return on investmentreturn on investment: high performance buildings the state of minnesota oversees...

MINNESOTA PLAN NING C R I T I C A L I S S U E S

R E T U R N O N I N V E S T M E N THIGH PERFORMANCE BUILDINGS

January 2002 Perspectives Series

Whole building■ Geo-Exchange heat pump system

(no furnace)

■ Low-emissivity, insulated windows

■ Native prairie restoration

■ 100 percent onsite stormwaterretention

■ Naturally enhanced biofiltrationof runoff

■ Fly ash in pre-cast concrete panels

■ Window sills made fromagricultural waste

■ 80 percent of construction wastereused or recycled

On the Cover

The Phillips Eco-Enterprise Center in Minneapolis is a $6 million, 64,000-square-foot state-of-the-art commercial and industrial facilitythat opened its doors in fall 1999. Photos are by Brian Droege of Brian Droege Photography.

Roof■ Solar-tracking skylights

■ Green roof with monolithicmembrane, drainageand filter

Staircase and foyer■ Reused steel joists and brick

■ Salvaged stair-treads

■ 100 percent recycledcontent tile

Office interior■ Operable windows

■ Energy recovery ventilation

■ Low and no-emission coatingsand adhesives

■ Daylight and air-quality controls

■ Showers and changing room

■ High-efficiency light fixtures

■ Energy management system

■ World’s first 100 percentrecyclable carpet

■ Salvaged sinks, carpet, cabinetry,decking and benches

Minnesota Planning is a state agency whose mission is to identify strategic issues and provide the information,analysis, coordination and tools necessary for informed decision-making that will guide Minnesota’s future.

The Critical Issues Team at Minnesota Planning examines emerging issues that could have a significant effecton Minnesota’s governments, its people, economy and natural resources.

Perspectives is a series of policy briefs on critical and emerging issues affecting Minnesota’s government,citizens, economy and environment.

Return on Investment: High Performance Buildings was prepared by Rolf Nordstrom and is available on theMinnesota Planning Internet site at www.mnplan.state.mn.us.

This report was printed on recycled paper with soy-based ink.

Upon request, this document will be made available in an alternate format, such as Braille, large print or audiotape. For TTY, contact Minnesota Relay Service at 800-627-3529 and ask for Minnesota Planning. For additionalprinted copies, contact Minnesota Planning at 651-296-3985.

CRITICAL ISSUESRoom 300

658 Cedar St.St. Paul, MN 55155

651-296-3985

www.mnplan.state.mn.us

January 2002

MINNESOTA PLAN N I NG

The Phillips Eco-Enterprise Center was designed by LHB Engineers & Architects, Sebesta Blomberg, and the Weidt Group.

January 2002 Perspectives Minnesota Planning 1

C O N T E N T S

State of the state’scapital management 2

Defining high performance buildings 3

Predesign phase 4

Minnesota’s efforts 6

Implications forMinnesota’s schools 11

State and federal efforts 13

Local governmentstaking action 14

The private sector 15

Recommendations 16

Sources 19

State and Federal Efforts 20

2001 Legislative Session Update 28

Glossary

Return onInvestment:High PerformanceBuildingsThe state of Minnesota oversees morethan 6,000 properties and 73 millionsquare feet of space, with a replacementvalue of over $7 billion. The siting, design,construction, operation, maintenance,renovation and demolition of state-fundedbuildings have significant impacts on thecost of government, the productivity ofemployees, and on the state’s economyand environment.

Emerging changes in the way buildings aresited, oriented, designed, built, operated,maintained and renovated could reducethe lifetime costs of state-funded buildingswhile improving their environmentalperformance and increasing the produc-tivity of the people in them. There is botha “what” and a “how” to capitalizing onthese changes and continually improvingthe economic, environmental and humanproductivity performance of statebuildings. The state could:

Evaluate capital investments basedon a building’s life-cycle costs andbenefits, including eventual real estatevalue after its initial useful life has ended.For example, a building constructed withpotential future uses in mind may actuallyappreciate in value rather than becoming adisposal cost.

In addition, the state could continue tomove toward a whole-building costingmethod that adheres strictly to an overallbudget for construction but allows higherthan conventional costs for some things ifit means lower costs for others.

For example, advanced windows,daylighting devices, raised floors and moreefficient mechanical systems might bemore expensive than the norm, but whencombined may allow the downsizing orelimination of other building costs, such assmaller chillers, less ductwork or fewerlighting fixtures.

Legislation passed in the 2001 sessionrequires new state-funded buildings tofocus on achieving the lowest possiblelifetime cost.

Develop measurable performancestandards for state-funded buildingsappropriate for Minnesota’s climate. Boththe legislative and executive branches ofMinnesota state government spelled outnew goals for state-funded buildingsduring the 2001 Legislative Session (see2001 Legislative Session Update on page28). The goals cover such things asimprovements in energy conservation, airquality and reducing material costs.Beyond broad goals, though, agencies donot have specific performance benchmarksthat they must hit in many of these areasin order for their buildings to qualify as“high performance” structures.

Measure and track buildingperformance. This means commissioningall state-funded buildings after they arebuilt to check that their systems areworking properly. It also means regularlymonitoring and adjusting buildingperformance in order to improve facilitymanagement, reduce maintenanceproblems, and identify ways to improvefuture buildings.

Help agencies to define as early aspossible how their capital projectswill contribute to the state’s highperformance building goals. In its FY2002 – 2007 Capital Budget Instructions,the Minnesota Department of Financestates that “projects that receive statefunding will be expected to employ highperformance building practices.” Thebudget instructions go on to define 10broad high performance goals thatagencies should strive toward (see page8). To be successful, agencies needtechnical assistance on high performancebuilding practices during the earliestplanning stages of their projects.

Establish an expert review of highperformance building practices aspart of the capital budget process.The new goals articulated by theDepartment of Finance set newexpectations for state-funded buildings,but the agencies involved in puttingtogether the capital budget still need toreach agreement on the details of whowill evaluate bonding proposals for “highperformance” and when and how thatevaluation will be done.

Employ multidisciplinary buildingdesign teams that bring together allinvolved from the predesign phaseonward, including architects, engineers,regulators, contractors, facility managers,users and disposers of property. Thisallows the design team to optimize thebuilding’s performance as a whole,avoiding the traditional focus on eachpart of the building separately. This teamprocess requires higher costs in theplanning phases, but can lead to lowerlifetime costs.

Establish an incentive and feestructure that rewards allparticipants in the building process forreducing a building’s lifetime costs andimproving its environmental andproductivity performance. The MinnesotaDepartment of Finance has taken a step inthis direction by awarding extra points inits review process to capital projects that“can demonstrate a reduction in netoperating costs (building operating costsor salary expenses) or which result inincreased efficiencies.” Another

2 Minnesota Planning Perspectives January 2002

possibility is performance contracting thatpays architects and engineers forsuccessfully designing out expensivemechanical equipment in favor of buildingproducts and designs that achieve thesame outcomes at lower long-term cost.

Educate everyone involved in astate-funded building project on highperformance building practices andtechnologies. Each profession involved inthe building process needs to understandthe performance goals for the project, theopportunities and constraints presented bythe other disciplines, and the potential forsynergistic solutions that are better thanany one discipline could achieve on itsown.

Lead by example throughdemonstration projects. States such asNew Jersey, Pennsylvania and Iowa areusing demonstration buildings as a way tomake the transition toward higherperformance buildings, raise awareness oftheir potential benefits, stimulate marketdemand, and gain practical experience forfuture capital investments. The state ofMinnesota should use its current pilotprojects to understand and define thechallenges and opportunities presented bythe current building environment (codes,regulations, and availability of highperformance building products).

This report introduces high performancebuildings as a distinct set of emerging

“best practices” within the building trade,describes the current state of Minnesota’scapital management, and discusses howthe state is already pursuing highperformance buildings. It briefly touches onthe implications of high performancebuildings for Minnesota’s schools, surveysfederal, state and local efforts, describeswhat is happening in the private sector,and offers 10 broad policy recommen-dations for integrating high performancebuilding practices into the state’s capitalinvestment process.

State of the state’scapital management

For the second time since 1998, and withthe help of Syracuse University in NewYork, Governing magazine is evaluatingthe governments of all 50 states as part ofits Government Performance Project. Theproject evaluates performance in fiveareas: financial management, humanresource management, informationtechnology, capital management andmanaging for results. In the 1998assessment, Minnesota received an A- onits capital management performance,placing the state above the average U.S.grade of a B-. In the 1999 to 2001assessment, however, Minnesota’s A-grade slipped to a B+.

The Governing study says that Minnesotamanages its capital investments with “oneof the strongest executive planningprocesses in the country.” What led to itsdowngrade to a B+ in the most recentassessment is the state’s large deferredmaintenance burden – that is, regularrepairs and maintenance that the state’sbuildings and grounds need but have notgotten. The Department of Administrationestimates this deferred maintenance“iceberg” to be roughly $1.5 billion.

Both the executive and legislativebranches of state government haverecognized that letting a buildingdeteriorate is generally more expensivethan keeping it in good repair. In an effortto melt the deferred maintenance iceberg,the Department of Administration hasestablished a statewide facilitiesmanagement group of facility manage-ment professionals from 15 agencies.Each agency is responsible for submittingannual updates on the state of the state’smajor buildings, including expected usefullife, current condition, estimated cost of

CAPITAL MANAGEMENT EVALUATION CRITERIA USED BY GOVERNING GOVERNING GOVERNING GOVERNING GOVERNING MAGAZINE

The Government Performance Project uses the following criteria to assess how well a statemanages capital projects.

Government conducts thorough analysis of future needs.

■ Government has a formal capital plan that coordinates and prioritizes capital activities.

■ A multi-year linkage exists between operating and capital budgeting.

■ A multi-year linkage exists between strategic planning and capital budgeting.

■ Government has sufficient data to support analysis

Government monitors and evaluates projects throughout theirimplementation.

Government conducts appropriate maintenance of capital assets.

■ Government has sufficient data to plan maintenance adequately.

■ Maintenance is appropriately funded.

AVERAGE ANNUAL ENERGY COST 1995-1997

Source: Minnesota Department ofAdministration

Includes:

Capitol complexCommunityCollegesCorrectionsEducation

Veteran AffairsHuman ServicesState UniversitiesZoo


needed repairs and suitability for thecurrent state purpose they are serving.These updates go into a central databaseat the Department of Administration viathe Internet. The information collectedled to increased funding for facility repairsand asset preservation in the 2000bonding bill.

Overall, the state of Minnesota is doing agood job of managing its capital assets.But there is room for improvement.

For example, according to the Departmentof Administration, based on a limitednumber of agencies for which there arecomplete energy-use data, the statespends an average of $25 million annuallyto heat, cool, light and ventilate roughlyone sixth of its buildings. One private-sector estimate by Factor 10, LLC, suggeststhat energy upgrades for the state’sbuildings could yield an annual savings ofbetween $35 and $50 million. Emergingenergy challenges now facing nearly allstates give such estimates even greatersignificance.

A new law passed during the 2001Legislative Session requires theDepartment of Administration to maintaininformation on energy usage in all publicbuildings for the purpose of establishingenergy efficiency benchmarks and energyconservation goals.

There appears to be a growing awarenesswithin state government that highperformance building practices couldreduce the lifetime operating costs ofstate buildings and make them easier andcheaper to maintain, even if there aresome initial transition costs.

Defining highperformance buildings

On average, Americans spend up to90 percent of their time inside buildings.Buildings not only reflect the culture,heritage and values of a place, but alsoinfluence the productivity and well-beingof those who live and work in them.Buildings also consume large amounts ofenergy and materials and produce great

quantities of waste and pollution, both intheir original construction and during theirlifetimes.

According to the U.S. Department of Energy:

■ There are more than 76 millionresidential buildings and nearly 5 millioncommercial buildings in the United Statestoday.

■ These buildings use a third of all theenergy consumed in the United States, andtwo-thirds of all electricity.

■ By the year 2010, the nation is likely tobuild another 38 million buildings.

■ Nationally, buildings account for49 percent of sulfur dioxide emissions,25 percent of nitrous oxide emissions, and10 percent of particulate emissions, all ofwhich degrade air quality and can harmhuman health.

■ Today’s buildings are also responsiblefor 35 percent of the country’s carbondioxide emissions, a key factor in climatechange.

The nature of buildings also affects humanproductivity. The U.S. EnvironmentalProtection Agency estimates that building-related illnesses in the U.S. account for $60billion of annual productivity lostnationwide, and a wider study put the lossat more than $400 billion.

The emergence of high performancebuildings is, in part, a response to theseimpacts. Terms in the literature describingsuch buildings and the design approachthat creates them include: green buildings,green architecture, green design, wholebuildings, sustainable buildings, andsustainable design. These terms refer to acomprehensive and integrated approach tobuildings that strives to enhance humancomfort and productivity while minimizingthe building’s lifetime economic andenvironmental costs, including siting,water, energy and materials use, indoorenvironmental quality and solid andhazardous waste impacts.

