President Clinton Announces the Launch of California’s Best Buildings Challenge at 2012 Clinton Global Initiative America

Jason Hartke
Vice President, National Policy
U.S. Green Building Council

Add six companies…five million square feet of collective real estate…and one challenge. Stir.

What do you get?

A recipe for something remarkable – not just better buildings, but best buildings. In other words, California’s Best Buildings Challenge.

Yesterday, six major leading companies – Adobe, Genentech, Google, Prudential Real Estate Investors, SAP and Zynga – stepped up to the Challenge, a commitment to achieve not just a 20 percent reduction in energy but also in water and waste.

The kicker? They’re doing it in 2 years.

President Clinton announced the Challenge at yesterday's CGI America conference

California’s Best Buildings Challenge, a joint effort of the U.S. Green Building Council and its Northern California Chapter, gained significant national recognition today when President Clinton highlighted the effort at the closing plenary of the Clinton Global Initiative America conference in Chicago.

"Greater building efficiency can make - listen to this - can make available to us 85 percent of future U.S. Energy demand and a national commitment to green building has the potential to create 2.5 million jobs," said President Clinton. "It is also by far the most labor rich of all the clean energy investments. A billion dollar invetment in energy efficiency yields about seven thousand jobs."

Top 10: How the Golden State Became the Green Building Leader

Matt Pearce
Campaign Specialist
U.S. Green Building Council

"If you would understand anything, observe its beginning and its development." – Aristotle

Yesterday marked a pivotal moment for state and local green building policy wins. In the state capitol of California, USGBC, in partnership with the eight chapters that make up USGBC California, announced the Top 10 list of California state and local green building policies. The list celebrates decades of leadership by state and local governments to advance green buildings through effective policies and codes.

Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson at the Top 10 Event

But it was a stop-the-presses moment when we learned that Gov. Brown issued a sweeping executive order yesterday - addressing LEED certification, emissions reduction and more - ensuring that California continues to be a national leader in green building. At our reception at the CalEPA LEED Platinum building, we applauded Gov. Brown for his dedication to green building and his lifetime achievement working to protect the environment.

“We must lead by example," said Brown. "Greening the state's buildings will shrink our environmental footprint and save taxpayers millions of dollars."

Top 10 States for LEED Green Buildings

Ashley Katz
Media Manager
U.S. Green Building Council

Today, USGBC released its top 10 list of states with the most LEED-certified building square footage per capita. The District of Columbia leads the nation, with more than 31 square feet of LEED-certified space per person in 2011, and Colorado is the leading state, with 2.74 square feet per person in 2011. Other top states include Illinois, Virginia and Washington, with 2.69, 2.42 and 2.18 square feet of LEED-certified space per person, respectively.

What's a Green Building? California's 2011 Building Codes & LEED

Dan Geiger
Executive Director
USGBC-Northern California Chapter

Source: USGBC-NCC.org

California’s new building codes took effect January 1, 2011, and policy makers and the industry continue to explore its implications and impact. Referred to as CalGreen, the codes have raised the floor on minimum building standards for new construction, incorporated green elements into base code, and as such are another manifestation of California’s leadership in the green economy.

There has been quite a bit of discussion about the relationship between the codes and rating systems like LEED. I’d like to place this issue in a larger context of the overall sustainability goals of California and the importance of leadership in the building industry.

The first distinction to keep in mind is that codes and rating systems are fundamentally, necessarily, and structurally different but complementary systems. Codes mandate minimum standards and some specific measures, whereas rating systems like LEED define leadership standards, are performance based, and are rigorously verified by an independent third party.

Industry and policy analysts widely agree that LEED is significantly more rigorous than the new building codes, and is the most powerful tool available for market transformation. In addition, LEED has systems for existing buildings, commercial interiors, core and shell, schools, neighborhoods and more. One way to think of all this is that codes define the floor (and are the law), whereas LEED sets the ceiling.

Click here to read the rest of the article on the USGBC-NCC site.