery mentioned the partnership with the Clinton Climate Initiative and noticed that Stockholm Royal Seaport is one of 12 global projects.

Olle Cyrén presented the Stockholm projects Hammarby Sjöstad and Stockholm Royal Seaport as examples of a SymbioCity concept. Whereas Hammarby Sjöstad achieved large energy savings and increases in property value, the Royal Seaport project will aim for even greater achievements including a drastic reduction in carbon footprint per capita. Cyrén concluded by mentioning the
European Union’s recognition by awarding Stockholm the first Green Capital Award.

Kevin Kampschroer presented the administrations ambitious efforts to create and save jobs through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, not least in the area of energy savings. Kampschroers agency is responsible for a budget of 5 billion USD to stimulate energy savings in buildings, the majority through refitting existing buildings. Current examples show a great potential with a pay back time on investments of no more than one year.

Elizabeth Heider, Senior Vice President, Skanska USA Building, made a convincing business case for green building based both on Skanska's own experience as tenants in the Empire State Building and various studies. Heider’s conclusion was that building green is profitable today and part of Skanska's competitive advantage.

The seminar was concluded with a panel discussion on "How to make Green Building profitable in the US" led by Frank Mruk, Associate Dean, New York Institute of Technology. The panellist were asked about their recipes to advance green building in the US. Jonathan Drescher (the Durst Organization) emphasised the current demand for green buildings and that his organisation as long-term owners, looked at a life-cycle cost analysis allowing them to make the economic case for green building. Dan Kaplan (Senior Partner, FXFOWLE Architects) argued that today’s commercial customers take green for granted as a pre-requisite for new buildings. Anthony Malkin (President of Malkin Holdings) stressed that energy efficiency is the key factor to make a difference and that the industry to make a real impact needs to "drive it all to dollars". Olov Hemström (Senior Project Leader, Swedish Trade Council) highlighted the need to widen the perspective from buildings to neighbourhoods to capture the economic and environmental benefits and asked for more federal incentives for small-scale energy production in the US.

The seminar was well-attended with the majority of the participants from US companies in the industry.

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