Unfortunately, too many people equate“green” building with “green” dollarbills – that is, building green meansbuilding expensively. It is true thatinitial costs for some elements of greenbuilding can exceed the costs ofconventional approaches. Life-cyclecosts, however, are lower, with thepayback frequently occurring withinfive years. – Urban Land Institute

Up-front costs of high performancebuildings can sometimes be more thantraditional construction. But, according tothe nonprofit Sustainable BuildingsIndustry Council, they can often havelower construction costs. This can happenwhen, for example, the use of passiveheating and cooling techniquessignificantly reduces (and sometimes

POTENTIAL COSTS OF A TRANSITION TO HIGH PERFORMANCE BUILDINGS

■ Additional time required for a more thorough, multidisciplinary predesign phase

■ Development of performance targets that are appropriate to Minnesota’s climate andpolicy goals

■ Education of building professionals on high performance building designs, products andpractices

■ Sometimes higher construction costs, often recouped in energy savings alone

■ Development of performance measurement procedures

■ Documentation of the design decision-making process and post-occupancy followthrough to check if the building is performing as expected

■ Development of new tools, resources and processes to make high performancebuildings the norm for future state building projects


eliminates) the need for expensivemechanical equipment. The council alsoasserts that even when construction costsare higher, they are usually just 1 to 2percent higher and these costs are oftenrecovered in energy savings within thefirst few years of operation.

In fact, according to the Rocky MountainInstitute, making a building incrementallymore energy efficient can be more costlythan making it dramatically more efficient.This is because modest improvements maycost more, yet not be enough of animprovement to enable the downsizing ofother building components. Moreambitious energy efficiency improvementsof 75 to 90 percent can sometimes allowsuch downsizing and thereby actually costless to build.

Both the public and private sectors in theU.S. and around the world are increasinglyemploying building practices andtechnologies that reduce a building’scapital and operating costs, improve itsenvironmental performance and increasethe productivity of the people who work inthem. From Ford Motor Company, The GAPand the U.S. Navy to the U.S. PostalService and states such as Pennsylvania,Oregon and New Jersey, more institutionsare aggressively pursuing highperformance building practices.

At its 2000 national convention, theAmerican Institute of Architects adopted aresolution on sustainable design, calling it“the basis of quality design andresponsible practice for AIA architects.”The resolution also supports integratingsustainable design (high performancebuilding practices) into AIA’s contractdocuments and its Master SpecificationSystem. This is significant because itinstitutionalizes these practices as anindustry norm.

The professional literature offers no singlerecipe for a high performance building.Yet it does consistently describe severalattributes that distinguish such buildingsfrom more conventional structures. Thesedistinguishing features, which couldimprove Minnesota’s capital managementsituation, include:

Sometimes lower investment costs

Less expensive and easier to operateand maintain over their useful lifetimes

More energy efficient, potentially savingbetween 70 and 90 percent of traditionalenergy use

More durable and adaptable to futureuses

More efficient in their use of materialsand water

Less waste produced and overall moreenvironmentally friendly

Often built on existing infrastructureand connected to a range of transportationoptions

Healthier, more productive spaces,stimulating average labor productivitygains of between six and 16 percent

Predesign phase

What appears to make such outcomespossible is a very different approach tothe building process. High performancebuildings take an interdisciplinaryapproach to – and place great emphasison – the predesign phase of a building.This step brings together planners,architects, engineers, landscapers,hydrologists, builders, facility managersand building users to collaborate onsetting the building’s purpose, scope andperformance goals.

This comprehensive approach to designstrives to optimize the building’s overallperformance rather than any singlecomponent. For example, energyefficiency becomes a matter of buildingorientation, exterior “skin,” windowplacement, glazing methods and shadingrather than just which heating, ventilationand air conditioning system to use.Through discussions at this predesign

New building at Oberlin College may generate moreenergy than it uses

The Adam Joseph Lewis Center for Environmental Studies at Oberlin College is likelyone of the most advanced academic buildings in the world. A primary goal of theproject, says program director David Orr, was to “build without compromising humanand environmental health somewhere else.” Designed by William McDonough +Partners, the 13,600-square-foot building is projected to use approximately 20,000British Thermal Units (BTUs) per square foot annually, roughly one-fifth of a typicalnew college classroom building in northern Ohio, which has a climate similar toMinnesota’s. The building’s natural wastewater treatment system, called a “livingmachine,” uses micro-organisms and plants to break down and digest impurities in thewastewater, which is then reused for non-drinking applications. “We’re trying to usethis to change the way the college thinks about architecture and landscape and energyuse,” says David Orr. “We want this building to be the default setting.”

Energy demand and potential savingsAccording to the Lawrence Berkeley NationalLaboratory, world energy use for buildings willgrow at a compounded rate of roughly 2.4 percentannually through 2020 if current consumptiontrends continue. Off-the-shelf technologies couldreduce this rate to about 1 percent, and somewhatmore advanced, but still available energy solutions could reduce this rate to zero.


COMPARING PEOPLE, ENERGY AND OTHER COSTS OF OPERATING AN OFFICE BUILDING

Source: Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution, p. 90

phase, complex and expensive mechanicalsystems can sometimes give way to simpledesign solutions that achieve the samegoal at less overall cost. For example,natural ventilation using operablewindows combined with careful selectionof building materials and products canproduce superior indoor air quality.

By contrast, the traditional buildingprocess affords relatively little time forthis goal-setting, predesign step. Thepressures of the trade tend to favor speedand uniformity in design; the norm is foreach building profession to do its piece ofthe job, then pass it on to the next in alinear and somewhat fragmented fashion.

While literature on high performancebuildings emphasizes the energy andresource savings possible with off-the-shelf technologies and design solutions, italso suggests that the real savings maycome in the form of increased occupantproductivity. For example, as described byThe Rocky Mountain Institute, defensecontractor Lockheed Martin built a newfacility in Sunnyvale, California that savedthree-fourths of its lighting energy withsophisticated daylighting. The ownersexpected to recover the cost of thedaylighting features within four years, buta 15 percent drop in absenteeism and a15 percent gain in labor productivity paidfor the daylighting in the first year.

The Minnesota Department ofAdministration captures this importantidea about productivity in what it calls the1-10-100 ratio. This ratio describes therelationships between three kinds of costs:the “1” represents the initial cost of abuilding (the cost almost everyoneemphasizes); the “10” represents the costto operate and maintain the building overits life; and the “100” represents the mostoverlooked, but highest, cost – thesalaries and benefits paid to thoseworking in the building.

Because such a large share of a building’slifetime costs is the salaries and benefitspaid to those who work in them, even verysmall percentage increases in humanproductivity can produce large financialsavings over the life of the building.Productivity gains can be tricky to

m

1991 AVERAGE ANNUAL COMMERCIAL EXPENDITURE(1991 DOLLARS PER GROSS SQUARE FOOT)

SOME OF THE TECHNOLOGIES THAT MAKE HIGH PERFORMANCE POSSIBLE

Daylighting is not just about adding more windows to a building, notes the Urban LandInstitute in The Practice of Sustainable Development. Instead, it is about the carefulintroduction of natural light into building interiors using light “shelves” and otherreflecting and diffusing techniques that bounce light around inside. Combined witheffective shading and coordinated with artificial lighting systems, daylighting can reduceor eliminate the need for electric lights much of the time. This saves the energy that wouldhave been needed to run the lights and the cooling energy to remove the “waste” heatcaused by the electric lighting.

According to the authors of Natural Capitalism, all lighting and most daylighting optionsavailable can be profitably retrofitted, with off-the-shelf equipment able to fit almost anyuse. Typical savings in lighting energy range from 80 to 90 percent at the same or lowercost in new buildings and 70 to 90 percent with a one-to-three year payback in mostretrofits.

Superwindows can insulate as well as eight sheets of glass. Such windows use high-tech glazes and tints to allow visible light into the building while blocking out theheat-producing infrared portion of the light spectrum. These windows generally cost morethan conventional windows, but can reduce solar heat gain by as much as 50 percent, andcan reduce energy requirements by 10 to 20 percent, depending on the number andorientation of the windows.

Displacement ventilation introduces fresh air at floor level, often controlled by eachbuilding occupant, or electronically, or both. Such systems depend on designing toxicmaterials out of the building to ensure indoor air quality, then the exhaust air flows up andout without any mechanical assistance, allowing recovery of either its heat, coolness,moisture or dryness. There is some debate about whether this particular approach isappropriate in Minnesota’s climate.


measure, particularly in the public sectorwhere much of the work is administrative,and much of what government produces iseither information or service. Still, thereare proxies one can use to trackproductivity improvements even in suchnon-manufacturing settings. An example isuse of sick time.

The 1-10-100 ratio is perhaps easiest tounderstand in the context of energy. Asdocumented in the book, NaturalCapitalism, the typical office buildingspends roughly 100 times as much persquare foot on the people in them (payroll,benefits, employer taxes and individualequipment) as for energy. The differencebetween “people costs” and the initialcapital cost of a building are even greater.In other words, if labor productivity goes upjust 1 percent, it can produce the same

Lower life-cycle costs

The city of Portland’s Energy Officesponsored a study that analyzedthe life-cycle costs associated withthree “green” buildings built over thepast six years. The direct life-cyclesavings were almost 80 percent morethan the additional up-front investmentof 2 percent or less. They calculated thesocietal benefits, such as improved airquality, as worth another 40 percent.Together, these benefits are more thandouble the cost over 25 years.

Source: Sustainable Business Insider,October 2000

Daylight leads to sales

In a study of skylighting in retail storesby Pacific Gas and Electric Company,daylight from the skylights oftenprovided more than two-to-three timesthe target illumination, making itunnecessary to use electric lighting atall. By comparing stores with andwithout skylights, they found thatstores could, on average, increase salesby 40 percent by adding skylights.

MINNESOTA SUSTAINABLE DESIGN GUIDE AND RATING SYSTEM

http://www.sustainabledesignguide.umn.edu/

Drawing on the best from existing building assessment systems, staff at Hennepin County,the University of Minnesota, Hellmuth, Obata & Kassabaum Architects and numerous otherlocal building professionals have created the Minnesota Sustainable Design Guide.It is a decision tool and rating system that presents the user with options and guidance forintegrating high performance building practices throughout the design, construction,occupancy, renovation and reuse/end-use stages of a building. A point system allows usersto rate the performance of proposed and existing buildings.

This flexible, adaptable Web-based tool was developed during 1999 in response toHennepin County’s need to ensure that its annual facilities budget of $30 million wasbuilding more sustainable, cost-effective structures. The guide is targeted toward designfirms and facility managers, though it is also meant to educate and assist building owners,occupants, educators, students and the general public about sustainable, high performancebuilding design. Instructions, checklists, a scoring system and a growing body of resourcematerials and supporting information guide building design teams and building operatorsthrough the full building life cycle.

The guide also provides 42 specific strategies, organized around six environmental designtopics: site, water, energy, indoor environment, materials and waste. Each strategy hasperformance indicators and associated target points representing feasible, yet ambitious,design goals. The points are weighted to reflect the priorities of Hennepin County, but areadaptable to any user. And since some strategies will apply only to certain projects (such asrenovations versus new construction, urban versus rural sites), it is important that thetarget score for a project be tailored to reflect the opportunities and constraints of thatbuilding and its site.

The current version of the guide will evolve based on feedback from users and new casestudies. Use of the site is free, though one must register with a name, organization, phonenumber and e-mail address.

bottom-line benefit as eliminating abuilding’s entire energy bill.

Given the annual $130 per square footcost for personnel that is typical in theaverage office building, this same 1percent gain in productivity would mean a$1.30 savings per square foot. Multiplyingthis by the state of Minnesota’s 73 millionsquare feet suggests an annual potentialsavings of nearly $95 million. Since not allof these square feet are office space, thenumber is inexact but it offers a sense ofthe impact that productivity improvementsmay have.

Despite the potentially significant gains inhuman productivity that better buildingsmay generate, this has not been the onlyor even the main factor driving theinterest in high performance buildings.Reducing the environmental impacts of

buildings throughout their life cycle hasbeen another significant driver.

Minnesota’s effortstoward highperformance buildings

One of the state’s most active proponentsof high performance buildings, the Officeof Environmental Assistance, useseducational materials and grants toencourage pollution prevention and wastereduction strategies, such as reducingconstruction and demolition waste andusing recycled building materials. It hasalso funded such projects as theMinnesota Sustainable Design Guide, acomprehensive set of building guidelinesdeveloped by Hennepin County and theUniversity of Minnesota and available


online. The office has come to view highperformance buildings as another way tomeet its statutory responsibilities forminimizing and managing the state’sgrowing waste stream.

The Department of Natural Resources hasbegun the process of documenting thecosts and benefits of high performancebuildings. In preparation for its capitalbudget requests, the departmentconducted post-occupancy evaluations ofits regional offices to help quantify thedifference that changes in building designand construction can make.

The department’s regional offices in Towerand Windom and the Pollution ControlAgency’s regional offices in Duluth andBrainerd represent good faith efforts toincorporate some innovations such asrecycled materials, daylighting andoperable windows.

In 1999, six state agencies formed theSmart Buildings Partnership in an effort toidentify what policy changes mightaccelerate adoption of high performancebuilding practices in state government.Participating agencies are the departmentsof Administration, Finance, and Commerce,Minnesota Planning, the Office ofEnvironmental Assistance and the PollutionControl Agency. These multi-agencydiscussions led to development of 10 broadgoals for state buildings which now appearin the Department of Finance’s FY2002-2007 Capital Budget Instructions. Inaddition to these goals, the Smart BuildingPartnership identified three other needs:

Consolidation of information andevidence on state-of-the-art buildingpractices and technologies.

Careful and systematic application ofhigh performance building practices in aselect number of state renovations andnew building projects to identify whichpractices and technologies make sense inMinnesota.

Documentation of needed changes to thestate’s capital budget process to ensurecontinuous improvement in the financial,environmental and human productivityperformance of its built environment.

These multi-agency discussions also led toa number of additional insights:

Evaluation of life-cycle costs andbenefits is critical to makingprudent building decisions. Thismeans considering upfront and operatingcosts together. Life-cycle analysis is aformal method of evaluating the economicand environmental costs of a givenmaterial or system, including itsproduction, transportation, use anddisposal. The American Institute ofArchitects’ Environmental Resource Guideprovides such analyses for many, but notall, construction materials. Such analysesare routinely done in Europe using a rangeof software and drawing on a commondatabase that is available to all EuropeanUnion countries.

According to Dakota County’s draftSustainable Design and BuildingGuidelines, this costing method oftenjustifies the use of materials with higherfirst costs when:

Their operational costs are lower thancomparable products or designs

They do not require as frequentreplacement or as much maintenance, or

Other factors such as lower disposalcosts come into play.

The county’s guidelines also note thatsince government buildings are oftendesigned for a 50-year useful life, it isappropriate to consider this longer thannormal timeframe when evaluatingbuilding products and design options.

As part of capital budget reform in theearly 1990s, the Minnesota Department ofAdministration began developing a processto do life-cycle cost-benefit analysis ofbuilding alternatives. The Department ofAdministration currently lacks the staffcapacity to perform such analysis, and thenecessary data is not readily available. Asit stands, agencies are left to attempt theirown cost analyses without the benefit of astandard methodology for the state.

Life-cycle analysis for high performancebuildings could evaluate each possiblebuilding material or system based on suchfactors as durability, resource efficiency,

toxicity and embodied energy. This wouldbe in addition to traditional considerationsof cost, appearance, performance,availability and ease of use.

High performance building practicescould be reflected in leased space.For cost reasons, the state of Minnesota isworking toward owning more of thebuildings it uses, but currently leases mostof its space. The Department ofAdministration has the responsibility toapprove all space leases, and is beginningto incorporate high performance buildingspecifications in its lease contracts.

The Office of EnvironmentalAssistance is developing a GreenBuilding Tool Kit for use by localgovernments. It has also fundedSustainable Schools Minnesota, a public-private effort that has produced apredesign manual to assist school boardsand superintendents in making moreinformed capital investment decisions.The project has involved a wide array ofinterests including the Department ofChildren, Families and Learning and the ElkRiver, Anoka/Hennepin and Hopkins schooldistricts. Elk River will be incorporatinghigh performance building practices intotwo demonstration buildings, including anew high school in Rogers and a newelementary school.

The Department of Administrationhas established a position withresponsibilities for organizing andcoordinating the department’sefforts on high performancebuildings and sustainable design.The department is also including arequirement on sustainable design for allcapital projects over $750,000.

The Department of Administration hopes tolearn from its initial projects how best toincorporate high performance buildingpractices into future state projects.

The Department of NaturalResources is continuing to integratehigh performance building conceptsinto its capital projects. This includesplans to “green” all the agency’s opera-tions from the products it buys to thevehicles it owns.


GOALS FOR HIGH PERFORMANCE

State-funded buildings

High Performance Building Goals were developed collaboratively by six state agencies as part of the Smart BuildingPartnership and are now part of the Minnesota Department of Finance’s 2002-2007 Capital Budget Instructions. The agenciesthat developed them were the departments of Administration, Finance, Commerce, the Office of Environmental Assistance,the Pollution Control Agency and Minnesota Planning. Just as the private sector has established goals like “zero defects,”“zero accidents,” and “zero emissions,” to spur continuous improvement in manufacturing, these building goals provide thestate with a comprehensive list of outcomes to work toward through its capital investments.

1 Minimize lifetime costs Minimize the lifetime costs of state-owned, leased and financed buildings. Relevant costsinclude siting, design, construction, operations and maintenance of buildings and grounds; building reuse,deconstruction or demolition, and recycling and disposal of building materials; impacts on Minnesota’s nonrenewableand renewable resource base, its biodiversity and its air, land and water resources; and impacts on human health,productivity and well-being.

2 Healthy, productive work environments Create healthier indoor environments that enhance employeeproductivity and wellness.

3 More accessible government Site buildings where public infrastructure already exists and employ designs thatreflect community preferences, accommodate a range of transportation options, and include advancedtelecommunications technologies that make government more accessible to the public.

4 Sustainable resource use Give preference to building products made from renewable, recycled and recyclablematerials, and to the development of brownfield sites that can be cost-effectively brought back into productive use.Use all resources as efficiently as possible and develop and follow a construction and demolition waste managementplan that emphasizes source reduction, reuse and recycling of materials generated through construction, remodelingand demolition activities.

5 Sustainable energy use Reduce fossil fuel use, use less polluting fossil fuels, and give preference to leastpolluting and renewable energy substitutes in order to increase the economic benefits and long-term reliability ofMinnesota’s energy system.

6 Pollution prevention Eliminate or minimize the use of persistent toxic chemicals in building materials and preventor reduce other forms of waste and emissions that, if allowed to systematically build up in the environment, degradeMinnesota’s air, water, land and other natural resources.

7 Optimize and document building performance Ensure that facility managers and users can optimize thebuilding’s systems by commissioning the building and developing and following an operations and maintenance plan.Plans should include strategies for documenting the building’s performance and operations and maintenance costs ascompared to the average for that building type.

8 Healthy natural systems Employ practices that preserve, conserve or enhance the natural landscape and habitaton site.

9 Consistent, effective government Ensure that operational and capital development plans and proposals specifytheir links to agency strategic plans, including methods of service delivery, and to the state’s overall strategic plan. Thestate’s built environment should be a natural extension of, and should help support, its overall strategic directions andgoals.

Continuous improvement Document barriers to implementing high performance building practices and share thisinformation with the Department of Administration so that the state may continuously improve the performance of itsbuildings.

10


THE EUROPEAN EXPERIENCE

According to Roland Stulz, head of the Swiss Institute of Technology and founder of INTEP Corporation, one of Europe’s largest buildingtechnology and engineering firms, a handful of lessons can be learned from the European experience of constructing high performancebuildings over the past 20 years:

■ High performance buildings are profitable.

■ High performance solutions should generally not have higher upfront capital costs (though there are exceptions).

■ High performance buildings have lower operating and life-cycle costs.

■ The knowledge of how to build high performance buildings already exists (there are lots of examples all over the world);what is missing is broad, mainstream application.

■ It is critical to set clear, measurable targets for building performance based on goals for the project that reflect the localclimate.

■ It is important to regularly measure and monitor building performance after buildings are built in order to optimize theirperformance and learn ways to improve future buildings.

■ Building design teams should include facility managers and their expertise should inform design decisions from the start.

■ High performance buildings create better working and learning environments for occupants.

■ People need a common understanding of why current trends in land use, energy, water and material use, and increasingwaste and pollution rates are not sustainable and what this means for the way buildings are designed, built andmaintained.

MINNESOTA BUILDINGS WITH HIGH PERFORMANCE ELEMENTS

SECTOR ORGANIZATION HIGH PERFORMANCE BUILDING ELEMENTS

Public Department of Natural Resources, Reused material, native landscapingGooseberry Falls Rest Area

Public Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, Recycled material, native landscaping, operable windows,regional office in Brainerd low VOC flooring

Public Minneapolis, Downtown School Solar wall, sharing some services with local businesses(e.g., gymnasium)

Commercial / Mississippi Market and Neighborhood Recycled material, reused material, low toxicity products,nonprofit Energy Consortium, St. Paul native landscaping, daylighting, on-site water management.

Nonprofit Water Foundation Composting toilets, solar and wind energy, recycled products

Commercial REI, Bloomington Native landscaping, Mankato’s PhoenixBiocomposites countertops (made fromsoybeans and newspaper)

Commercial Cities Management, Inc. Refurbished office panels, recycledcarpet, vermicomposting, waste reuse

Residential Private cabin in Tofte No fossil fuel energy (photovoltaics, wind, daylighting,water-to-water heat pump, reuse materials onsite, nativelandscaping, low-impact, resource-efficient materials.)

Residential American Lung Association Certified lumber floors, low VOC finishes,Health House, Chanhassen native landscaping, resource efficient materials

Source: Minnesota Office of Environmental Assistance


HIGH PERFORMANCE FEATURES OF THE PHILLIPSECO-ENTERPRISE CENTER IN MINNEAPOLIS

GOAL: IMPROVE WORK ENVIRONMENTTHROUGH NATURAL LIGHTING ANDCLEAN INDOOR AIR

Solar-tracking skylights

Operable windows

Energy recovery ventilation

Low and no-emission coatings andadhesives

Daylight and air-quality controls

Showers and changing room

GOAL: REDUCE ENERGY LOAD BY 50PERCENT COMPARED TO NEWCONVENTIONAL CONSTRUCTION

Geo-Exchange heat pump system(which means no furnace)

Solar-tracking, insulated skylights

High-efficiency light fixtures

Energy management system

Low-emissivity, insulated windows

Planned 10 kilowatt wind turbine andphotovoltaic demonstrations

GOAL: SUBSTITUTE HIGH-QUALITYSALVAGED MATERIALS AND SPECIFYRECYCLED CONTENT

Reused steel joists, brick and lumber

Salvaged sinks, stair-treads, carpet,cabinetry, decking and benches

Fly ash in pre-cast concrete panels

Window sills made from agriculturalwaste

100 percent recycled content tile

World’s first 100 percent recyclablecarpet

80 percent of construction waste reusedor recycled

GOAL: RESTORE NATIVE LANDSCAPESAND PROTECT AND CONSERVE WATERRESOURCES

Native prairie restoration

100 percent onsite stormwaterretention

Naturally enhanced biofiltration ofrunoff

Green roof with monolithic membrane,drainage and filter

A growing number of public, private,nonprofit and academic institutions inMinnesota are constructing and promotinghigh performance buildings.

For example, one of the state’s mostdiverse and economically challengedneighborhoods has built the PhillipsEco-Enterprise Center, a $6 million state-of-the-art business center just off LakeStreet in Minneapolis. This 64,000-square-foot commercial and industrial facilityopened its doors in the fall of 1999.Among the center’s objectives is thecreation of high-quality, living-wage jobsfor local residents. Thirteen companiesalready occupy 75 percent of the building’soffice and light manufacturing space.

The Phillips Eco-Enterprise Center wasawarded Cutting Edge Project of the Yearby City Business Magazine in 1998 and

was one of the American Institute ofArchitects Earth Day Top Ten in 2000.The center is also a pilot project of theU.S. Green Building Council’s Leadershipin Energy Efficiency and EnvironmentalDesign (LEED) program.

High performance buildings are not justgoing up in and around the Twin Cities.The Department of Natural Resources hasconsolidated its former field offices inTower and Ely to a new location in Tower.The office building has a floor area of10,300 square feet housing 45 people,while three garage buildings comprise anadditional 27,000 square feet. The projectis expected to cost about $3.2 million.

The site selected is a gravel pit and thedevelopment is limited largely to apreviously disturbed area. The desire of alloccupants to be close to windows – and

the daylight, views and natural ventilationthey provide – helped shape the building’sfinal form. Computer-based energysimulation helped designers optimizewindow glazing, type and location,insulation, overhangs and other buildingelements. The project also used efficientlighting fixtures, controls and an efficientheating, ventilation and air conditioningsystem.

Recycled content materials includedcarpets, floor mats and ceiling tiles. Theproject specified paints and other interiorfinish products containing low amounts ofvolatile organic compounds and made useof existing materials on the site such asstone, gravel and wood. The structuraldesign allows the building to be expandedat the gable wall ends as needed and longspans allow for flexible interior rearrange-ments. This will reduce costs and materialwaste in any future changes within thestructure.

Predating both of these projects, the618,000-square-foot Minneapolis FederalReserve Bank building was completed in1998. Designed by Hellmuth, Obata +Kassabaum, (HOK) Inc., the bank’s goalwas to create a building of long-term value(at least 100 years) that would minimizethe facility’s overall impact on theenvironment, with particular attention toenergy conservation. Other initiativesincorporated into the project include lowmaintenance landscaping, waterconservation, improved indoor air quality,environmentally preferable materialsselection, and recycling of constructionwaste.

The building design led to net annualenergy consumption of less than 45,000BTUs per square foot and also reduced thebuilding’s overall capital costs. Keyelements include an extremely tightexterior envelope and a low interiorlighting load, including triple-glazed, low-Efilm, argon windows and high efficiencylighting controlled by occupancy sensors.

The design team selected materials basedon whether their original source wassustainable, on the embodied energy in thematerial, and on the recycled content andthe recyclability of the product, as well as


the product’s effect on indoor air quality.The result was materials that came mostlyfrom local sources, with greater durabilityand lower maintenance requirements.

During construction a salvage yard wascreated for materials that could be reusedand not just recycled, such as waste woodfrom formwork. Some site separation wasdone; however, the majority of waste wasseparated off site and recycled to producea recycling rate of about 70 percent and adecrease in construction costs for theproject.

Implications forMinnesota’s schools

The nonprofit Sustainable BuildingsIndustry Council suggests that schooldistricts can save 30 to 40 percent onutility costs each year for new schools and20 to 30 percent on renovated schools byapplying high performance design andconstruction concepts. The potential forsavings is greater in new schools becauseit is possible to eliminate inefficienciesfrom the outset. The council cites the U.S.Department of Energy’s Rebuild AmericaK-12 Schools Program estimate that schoolenergy costs are approximately $110 perstudent per year, depending on region andclimatic conditions. Add in the costs ofwater, wastewater processing and trashremoval, and the cost rises toapproximately $140 per student per year.High performance building solutions canyield savings of up to $56 per student peryear, depending on the project and itslocation.

There are about 1,700 school buildings inMinnesota. According to the Departmentof Children, Families and Learning, thestate and school districts spent $1.3 billionin 2000 on these facilities. At least one keystate building official believes that thisnumber is so high because Minnesota “isreplicating buildings that don’t work.”From failing mechanical systems to poorindoor air quality, many of Minnesota’sschools are in need of significantmaintenance and repair. When schooldistricts face difficult budget choices, oneof the first things to go is routine cleaningand building maintenance. While this is

often unnoticeable in the short run, it canlead to expensive repair and restorationcosts down the road.

Research findings suggest untappedopportunities to improve Minnesota’sschools. Kathy Tremain’s “Little GreenSchoolhouse” notes that schools designedto use resources efficiently and helpsustain the environment are safe, long-lasting and cheaper to maintain thantraditional school buildings.

The most advanced school buildings makegood use of native vegetation, naturaldrainage and sun orientation, andincorporate locally produced and recycledbuilding materials and natural lighting.Advanced computer systems are used tomonitor resource usage. Students getinvolved in studying, designing andmaintaining the schools’ environmentalfeatures. The building becomes a practicaland applied part of the learningcurriculum.

The U.S. Department of Energy says thatschools could cut operating costs by25 percent — a nationwide savings of$1.5 billion — just by conserving energy.

Since high performance schools use lessenergy to begin with, their savings couldbe even greater, says Gary Bailey ofInnovation Design of North Carolina, a firmthat builds such schools. As much as $4billion of current costs could be savednationwide in a year, according to hiscalculations, because high performanceschools use one-third to one-half of theBTUs of a typical school.

In keeping with these national findings, inMinnesota an international architectureand engineering firm, INTEP US, analyzedfacility management and new buildingconstruction needs at one of Minnesota’scommunity college campuses and came totwo conclusions:

The existing buildings on campus use10 times more energy than a similar, butnew state-of-the-art educational facilitybuilt in Europe.

Integrating high performance buildingstrategies into campus facilities could yieldan immediate 10 to 20 percent savings,and in some cases more than that.

AMERICAN LUNG ASSOCIATION AIMS TO RAISE THE BAR FOR HEALTHY BUILDINGS

The American Lung Association of Minnesota has launched a new Minnesota-basedinitiative with a national scope called Healthy DesignTM Raising the Standard for WorkEnvironments. They are building a 60,000 square foot speculative office building as theinitial pilot project. Capital City Partnership is helping to identify and secure a suitable St.Paul site and ways to make connections with potential partners to demonstrate highperformance building practices and their costs and benefits. They expect to break groundon the building by spring 2002.

The pilot project is unique for several reasons. It will document the process of using anintegrated design approach; it will set objectives and measurable performance metrics;and it will track them over time, possibly over ten years. Expected benefits include:

■ Filling a needed research gap by investigating the link between building health, humanhealth and productivity

■ Showcasing new building technologies, products and services

■ Transferring applied knowledge about high performance building practices to themarketplace

Two key reasons that the American Lung Association states for launching this initiative arethat lung health is affected by indoor environments and indoor air is often two to fivetimes more polluted than outdoor air. Through this Healthy DesignTM initiative theAssociation hopes to become a “primary stimulus nationally for changing the way buildingsare designed, constructed, remodeled, operated and maintained.”


SUMMARY OF STATE EFFORTS

STATE CATALYST FOR TAKING ACTION KEY FEATURES

Pennsylvania Executive order by Governor Thomas Ridge creating ■ Commissioner-level accountability for progress.http://www.gggc.state.pa.us/building/default.htm the Governor’s Green Government Council and ■ Demonstration building with annual energy savings

Pennsylvania’s Secretary of Environment. estimated at $50,000.■ High-Performance Green Building Guidelines and ModelGreen Office Leasing Specifications.■ Cross-disciplinary design process will now be used for allstate-funded projects.

California California’s Integrated Waste Management Board, ■ $500,000 to serve as a catalyst for higher performancehttp://www.ciwmb.ca.gov/GreenBuilding one of six boards that make up the state’s buildings.

Environmental Protection Agency. ■ Executive-level Sustainable Building Committee.■ Grant program to fund building design efforts,workshops and education forums.

Indiana Governor Frank O’Bannon’s Executive Order 99-07 ■ Public Works Division has incorporated requirementshttp://www.state.in.us/idoa/greening leading to the Greening the Government Plan. for architects and engineers to use sustainable design

practices, building products and procedures.http://www.state.in.us/idoa/pwd/

Iowa Department of Natural Resources and ■ Establishes sustainable development principles as parthttp://www.state.ia.us/government/dnr/index.html Department of General Services of the Iowa Capitol Complex Master Plan.

■ Aims to apply high performance building concepts toall new construction, renovation and demolition projectson the Capitol complex.■ Developing a Sustainable Building Checklist and standardcommissioning and RFP language.

Maryland Grew out of Maryland’s Smart Growth Initiative, ■ Works with county and municipal planners and others tohttp://www.dnr.state.md.us/programs/greenbuilding begun in 1997 by Governor Parris Glendening. evaluate and modify codes, ordinances and policies.

■ Traveling green building exhibit and workshops.

New Jersey New Jersey Office of Sustainable Business, established ■ Public-private partnership.http://www.bgnj.org by Governor Christine Todd Whitman. ■ Office of Sustainable Business provides staffing,

coordination, a green building library and free monthlyworkshops.■ Department of Community Affairs in collaboration withthe state’s largest utility have a Sustainable Developmentand Affordable Housing Pilot Program underway.http://www.state.nj.us/dca/dhcr/sdhome.htm

New York In May 2000, Governor George Pataki signed the nation’s ■ Provides $25 million in credits to encourage ownershttp://www.dec.state.ny.us/website/dar/ood/ first Green Building Tax Credit into law. and tenants of commercial and residential buildingsgrnbldg.html to incorporate environmental features.

■ Buildings must be over 20,000 square feet and 35percent more energy efficient than the state’s energy code,renovated buildings 25 percent more efficient. Buildingsmust also meet standards on indoor air quality, wastedisposal, energy and water use.■ First building to take advantage of the tax credits is a250-unit luxury high-rise tower in Manhattan’s Battery ParkCity. Four Times Square will be 337,000-square feet, 26stories high and privately financed at a cost of $95 million.

Oregon In May 2000, Governor John Kitzhaber, M.D., signed an ■ Department of Administrative Services must adopt newhttp://www.governor.state.or.us/governor/ executive order, Development of a State Strategy facilities standards and guidelines covering siting,sustainability/index.html Promoting Sustainability in Internal State Government design, construction, deconstruction, operation and

Operations. maintenance of state buildings and landscapes, and theselection, terms and conditions for state leaseholds.■ Review and update the state’s facilities standards andguidelines at least biennially.■ Track and report key performance elements through theexisting State Facilities Coordination Program.■ Use a state building as a pilot for demonstrating andevaluating high performance products and practices.■ Expand procurement of environmentally sound productsand services and purchase energy from renewable sources.


SUMMARY OF FEDERAL EFFORTS

FEDERAL AGENCY / PROGRAM KEY FEATURES

Environmental Protection Agency ■ Voluntary program for commercial buildingsEnergy Star Buildings Program interested in profitable investments using provenhttp://www.epa.gov/buildings technologies.

■ Program participants can expect to reduce theirbuilding’s energy consumption by about 30 percent.■ Green Lights program, another voluntary initiativethat provides technical assistance, resources and tools.Savings from this program also average 30 percent.

Department of Energy ■ Provides information about renewable energy andEnergy Efficiency and Renewable energy efficiency developments along with links andEnergy Network information on the department’s other buildingshttp://www.eren.doe.gov programs.

Department of Housing and Urban ■ Provides information on best practices, a technologyDevelopment inventory, a Residential Structural Design Guide and otherPartnership for Advancing Technology in Housing resources.http://www.pathnet.org.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory ■ Information on efficient building systems, such asTennessee heating, cooling, and refrigerating equipment; roofs, walls,http://www.ornl.gov and foundations; insulating materials; retrofit of existing

structures; and evaluation and analysis of existingefficiency programs.

Argonne National Laboratory ■ Works with communities in the Midwest to makeIllinois and Idaho housing in low-income neighborhoods more affordableExisting Buildings Efficiency Research through energy efficiency.http://BuildingsResearch.anl.gov/eber

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory ■ Develops and helps commercialize energy-efficientCalifornia technologies and analytical techniques.Building Technologies Department ■ Documents ways of improving the energy efficiency andhttp://eetd.lbl.gov/BT.html indoor environmental quality of residential and commercial

buildings.■ Offers software tools including Home Energy Saver, anInternet-based tool for calculating energy use in residentialbuildings.

Naval Facilities Engineering Command ■ The command has committed to demonstratingSustainable Design Program engineering leadership through “environmentallyhttp://www.efdlant.navfac.navy.mil/Lantops_15/ sustainable facilities.”sustainable_design.htm ■ Sponsors a Whole Building Design Guide Web site that

provides guidance on designing environmentally soundcommercial buildings.http://www.wbdg.org/mtext.html

National Park Service ■ Published Guiding Principles of Sustainable DesignSustainable Design Initiative for the design and management of tourist facilities.http://www.nps.gov/dsc/dsgncnstr

U.S. Postal Service ■ Built a high performance, 25,500-square-foothttp://www.usps.gov/environ/webpages/ demonstration building in Fort Worth, Texas, the firstgrnbldg.htm of a series of demonstration buildings planned to test

innovative building practices.

Cost savings and environmental benefitsaside, however, the most compelling casefor new approaches to the siting, designand construction of school buildings maybe the effect they have on Minnesota’schildren and their academic performance.Research sponsored by the Californiautility, Pacific Gas & Electric Company,found that students in classrooms with themost daylighting had test scores 7 to 18percent higher than those in rooms withthe least daylight.

Minnesota school districts that integratehigh performance building practices andtechnologies into their future schools, suchas Elk River, will provide usefulinformation for others interested in therelationship between the built environ-ment, cost savings and studentachievement.

State and federaleffortsAt least eight states have made significantcommitments to incorporate highperformance building practices into theirfacilities and capital investment processes.The catalyst for action has varied. InOregon, Pennsylvania and New Jersey,executive orders have provided the initialimpetus. In California and Iowa, a singlestate agency has led the effort. And inNew York, a new law offering “greenbuilding” tax credits is aimed at spurringthe market for new building approaches.

These efforts differ in their scope andfocus, but with the exception of NewYork’s tax credits, state initiatives appearto share three common goals:

To reduce the long-term cost ofgovernment and negative environmentalimpacts

To use state facilities to demonstratethe economic, environmental and humanproductivity benefits of high performancebuildings, and make such buildings thenorm

To use the “market pull” that stategovernments have as large consumers toincrease the demand for high performancebuildings and the products andtechnologies that go into them.


Of the eight state efforts summarized inthe enclosed insert, Pennsylvania hasperhaps had the most success inconstructing high performance buildings.(See the insert on “State and FederalEfforts” at the back).

On the federal level, the approach hasbeen to serve as a role model rather thanas a regulator when it comes to promotinghigh performance buildings. The federalgovernment has launched initiatives inthree general areas. First, several nationallaboratories are engaged in research,development and testing of new buildingtechnologies. Second, the departments ofEnergy and Housing and UrbanDevelopment and the EnvironmentalProtection Agency have incentive andtechnical assistance programs to fostergreater application of new buildingtechnologies. Finally, several agencies,such as the U.S. Postal Service, theNational Park Service, the EnvironmentalProtection Agency and the Navy areconstructing buildings that demonstratehigh performance practices and developingvoluntary guidelines for others to use.

These efforts are a response to bothfederal legislation and presidentialexecutive orders. For example, ExecutiveOrder 13123, “Greening the GovernmentThrough Efficiency Energy Management,”issued June 3, 1999 goes well beyondenergy goals. It requires that highperformance sustainable design principlesmust be applied to federal projects toreduce pollution and other environmentalcosts associated with the construction,operation and eventual decommissioningof those facilities.

Local governmentstaking action

Federal and state governments have notbeen the only part of the public sector topursue high performance buildingpractices. Local governments havechanged building codes, developedcertification programs and establishedguidelines and other forms of assistanceand incentives to foster high performancebuildings.

SUMMARY OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT EFFORTS

LOCAL GOVERNMENT AND PROGRAM KEY FEATURES

Atlanta, GeorgiaEarthCraft House programhttp://www.southface.org/home/ech/earthcraft_home.htm

Arlington County, VirginiaPilot Green Building Incentive Program

Austin, TexasGreen Builder Programwww.ci.austin.tx.us/greenbuilder

Boulder, ColoradoGreen Points programhttp://www.ci.boulder.co.us/environmentalaffairs/green_points/gp_overview.html

Hennepin County, MinnesotaMinnesota Sustainable Design Guide and Rating Systemwww.sustainabledesignguide.umn.edu

Kitsap County, WashingtonBuild a Better Kitsap programhttp://www.wa.gov/kitsap/departments/pubworks/buildbetter.html

Portland, OregonGreen Building Action Planwww.ci.portland.or.us/energy/greenbuilding

New York City, New YorkHigh Performance Building Programhttp://www.ci.nyc.ny.us/html/ddc/html/pdfdl.html/guidelines

San Francisco, CaliforniaResource-efficient Buildingshttp://www.ci.sf.ca.us/environment/index.htm

Scottsdale, ArizonaGreen Building Programhttp://www.ci.scottsdale.az.us/greenbuilding

Seattle, WashingtonSustainable Building Programwww.ci.seattle.wa.us/util/rescons/susbuild

St. Paul, MinnesotaSustainable Decisions Guidehttp://www.stpaul.gov/depts/realestate/sustainable/index.html

Provides builders training, one-on-one design andconstruction advice, marketing materials and referrals.

Must be a member of the Home BuildersAssociation.

Homes are inspected and certified by theEarthCraft program.

Offers developers a density bonus for includingsustainable design features in construction projects.

The only city to require green building through itsbuilding permit process; and the only one to includeremodeling.

Uses a checklist of options, each assigned a pointvalue; builders must score a certain number of pointsto pass final inspection.

Developed in collaboration with the University ofMinnesota, the guide contains specific building criteriaunder siting, energy, water, materials use, indoorenvironmental quality and waste.

Unlike LEED, there is no formal certificationprocess.

Establishes Code Plus standards to improve abuilding’s performance and provide economic andenvironmental benefits.

Includes design checklist and a handbook withlinked content areas and local resources.

The plan seeks to increase market demand forsustainable design practices and products and tofacilitate greener buildings through technicalassistance.

The city has adopted high performance buildingguidelines for its capital projects and has ninedemonstration projects currently underway, bothrenovation and new construction.

City passed two ordinances that require highperformance building practices in all renovations andmany types of new construction.

Market-driven program for interested homeowners.City rates homes on site use, building materials,

water, energy, indoor air quality and solid waste.City provides monthly educational forums on

technical subjects related to green homes, anewsletter and other educational events such as toursand lectures.

Buildings over 5,000 square feet must meet orexceed the U.S. Green Building Council LEED rating of“silver.”

Established the first green builder rating system inthe United States.

The county will use the U.S. Green Building Council’sLEED rating system to determine the bonus.

Guidelines adopted by the city of St. Paul for itscapital facilities.

Dakota County, MinnesotaSustainable Design and Building Guidelines

Guidelines adopted by Dakota County for its capitalfacilities.


Hillary Brown, New York City’s assistantcommissioner of design and construction,notes in Institutionalizing HighPerformance Buildings: A New PublicManagement Strategy, that guidelinesadopted by the city and ninedemonstration buildings underway areexceeding expectations, both in costsavings and in reshaping perceptions aboutwhat constitutes quality design.She suggests that the success of theprogram has stimulated interest in highperformance buildings among publicagencies locally and nationally, extendingto workshops in Japan.

Closer to home, Hennepin County,Minnesota, is aggressively pursuing a newapproach to buildings. The countycollaborated with the University ofMinnesota and others to develop theonline Minnesota Sustainable DesignGuide and Rating System, and has alsobegun to apply these guidelines to itsbuildings. Its first attempt was a new242,205 square foot public works facility inMedina. The building had a constructionbudget of $23.9 million and a final cost of$23.5 million. High performance featuresof the building include:

Site design that left a nearby wetlandintact

Use of recycled and recyclable buildingmaterials

An internal sewage treatment plant anda grey water system that reuses water forflushing of toilets

Structural steel made from 90 percentpost industrial and post consumer waste

Millwork produced from 90 percent postindustrial forestry products and resins

Though the building does not incorporateall aspects of a high performance building,it does represent a departure from thetraditional approach. The county’s secondproject will be an expanded library, courtsand service center due for completion byMay 2003.

St. Paul, Minnesota has prepared an onlineSustainable Decisions Guide to help fosterbuildings that are “more efficient, lesstoxic, and more livable spaces whereproductivity will be enhanced.” Theguidelines are strictly voluntary. But thecity’s expectation is that everyoneresponding to a request for proposal forvirtually any kind of building project“should make a good faith effort to followthe recommendations” presented in theguide. The guide was developed early in2000 and has therefore had relatively littletime to affect the city’s built environment.

The private sector

This report has focused on the publicsector’s high performance buildinginitiatives and the implications of those forthe state of Minnesota. But much of themomentum for better buildings and manyof the most striking examples of highperformance structures are emerging inthe private sector.

David Kozlowski, senior editor forFacilitiesnet.com, an industry Web site forbuilding professionals, writes in “CanGreen be Gold?” that “10 years ago,green buildings weren’t a blip on the radarscreen of commercial and institutionalbuilding professionals. But in that time,designers have gained experience,developers have gained a certain comfortlevel, and manufacturers have increased

HIGH PERFORMANCE GUIDELINES AND RATING SYSTEMS

According to Dr. James Wise, CEO of Eco Integrations, Inc., there are a great many sourcesof guidance on high performance buildings, each with its own peculiar methodology andpurpose. In addition to the Minnesota Design Guide and Rating System, there are sevenother guidance or building rating systems in North America and roughly twice that numberif one includes international systems. As Wise describes them, North American systemsinclude:

LEED, developed as a national green building rating system by the U.S. GreenBuilding Council (a private, nonprofit organization composed mostly of businesses).

GBTool, (also referred to as GBA) the performance assessment model developedover two years by an ad-hoc international partnership involved in the planning andconduct of the Green Building Challenge Conference, held in Vancouver, Canada inOctober 1998.

BREEAM North America, a U.S. version of the Building Research EstablishmentEnvironmental Assessment Methodology developed originally in the UK.

BEPAC, Building Environmental Performance Assessment Criteria,developed at the University of British Columbia and used primarily in Canada.

Green Building Advisor, a software advisory tool for green building design,developed by a team of building professionals under the auspices of CREST (Centerfor Renewable Energy and Sustainable Technology) and Environmental Building News.

EVE, Environmental Value Engineering, a tool from Bowling Green StateUniversity that assesses entire building performance by EMERGY units, as originallydeveloped by Dr. H.T. Odum for the assessment of natural systems.

BEES, Building for Environmental and Economic Sustainability, amethodology developed at the National Institute of Standards and Technology forselecting environmentally preferable building products.

All these building rating systems are at their first stages of development, but demonstratea number of sound ways to measure and evaluate high performance buildings even if thereis no single standard yet.


their product offerings so that greenbuildings have become cost-effective.”

Kozlowski also notes that, particularly inthe area of energy efficiency, buildingappraisers and lenders are beginning toequate higher performing buildings withgreater value, in part because suchbuildings have higher net operatingincome. He says that as the market seesthe dollars and cents behind suchbuildings, it will lead to increased rents,higher resale values and more generousloan underwriting. Even insurancecompanies are beginning to talk aboutpremium credits, lower deductibles andrebates for steps such as thecommissioning of buildings. Kozlowskiquotes Lynda Grasser, property and financemanager for Fireman’s Fund InsuranceCompany, which leases more than 3 millionsquare feet nationally, as saying, “We’rehaving green aspects of the space writteninto all our lease requirements, and we’rehaving our brokers consider green spacesfirst.” Kozlowski concludes, “it may justtake a critical mass of buildings to tip themarketplace in favor of green buildings.”

In November 2000, Ford Motor Companyannounced that it will spend $2 billion totransform its 83-year old Rougemanufacturing facilities in Dearborn,Michigan, into models of economicefficiency and environmental intelligence,including stormwater-absorbing roofs,porous paving and native landscaping.Ford plans to use the most successfulinitiatives at the Rouge plant at otherFord plants.

In 1998, GAP, Inc. completed a new191,000 square foot office complex withina standard budget for something of itssize. Using cost-benefit analysis, thedesigners developed a series of buildingsthat feature extensive daylighting, naturalventilation and environmentally soundmaterials.

According to the Urban Land Institute, themagazine retailer Norm ThompsonOutfitters built a new facility in Portland,Oregon that integrates natural daylighting,high ceilings and reflective surfaces andcolors to reduce energy demand. Inside,the building uses “light shades” that

bounce light around the interior and reduceboth glare and heat gain. Combined withefficient lighting and computer-controlleddimmable ballasts that adjust lights basedon available daylight and “light sweeps”that turn lights off at night, thesemeasures cut the outfitters’ utility bills by40 percent, saving $122,000 a year, whichoffset the cost of some other highperformance measures.

The authors of Natural Capitalism:Creating the Next Industrial Revolution,document many other examples of highperformance business space. In one suchcase, VeriFone renovated a windowless,76,000-square-foot warehouse inCalifornia into a new distributionheadquarters featuring daylighting, a newfiltration system, nontoxic materials andimproved energy efficiency with a per-square-foot budget of $39. The companyexpected the 65 to 75 percent energysavings to pay back in 7.5 years. Thiswould have been an after-tax annualreturn of 10 percent, but didn’t account fora 45 percent decrease in absenteeismwhich sped up the payback.

According to research by In Businessmagazine, private sector interest in highperformance buildings appears to bedriven by two key perceptions:conventional buildings can adversely affecthealth and productivity; and highperformance buildings are a betterinvestment. On the human health side,In Business cites a recent survey ofcommercial property owners, 60 percent ofwhom had experienced a tenant-relatedindoor air quality problem in the past year.

On the investment side, Fannie Mae, thelargest non-bank financial servicescompany in the world, has concluded thathigh performance buildings justify offering“green mortgages,” which reward buyerswho select a home that meets adesignated set of criteria. Homebuyers geta reduced mortgage rate, as high as a fullpoint, which Fannie Mae justifies based onreduced operating cost, improved cashflow and less risk of default.

These examples and many others seem toconfirm two things. The first is that thereis no single recipe for high performance

buildings. The second is that even modestattempts to integrate the latest, mostenvironmentally sound technologies anddesign practices into a building’s predesignphase can often yield significant savingsand produce healthier, more productivestructures.

Yet, if high performance building practiceshave yielded such impressive results, whyhas the market not produced more of themon its own? A superior product should sell.Research on the traditional buildingprocess documents a range of barriers.These, along with recommendations foraddressing them, are discussed next.

Recommendations

Better-informed capital developmentdecisions could result in investments inpublic buildings and renovations that havelower lifetime costs for taxpayers, helpmaintain and restore Minnesota’s naturalenvironment and increase the health andperformance of its public servants.

The following policy recommendations,and the issues they address, are based ona review of published literature on highperformance buildings and months ofdiscussions among the six state agenciesthat participated in the Smart BuildingPartnership. These 10 recommendationsare offered in order of priority and aredirected at state government, though thebest solutions will likely come fromcollaborative efforts among public andprivate professionals and organizations.

1 Use demonstration projects toaddress fears about new buildingapproaches, raise awareness and givethe state practical experience in anintegrated design approach. A public andprivate advisory group of buildingprofessionals and others could help guidethe pilot efforts and recommend ways tofurther integrate high performancebuilding practices into state government.

The public-private advisory group couldhelp the Department of Administrationdefine the challenges and opportunitiespresented by the current buildingenvironment (codes, regulations, andavailability of high performance building


products), and identify any additionalchanges needed in the capital budgetprocess or in state law.

The state might contract with theUniversity of Minnesota’s Center forSustainable Building Research to convenethis advisory group.

Despite a growing body of evidence on thelong-term cost savings of highperformance buildings, it is often difficultto prove in the abstract that doingsomething differently today will have long-term benefit. Fueling this unease aboutnew building approaches is a general lackof awareness within the building tradesabout the availability and reliability of highperformance building products andtechniques. There can also be culturalresistance to new building designs andtechnologies if they force people to workin ways that they are not used to and didnot help choose.

A systematic research and developmenteffort through which the state can “learnby doing” in a thoughtful and controlledway is a prudent path around thesebarriers. This would require fundingoutside of an individual building project.

Develop measurable standards for statebuildings (by building type), appropriate forMinnesota’s climate. Demonstrationprojects would offer a starting point fordeveloping these performance standards.Standards should at least cover siting,water, energy, indoor environmentalquality, materials use and waste.

The available guidance on highperformance buildings is frequently notimmediately transferable to Minnesota’sclimate and often not specific enough toapply directly to a given project.

2 Require the use of multi-disciplinary design teams to developand manage all capital requests, startingwith predesign. Making a shift towardhigher performance buildings will requireboth a better understanding of emergingdesign options and technologies and thedevelopment of a new, more integratedbuilding process within the state thatbrings together all the relevant players atthe predesign phase.

The traditional building process is linearand segmented. Having each aspect of abuilding handled by a different specialist,each in turn, means that the building’ssystems are often not integrated in waysthat would maximize energy and costsavings, such as designing out the need forcomplex mechanical equipment.

Depending on the project, there are a largenumber of interests involved in thebuilding process, including owners,architects, engineers, regulators,contractors, lenders, operators, renovators,lessors, users and disposers of property.High performance buildings depend onthese interests working together as a teamfrom the very earliest predesign phase of aproject. This requires extra effort on thefront end, particularly until all of theseplayers have education and training in highperformance building techniques.

3 Help agencies to define as earlyas possible how their capitalprojects will contribute to thestate’s high performance buildinggoals. In its FY 2002 – 2007 CapitalBudget Instructions, the MinnesotaDepartment of Finance states that“projects that receive state funding will beexpected to employ high performancebuilding practices.” The Department ofAdministration’s revised predesign manualshould reflect these new expectations, andagencies should have access to technicalassistance on high performance buildingpractices as early as possible in theplanning phase of their capital projects.

Include a high performance buildingreview and comment opportunity duringthe existing review and comment phase ofthe capital budget process. A cross-disciplinary team of professionals withexpertise in high performance building

CAPITAL BUDGET PROCESS

This is the process as it stands with suggested amendmentsin italic.

April Department of Finance issues capital budget instructions,which now include instructions for addressing highperformance building practices

July Preliminary capital requests are due to the Department ofFinance (with copies provided to the Legislature)

August – September Two rounds of review and comment by departments ofAdministration and Finance, the Capitol Area Architecturaland Planning Board and the Office of Technology (couldinclude high performance building evaluation)

October Final capital requests due to Finance, final review andcomment takes place (could include final high performancebuilding evaluation)

October – November Executive budget team reviews capital requests

January Governor’s recommendations presented to the Legislature

CURRENT SMART GROWTH CRITERIA FOR CAPITAL PROJECTS

■ Provide wise stewardship of land, buildings and natural resources to sustain themover time■ Select efficient, integrated public investments based on lowest long-term economic,environmental and social costs■ Increase the range of Smart Growth options■ Reinforce accountability for development decisions


practices – including architects, engineers,builders and facility managers – couldreview and comment on major newbuilding and renovation proposals, basedon an agreed upon set of criteria.

The state could start by using theMinnesota Sustainable Design Guide andadd more specific performance criteria andguidelines over time, based on experiencegained through the demonstrations.

The up-front costs of capital projects tendto overshadow their lifetime costs.Explicitly including a high performancebuilding assessment as part of the capitalbudget process would help make thetradeoffs between short- and long-termcosts clearer and easier to weigh.

The Department of Finance requiresagencies to anticipate and identify likelyoperating costs in their capital requests.But the Legislature appropriates money forthe construction of buildings in one budgetround and money for ongoing operationand maintenance in another. This makes itpolitically more attractive to keep initialcapital costs low and worry about theoperating and maintenance expenses later,even when doing so may increase theoverall lifetime cost of the building.

4 Ensure appropriate training andretraining on high performance buildingpractices and technologies for relevantstate personnel. If training alone provesinsufficient, invest in additional staff withexpertise in high performance buildingpractices and approaches or contract forthe expertise.

There are few staff within stategovernment trained on high performancebuilding practices or explicitly chargedwith fostering their integration into stateprojects, though the Department ofAdministration has added some of theseresponsibilities to a position in its buildingconstruction division. The introduction ofnew designs, technologies and productsoften requires some additional research,as well as education and training of thebuilding’s clients, users and facilitymanagers.

5 Launch a public-private effort toconsolidate, and improve access to,information on high performancebuilding practices and technologies.This effort should support and complementthe University of Minnesota’s evolvingonline design guide and database to makethe available information and assistanceas user-friendly as possible to buildingprofessionals.

Existing information on high performancebuildings can be hard to access and apply.A great deal of information is available onhigh performance building practices andtechnologies, including design guides,product specifications and case studies.But because the information is widelydispersed, finding it and applying it can bedifficult and time consuming.

6 Establish a standard lifecycle orreinvestment costing methodology.This would allow the state to consistentlyproject and measure the short- and long-term costs of proposed high performancebuilding strategies.

Currently, the state has no such standardmethodology. Instead, agencies are left toconduct their own analyses, which may notbe comparable. The state should requirecomparison of first costs with life cyclecosts.

7 Develop an incentive andfee structure for all participants inthe building process that rewardsefficiency. Instead of paying contractorsbased only on a percentage of the cost andsize of a building or building system, therecould be added incentives for reducing thebuilding’s lifetime costs and improving itsenvironmental and human productivityperformance.

Develop lease options that allowlandlords and tenants to share benefits ofbuilding performance. For example,sharing operating savings due to energyefficiency improvements would give bothlandlord and tenant an incentive to investin the most efficient building systems andequipment possible. This could also includedeveloping measurable buildingperformance standards for state leasecontracts.

The current incentive structure in thebuilding trade generally rewardsinefficiency. Architects and engineers oftenget paid based on a percentage of buildingand equipment costs. Thus, there is littleincentive to eliminate mechanical needs orreduce costs in others ways. Virtually all ofthe players in the building process arerewarded for inefficiency rather than fordesigns and technologies that would lowera building’s lifetime costs and add to itsultimate real estate value.

There is also a unique disincentive forstate builders to save money onoperational costs because, with theexception of the Department ofAdministration, any money saved must bereturned to the general fund rather thandevoted to needed repairs or invested inadditional efficiency improvements.

8 Develop a process for trackingbuilding performance more regularlyover time. This is already being set up forenergy performance but could also includepost-occupancy evaluations that allow thestate to measure and adjust buildingoperations and transfer lessons learned tofuture buildings. The performanceevaluation process should encouragecontinuous improvement, both within abuilding and from one building to the next.

Require commissioning of statebuildings and operations and maintenanceplans. This would help ensure that facilitymanagers and users can keep theirbuilding operating at peek performance.Plans should include strategies fordocumenting the building’s operations andmaintenance costs to allow comparisonwith other buildings of the same type. Thiswould improve both facility managementand future capital investment decisions.

9 Require projects over $25 millionto go through a policy review priorto completing pre-design.This would not lengthen the existingreview and comment phase of the capitalbudget process, but would add to thereview, where appropriate, agencies withresponsibilities for strategic policydevelopment and the performance andimpacts of state buildings. This would helpensure that capital projects are consistentwith state policy and budget priorities.


In the past, agencies have sometimesinvested heavily in designing a majorcapital request before ensuring that theproposal is consistent with the state’sstrategic directions and budget priorities.

10 Evaluate the consistency andrelevance of existing statutesgoverning state-owned and financedbuildings and recommend changes thatfoster high performance buildings. Theultimate goal of this evaluation would beto establish a coherent set of policies thatreward and encourage continuousimprovement in the economic, environ-mental and human health performance ofthe state’s built environment.

The statutes covering building performancegovern some aspects of high performancebuildings but not others, leading to a patch-work quilt of performance goals spreadacross a number of different statutes.

A lesson of previous attempts to buildbetter buildings is that concentrating toomuch on one aspect or another of abuilding can lead to unintended costsdown the road (for example, making abuilding so energy tight that moldbecomes a problem). Another lesson is thatadding features late in the design andconstruction process, or as an afterthoughtonce a building is up, can often be lesseffective and more expensive thanintegrating them at the design stage.

This does not mean that high performancebuilding practices are not appropriate forrenovations and retrofits, but they areeven more effective when integrated intothe original building design. Whether thepractices are applied to new or existingstructures, high performance is achievedthrough an integrated, cross-disciplinarydesign approach and a commitment tosuperior financial, environmental andhuman health goals.

In the end, high performance buildings areabout getting the best return for everydollar invested. The State of Minnesotahas a long-term investment horizon andthe budget in 2020 is just as important asthe budget in 2002. Because the act ofbonding imposes future costs on residentswho must pay off the bonds, it is the

state’s responsibility to minimize thosecosts in pursuit of the greatest returns.The state must strive to maximize not onlyfinancial returns on its capital investmentsbut environmental and human healthdividends too. High performance buildingsdo just that. ■

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Barnett, Rick. “Greening the Public Sector.”In Business (September/October 2000): 18-21.

Barnett, Rick. “Greening the Private Sector.”In Business (November/December 2000): 16-19.

Brown, Hillary, AIA. Institutionalizing HighPerformance Buildings: A New Public ManagementStrategy. Technical Lecture at the MainstreamingGreen Conference 1999, Chattanooga, Tennessee.www.e-architect.com

California Launches State “Green Building” Effortfor the Next Century, Business Wire, CaliforniaIntegrated Waste Management Board, pressrelease, April 28, 1999.

Clayton Group Services, Inc.,www.claytonenvironmental.com

Daylighting in Schools: An Investigation into theRelationship Between Daylighting and HumanPerformance. Condensed Report. Pacific Gas andElectric Company, August 20, 1999.

Development of a State Strategy PromotingSustainability in Internal State GovernmentOperations, Executive Order #EO-00-07, Governor’sOffice of the State of Oregon, May 17, 2000.

Dobnik, Verena. “Pioneer high-rise going up inNYC.” Associated Press, 22 June 2000.

Cohen-Rosenthal, Ed; Schlarb, Mary; JenniferThorne with Adam Serchuk and Don Bradley.Build it Right: Cleaner Energy for Better Buildings.American Council for an Energy Efficient Economyand Renewable Energy Policy Project, No. 10,May 2000.

Energy Policy and Conservation Report, MinnesotaDepartment of Commerce, 2000.

Executive Order #96 on pursuing the 11sustainability goals outlined in New Jersey Future’s“Living With the Future in Mind” report, State ofNew Jersey Executive Department, May 20, 1999.

Executive Order #1998-1, establishing theGovernor’s Green Government Council, State ofPennsylvania, March 25, 1998.

Fact Sheet: Green Building in Pennsylvania forCommonwealth Real Estate Staff, Governor’sGreen Government Council, State of Pennsylvania.

“Fort Worth Post Office Tests Green Design.”Environmental Building News, vol 8, No. 4,(April 1999): 13. http://www.ebuild.com/archives/other_copy/postoffice.html.

Greening Indiana’s Government: A Plan toImplement Governor Frank O’Bannon’s ExecutiveOrder 99-07, Greening the Government, May 25,2000.

Hammer, Chris. Sustainable Design and BuildingGuidelines for Dakota County, Minnesota. April2000.

Hawken, Paul; Lovins, Amory and Hunter L. NaturalCapitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution.Little, Brown and Company (1999): 82 – 110.

Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum, Inc. case studiesonline. http://www.hok.com/sustainabledesign/casestudies/frb.html

Kozlowski, David. Can Green be Gold: ProponentsSay Green Buildings Are Worth More ThanConventional Ones. Now There Are Signs That theMarket Is Starting to Agree. www.facilitiesnet.comA site developed by the publishers of BuildingOperating Management, Energy Decisions andMaintenance Solutions magazines.

Minnesota Capital Management 2000. Departmentof Finance. State of Minnesota, July 2000.

Minnesota Office of Environmental Assistance.Research on Minnesota buildings that have“green” components and aspects to them.

Porter, Douglas R. The Practice of SustainableDevelopment, Chapter 7, “Sustainable Building.”The Urban Land Institute, 2000.

Reis, Michael. Environmental Design &Construction. March-April 2000, p 32.http://www.oberlin.edu/newserv/esc/Default.htm

Revkin, Andrew C. “NY Governor Proposes GreenBuilding Tax Credits.” The New York Times.11 January 2000, p. C30.

Skylighting and Retail Sales: An Investigation intothe Relationship Between Daylighting and HumanPerformance. Condensed Report. Pacific Gas andElectric Company, August 20, 1999.

State Building Maintenance. Summary. MinnesotaOffice of the Legislative Auditor.

Sustainable Buildings Industry Council,http://www.sbicouncil.org.

Sustainable Business Insider, October 2000.

Sustainable Decisions Guide for City of Saint PaulFacilities, City of St. Paul, Minnesota, 2000. http://www.stpaul.gov/depts/tms/real/sustain/index.html.

Sustainable development consulting services forIowa capitol complex master plan, IowaDepartment of Natural Resources, October 5, 1999.

Sustainable development consulting services for theIowa capitol complex master plan – contractrenewal approval. Iowa Department of NaturalResources, September 4, 2000.

Tremain, Kerry. “Little Green Schoolhouse.”New Democrat. (September/October 1999): 16.

Wise, James A. Ph.D. “On the Adoption ofSustainability Rating Systems.” Big Green Digest.October 12, 1999.

State and Federal Efforts

Leading states

PENNSYLVANIAhttp://www.gggc.state.pa.us/building/default.htm

The nation’s federal and state governments represent largecustomers for building products and services. The stateinitiatives and federal programs described in this sectionsuggest that some of these large public customers aredemanding building products, services and design approaches

that deliver better financial, environmental and humanhealth results. Advances in building technologies matchedwith executive orders, new guidelines and tax credits arebeginning to create a significant market pull toward highperformance buildings.

Pennsylvania has decided to learn by doing. The Departmentof Environmental Protection built its new south-centralregional office building as the state’s first high performancedemonstration project. To help Pennsylvania’s other stateagencies shift toward better building practices, theDepartment of General Services developed High-PerformanceGreen Building Guidelines and Model Green Office LeasingSpecifications for state buildings.

All this was spurred in March 1998, when Governor ThomasRidge signed an executive order creating the Governor’sGreen Government Council. The council’s purpose is to workcooperatively across agency jurisdictions to “facilitate theincorporation of environmentally sustainable practices . . .into the Commonwealth government’s planning, operations,policymaking and regulatory functions, and to strive forcontinuous improvement in environmental performance withthe goal of zero emissions.”

Under this order, each state agency must assign a deputysecretary or equivalent to be responsible to the agency headfor progress toward incorporating environmentallysustainable practices into the agency’s management andoperations. Each agency must also identify a green teamleader who is responsible for development and implemen-tation of the agency’s activities. As a first step, the executiveorder asks Pennsylvania agencies to focus their efforts onplanning and operations, particularly energy efficiency,building design and management.

In response, the state established a High Performance GreenBuildings program to foster the use of building products,components and systems that improve building performance.This means significantly reducing energy consumption,enhancing facility flexibility using systems that allow quick,cost-effective space reconfiguration, improving user comfortand satisfaction with high indoor air quality, using such meansas individual temperature and ventilation controls.

The call to construct the state’s first demonstration buildingcame from Pennsylvania’s Secretary of Environment JamesSeif, based on the rationale that such a building would reducethe state’s long-term costs.

Actual hard construction costs, excluding site costs, for theEnvironmental Protection department’s south-centralregional office building totaled just over $78 per squarefoot, a difficult target even for conventional constructionin the central Pennsylvania market. Now that the buildingis built, the state expects its lifetime energy costs to belower than average by approximately $50,000 annually.

The new building is on a brownfield site, stands threefloors high and has 73,000 square feet. It has a modular,flexible design that could accommodate a wide range offuture tenants. Some of the building’s other highperformance aspects include:

■ A raised floor to allow air flow and advancedtelecommunications infrastructure.

■ Super insulated “low-e” windows that let light in butminimize heat loss and gain.

■ Water as its refrigerant (no CFCs or HCFCs).

■ Personal control of temperature through the use ofdiffusers.

■ Indirect lighting that offers no glare, less maintenanceand reduces the inside wattage necessary.

■ 79 percent recycled material in the ceilings.

■ $70 per work station as compared to $300 fortraditional work spaces.

According to Pennsylvania’s Department of EnvironmentalProtection, it would be hard to overemphasize theeconomic benefits of the project’s “green” or highperformance attributes and their beneficial impacts onworkers. Their assessment is that the sometimes-highercost of green materials at present is a function of lowdemand, caused by too little awareness within thebuilding and financing sectors. Department officialsbelieve that as awareness increases so will demand,particularly given the potential major economic benefits ofsuch practices and technologies.

The state of Pennsylvania views this new regionalheadquarters building as a significant opportunity to raisethat awareness and expects it, and future state buildings,

to demonstrate the benefits of high performancebuilding design and construction.

The cross-disciplinary design process used for this firstbuilding drew together the knowledge of designers,constructors, government officials, academics andothers. It proved so successful that the same process

will now be used statewide as the commonwealth designs andbuilds future facilities. The Governor’s Green GovernmentCouncil believes that demonstrating high performance buildingpractices in a real building has given the state a working modelof a new design process and a new product that tangiblycommunicates the commonwealth’s commitment to operatingin a sustainable manner.

CALIFORNIAhttp://www.ciwmb.ca.gov/GreenBuilding

In 1999, California’s Integrated Waste ManagementBoard, one of six boards that make up the state’sEnvironmental Protection Agency, adopted a SustainableBuilding Plan. The board allocated $500,000 to serve as acatalyst for higher performance buildings in stategovernment, and eventually throughout California.

According to California’s waste board, the $500,000 infunding will allow it to:

■ Create an executive-level Sustainable BuildingCommittee, comprised of state department, board andagency leaders, sustainable building experts and privatesector representatives (such as utility companies);

■ Design a grant program to fund building design efforts aswell as workshops and education forums on sustainablebuilding; and

■ Develop a sustainable building tool kit which, amongother things, will include guidelines to assist localgovernments in communicating their green building goals andrequirements to design and construction bidders.

INDIANAhttp://www.state.in.us/idoa/greening

Governor Frank O’Bannon signed Executive Order 99-07on April 22, 1999 to improve the state’s overallenvironmental performance and wherever possible tomake its operations more efficient and cost-effective.The resulting Greening the Government Plan outlineswhat state agencies should do to implement theexecutive order.

The plan asks the Public Works Division of Indiana’sDepartment of Administration to “green” state building

and deconstruction projects. Toward this end, the divisionhas incorporated requirements for architects and engineersto use sustainable design practices and green buildingproducts and procedures. These changes cover such things asconstruction and deconstruction, eliminating hazardousmaterials, reducing products that produce volatile organiccompounds, recycling construction waste and salvagingmaterials for reuse. Design teams must integrate these newconsiderations from the outset of a building or majorrenovation project. [http://www.state.in.us/idoa/pwd/]

IOWAhttp://www.state.ia.us/government/dnr/index.html

The Department of Natural Resources has workedclosely with the Department of General Services andindividual project architects to establish SustainableDevelopment Principles as part of the Iowa CapitolComplex Master Plan. The plan provides a frameworkfor complex-wide planning efforts. Iowa may be the firststate to include such principles in its capitol area’smaster plan. Concepts addressed in the master planinclude site planning, energy efficiency, water, materialand resource conservation, indoor air quality, solidwaste reduction and overall environmental quality.

The state’s goal is to apply these high performance buildingconcepts to all new construction, renovation and demolitionprojects on the Capitol complex. To accomplish this goal,Iowa’s Department of Natural Resources contracted with aprivate consulting firm to:

■ Develop documentation tools for project reviews includinghigh performance checklists for each building phase.

■ Provide technical support for a “green” purchasing agentwithin the Department of General Services.

22 State and Federal Efforts January 2002 Perspectives Minnesota Planning

■ Develop and implement outreach and awareness activitiessuch as meetings and presentations with stakeholder groups,a Web site and development and dissemination ofinformational literature.

■ Evaluate project success through post-occupancyevaluation of building goals and systems.

Since this effort began in 1999, the Iowa Department ofNatural Resources’ accomplishments include:

■ Testing current and upcoming projects with the nationalbuilding rating system known as LEEDTM (Leadership inEconomic and Environmental Design), developed by the publicand private U.S. Green Building Council. The goal of thesetests is to evaluate the benefits and potential impacts onbuilding costs and schedules.

■ Developing a Sustainable Building Checklist to providearchitects and engineers with a means of measuring theirperformance on the LEEDTM Rating System.

■ Defining levels of commissioning and negotiatingcommissioning language for Capitol complex projects anddeveloping standard request for proposal language andsupplemental information to support the integration ofcommissioning on upcoming projects.

While the current focus is on the Capitol complex, thedepartments of Natural Resources and General Servicesplan to share relevant information with other stateagencies and plan to include funding for high performanceconsulting services in all building, renovation anddemolition project budgets for legislative approval.

The Iowa effort explicitly aims to transform the localbuilding industry into one that understands and delivershigh performance buildings as standard practice.

MARYLANDhttp://www.dnr.state.md.us/programs/greenbuilding

Maryland’s Green Building Program hopes to change the wayland development occurs in the state. It promotes awarenessand use of environmentally responsible building practices,materials and site designs that provide more comfortable,affordable and healthier buildings. As a logical extension of itsnationally known Smart Growth efforts, Maryland’s GreenBuilding Program works with county and municipal plannersand others to evaluate and modify codes, ordinances andpolicies to better foster green building and development.Maryland believes that it makes no sense to stop being“smart” at the front door of a building. The state sees itsgreen building program as different from many similar buildingprograms across the country. It focuses not only on howbuildings are designed and built, but also on where they are onthe land in relation to existing infrastructure, transportationand environmentally sensitive areas. The program aims tominimize the negative impacts of buildings.

In addition to helping local governments revise codes andordinances, the Maryland Department of NaturalResources also coordinates a traveling green buildingexhibit and sponsors workshops. The DNR partners withthe U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy StarHomes Program, the U.S. Department of Energy’s RebuildAmerica Program, and the Energy Efficient BuildingAssociation. Maryland’s program draws information fromthe Oak Ridge National Building Technology Center, theSouthface Energy Institute and Environmental BuildingNews. The department also partners with the Baltimore,Annapolis, and District of Columbia chapters of theAmerican Institute of Architects and the U.S. GreenBuilding Council.

NEW JERSEYhttp://www.bgnj.org

The Building a Greener New Jersey Program is a public-private partnership dedicated to shifting current buildingpractices toward technologies and techniques that areenvironmentally preferable.

The New Jersey Office of Sustainable Business establishedthe partnership in 1997 as a way to transform the market forgreen building products and services. The Office ofSustainable Business provides staffing, coordination, a greenbuilding library and free monthly workshops to the Building aGreener New Jersey Program. Eventually, the program plans

to provide information on New Jersey companies thatoffer green building products and services, a searchabledatabase of green building products and services, currentbuilding projects in New Jersey and case studies.

In addition, New Jersey’s Department of CommunityAffairs in collaboration with the state’s largest utilityhave a Sustainable Development and Affordable HousingPilot Program underway. [http://www.state.nj.us/dca/dhcr/sdhome.htm] Its purpose is to determine how toincorporate sustainable design principles and energy

23State and Federal Efforts January 2002 Perspectives Minnesota Planning

efficiency into affordable housing. The program’s goalsare to:

■ Promote implementation of New Jersey’sDevelopment and Redevelopment Plan by applyingproven energy efficiency technologies andenvironmentally sensitive construction practices andmaterials.

■ Encourage developing municipalities to provideaffordable housing by demonstrating that it can beattractive and an asset to the community.

■ Encourage site selection, planning and buildingdesign that minimizes the impact on environmentalquality and limits emissions of greenhouse gases.

■ Demand energy and resource-efficient design andconstruction to spur the market for such practices.

■ Produce housing for low- and moderate-incomehouseholds that is highly energy efficient, cost efficientand easy to maintain.

In 1998, the Department of Community Affairs publisheda request for proposals seeking housing developmentteams to design and construct housing that is affordable,highly energy efficient and meets sustainabledevelopment criteria. New construction, substantialrehabilitation and conversion were eligible activities.

The department encouraged developers to team up withprofessional consultants, planners, architects and buildersexperienced in sustainable design.

Applicants were asked to propose design strategies in fourkey categories to the greatest extent possible within site andcost constraints. The categories were:

■ Site and building designs that reduce dependence onautomobiles, promote community and security and fosterappreciation of the surrounding environment.

■ Resource conservation and waste minimization throughmaterials that are long-lasting, low maintenance, resource-efficient and environmentally responsible.

■ Comprehensive approaches to energy and waterefficiency, such as well-insulated building envelopes, suntempering, high performance windows, properly sized,efficient heating and cooling systems, efficient lighting andappliances and water conservation measures.

■ Health and safety through minimizing use of indoorpollutants, proper ventilation, choice of durable materialsand education and training of the building users.

In October 1999, the program announced eight winningprojects. One is currently under construction.

NEW YORKhttp://www.dec.state.ny.us/website/dar/ood/grnbldg.html

Other states actively encouraging high performancebuildings have focused their efforts on the workings ofstate government. Instead, New York is hoping toinfluence private development with a market-basedapproach. In May 2000, Governor George Pataki signedthe nation’s first Green Building Tax Credit into law. Itprovides $25 million in credits over the next five yearsto encourage owners and tenants of commercial andresidential buildings to incorporate environmentalfeatures. The credits are meant to ease the transition tosuch practices by offsetting some of the additionalupfront costs sometimes associated with highperformance buildings.

To qualify for the credits, new buildings must be over20,000 square feet and 35 percent more energy efficientthan the state’s energy code, renovated buildings 25percent more efficient. Qualifying buildings will alsohave to meet standards on indoor air quality, wastedisposal, energy and water use. They can earn additionalcredits for incorporating renewable energy technologies.

According to the Associated Press, the first building to takeadvantage of the tax credits is a 250-unit luxury high-risetower in Manhattan’s Battery Park City. Four Times Squarewill be 337,000-square feet, 26 stories high and privatelyfinanced at a cost of $95 million. Tenants may be able tomove in by the end of 2002.

The building’s high performance characteristics will include:

■ Energy efficiency 35 percent higher than state codesrequire.

■ Dimmable and motion-controlled lighting, more naturallight and energy-efficient refrigerators.

■ Solar panels that generate electricity for halls andcommon areas.

■ Water in bathrooms and washing machines recycled foruse in toilets and in maintenance work.

Builders expect the upfront costs to be about 15 percenthigher than similar city apartments, but rents are notexpected to be significantly different than the average forBattery Park.


SOURCE: Porter, Douglas R., The Practice of Sustainable Development, Chapter 7, “Sustainable Building.”Urban Land Institute, 2000.This material is reproduced with the permission of the Urban Land Institute

Green Building Features of Four Times Square, New York, NY

FUEL CELLS

ALTERNATIVEENERGY SOURCE

GAS-FIREDABSORPTIONHVAC SYSTEM

HIGH EFFICIENCYVARIABLE SPEEDPUMPS, MOTORS, FANS

NO CFCs OR HCFCs

IN CURTAINWALL

PHOTOVOLTAICPANELS

ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLYBUILDING MATERIALS

FLOOR-BY-FLOOR AIRQUALITY MONITORING,CONTROL & PURGE SYSTEM

50% MORE FRESH AIRPROVIDED

FILTRATION SYSTEMFOR AIR POLLUTANTS

ADDITIONALEXHAUST SHAFT

ENVIRONMENTALLYFRIENDLY BUILDINGMAINTENANCE

EXISTING FOOTINGSREUSED

CENTRALIZED,AUTOMATEDBUILDINGMANAGEMENT

FOR SMOKING, FUMES & HEAT

INTEGRATEDCOMMUNICATIONSTOWER

REMOVABLE CRANE

HAT TRUSS STRUCTURE

HIGH PERFORMANCELOW-E GLASSCURTAINWALL

EFFICIENT LIGHTING

RECYCLED & RECYCLABLEBUILDING MATERIALS

RECYCLABLE WASTE CHUTES

CONCRETE CORESTRUCTURE

COMMISSIONING

RECYCLABLE WASTESTORAGE FACILITIES

FOR BUILDING MAINTENANCE

REDUCES STRUCT. STEEL USE

WITH LARGER WINDOW AREAS

OCCUPANCY SENSORS & CONTROLS

REDUCES STRUCT. STEEL USE

ENERGY

INDOOR AIR QUALITY

RECYCLING

MANAGEMENT


OREGONhttp://www.governor.state.or.us/governor/sustainability/index.html

In May 2000, Governor John Kitzhaber, M.D., signed anexecutive order, Development of a State StrategyPromoting Sustainability in Internal State GovernmentOperations. Its goals include:

■ Increasing the efficiency with which energy, water,material resources and land are used.

■ Reducing releases of substances harmful to humanhealth and the environment.

■ Reducing adverse impacts on natural habitats andspecies.

The order directs Oregon’s Department of AdministrativeServices to adopt new facilities standards and guidelineswithin six months. They are to cover siting, design,construction, deconstruction, operation and maintenanceof state buildings and landscapes, and the selection,terms and conditions for state leaseholds.In carrying out this task, the department must:

■ Review and consider “sustainable” facilities standards,practices and principles employed by businesses, educationalinstitutions and other governments;

■ Obtain input from the existing central facilities planningcommittee and the capital projects advisory board;

■ Review and update the state’s facilities standards andguidelines at least biennially; and

■ Track and report key performance elements through theexisting state facilities coordination program.

In addition, the executive order asks Oregon’s Department ofAdministrative Services to use a specific state building as apilot for demonstrating and evaluating high performanceproducts and practices. The department must expandprocurement of environmentally sound products and servicesand purchase energy from renewable sources.


FEDERAL ACTIVITIES

Below is a summary of current federal programs devoted to fostering higher performance buildings in the United States.While the Web sites provided here are accurate at the time of this publication, readers may need to contact the relevantagency directly to obtain the most recent information on its activities.

The Department of Energy

The Energy Efficiency and Renewable EnergyNetwork provides information about renewable energy andenergy efficiency developments along with links andinformation on the department’s other buildings programs.[http://www.eren.doe.gov]

The Office of Building Technology, State andCommunity Programs provides technical and financialassistance, case studies and information on advancedtechnologies for commercial and residential buildings, includingthe Technology Roadmap for High-Performance CommercialBuildings. The report outlines a plan to integrate research,development and deployment of new technologies forcommercial buildings, using a “whole-building” approach thatevaluates the energy efficiency trade-offs inherent in differentarchitectural and design options.

Buildings for the 21st Century aims to reduce currentenergy consumption in existing buildings by 20 percent and innew buildings by 50 percent, compared to current buildingpractices.

Million Solar Roofs Initiative was developed in responseto President Clinton’s call to address the challenge of globalclimate change. The Department of Energy has been leadingthis effort to place one million solar energy systems on theroofs of buildings and homes across the U.S. by the year 2010.

Federal Energy Management Program is thedepartment’s effort to reduce the cost of government byadvancing energy efficiency, water conservation and the use ofrenewable energy sources within federal facilities. Perhaps itsmost high profile demonstration site has been the WhiteHouse.

The Environmental Protection Agency

The EPA offers several Energy Star programs to reduce energyconsumption in buildings. The Energy Star Buildings Program isa voluntary energy-efficiency program for commercial buildingsin the United States. The program focuses on profitableinvestments available in most buildings using proventechnologies. Program participants can expect to reduce theirbuilding’s energy consumption by about 30 percent.[http://www.epa.gov/buildings]

The agency also runs the Green Lights program, anothervoluntary initiative that provides technical assistance,resources and tools to U.S. businesses, institutions,government agencies and other organizations interested in

replacing inefficient lighting with new, high-efficiencylighting systems. This program, too, has helped itsparticipants save an average of 30 percent on lightingenergy costs.

The General Services Administration

The administration is responsible for providing otherfederal agencies with the workspace, products, servicesand technologies they need to accomplish their missions.In response to President Clinton’s Greening theGovernment executive order, the administration produceda Real Property Sustainable Development Guide to helporganizations understand the triple bottom line ofsustainable development – superior economic,environmental and community outcomes.[http://policyworks.gov/org/main/mp/gsa/index.html]

Department of Housing and UrbanDevelopment

Focused more on the country’s residential buildings, theDepartment of Housing and Urban Development managesthe public-private Partnership for Advancing Technologyin Housing, or PATH program [http://www.pathnet.org].It seeks to expand the development and use of newtechnologies to make American homes stronger, safer andmore durable, more energy-efficient and environmentallyfriendly, easier to maintain, less costly to operate andmore comfortable to live in. The program providesinformation on best practices, a technology inventory, aResidential Structural Design Guide and other resources.

National Park Service

The Park Service has established a Sustainable DesignInitiative to develop, implement and promote sustainablepractices in its own operations. As a first step, the ParkService published Guiding Principles of Sustainable Designfor the design and management of tourist facilities. Theprinciples emphasize environmental sensitivity inconstruction, the use of non-toxic materials, resourceconservation, recycling and integration of visitors withnatural and cultural settings.[http://www.nps.gov/dsc/dsgncnstr]

National Research Laboratories

Three national laboratories conduct research anddevelopment to improve building performance. The OakRidge National Laboratory in Tennessee has a major


emphasis on efficient building systems, such as heating,cooling and refrigerating equipment, roofs, walls andfoundations, insulating materials, technology transfer,retrofit of existing structures and evaluation and analysisof existing efficiency programs. [http://www.ornl.gov]

Argonne National Laboratory, with sites in Illinois andIdaho, runs the Existing Buildings Efficiency Researchprogram. It focuses on working with communities in theMidwest to make housing in low-income neighborhoodsmore affordable through energy efficiency.[http://BuildingsResearch.anl.gov/eber]

Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s BuildingTechnologies Department in California develops andhelps commercialize energy-efficient technologies andanalytical techniques. It also documents ways ofimproving the energy efficiency and indoorenvironmental quality of residential and commercialbuildings. A quarterly news magazine featuresinformation on current projects. The center providessoftware tools and The Home Energy Saver, an Internet-based tool for calculating energy use in residentialbuildings. [http://eetd.lbl.gov/BT.html]

The Navy

The Naval Facilities Engineering Command hascommitted to demonstrating engineering leadershipthrough “environmentally sustainable facilities.” ItsSustainable Design Program has led to the adoption ofseveral formal planning and design policy statements onsustainable, high performance building design.[http://www.efdlant.navfac.navy.mil/Lantops_15/sustainable_design.htm]

The Navy also sponsors a Whole Building Design GuideWeb site that provides guidance on designingenvironmentally sound commercial buildings. The guidesets energy use goals and suggests sustainable designmaterials and methods consistent with a whole buildingdesign approach. [http://www.wbdg.org/mtext.html]

U.S. Postal Service

The Postal Service has 35,000 facilities across the countryand expects to construct 500 to 700 new ones each year.Since 1993, it has worked to reduce the environmentalimpact of its operations by using alternative-fueled vehicles,recycled and recyclable paper, and more recently byintroducing high performance buildings.

As featured in the April 1999 issue of Environmental BuildingNews, the Postal Service has built a high performance,25,500-square-foot post office in Fort Worth, Texas. This isthe first in a series of demonstration buildings planned to testinnovative building practices.

The high performance features of the new Fort Worth postoffice include an exterior that reflects heat, glazed windowsto allow light in but keep excess heat out and naturallighting. Low-impact building materials include “Agri-board,”straw-and-oriented-strand-board panels for the exteriorwalls. Rainwater is collected for irrigation and may be usedfor drinking water after the first year depending on theoutcome of water quality tests. The project budget of $93.50per square foot allowed 10 percent to cover these and othernew strategies. The second demonstration post office isunder construction in Raleigh, North Carolina.[http://www.usps.gov/environ/webpages/grnbldg.htm]


The 2001 Legislative Session produced significant progresstoward higher performance public buildings:

ARTICLE 1 of the Energy Security and Reliability Actof 2001 includes three provisions aimed at reducing thelifetime costs of state-funded buildings:

1. Energy conservation in public buildings. TheDepartment of Administration, in consultation with theDepartment of Commerce, may contract with public utilities orcomprehensive energy service providers to invest in energyconservation measures in state-owned and wholly state-leasedbuildings. The contracts must require inclusion of all energyimprovements with a payback of 10 years or less. The utility orenergy service provider will be paid solely from energy costsavings.

The goal of the program is to demonstrate that stategovernment can, through effective energy conservationmeasures, exceed the existing energy code by at least 30percent, thereby reducing its energy consumption per squarefoot and its long-term energy costs.

2. Sustainable building guidelines. The departments ofAdministration and Commerce, with the assistance of otheragencies, must develop sustainable building design guidelinesfor all new state buildings by January 15, 2003. The guidelinesmust:

■ Exceed existing energy code by at least 30 percent

■ Achieve lowest possible lifetime costs for new buildings

■ Encourage continual energy conservation improvements innew buildings

■ Establish sustainability guidelines that:

– Define air quality and lighting standards– Create and maintain a healthy environment

– Facilitate productivity improvements– Specify ways to reduce material costs– Consider the long-term operating costs of the building,

including the use of renewable energy sources anddistributed electric energy generation that uses arenewable source or natural gas or a fuel that is as clean orcleaner than natural gas.

The Department of Administration must use an open process indeveloping the guidelines, including opportunities for publiccomment.

Once established, the guidelines are mandatory for all newbuildings receiving funding from the bond proceeds fund afterJanuary 1, 2004.

3. Benchmarks for existing public buildings. TheDepartment of Administration must maintain information onenergy use in all public buildings in order to establish energyefficiency benchmarks and energy conservation goals.

The department must report preliminary energy conservationgoals to the legislature by January 15, 2002.

By January 15, 2003, the department must develop acomprehensive plan for maximizing electrical and thermalenergy efficiency in existing public buildings. The energyconservation measures must have a simple payback within 10 to15 years or less.

The comprehensive plan must outline how to implement theconservation measures and their projected costs.

SUSTAINABLE SCHOOLS. In addition, the K-12 funding billencourages school boards to use “environmentally sustainableschool facility design concepts” for new schools, and requiresthe Department of Administration to provide information to anyschool district “interested in providing environmentallysustainable facilities.”

2001 Legislative Session Update

The FY 2002 – 2007 Capital Budget Instructions, issued by theDepartment of Finance in May 2001, also contain newprovisions on high performance buildings and sustainabledesign practices, stating that “Projects that receive statefunding will be expected to employ high performance buildingpractices.”

The Capital Budget Instructions include high performancebuildings as one of several “guiding principles” for the budgetprocess and encourage those proposing projects to identify inthe predesign phase ways of pursuing 10 high performancebuilding goals (see page 8 of this report).

The instructions also encourage agencies and elected officialsto focus on the maintenance and adaptive re-use of existing

Executive Branch Update

buildings before proposing new facilities, which many considerthe ultimate sustainable design strategy.

Finally, the capital budget evaluation process will giveadditional points to bonding requests that can “demonstrate areduction in net operating costs (building operating costs orsalary expenses) or which result in increased efficiencies.” Theaim here is to encourage and reward high performance buildingpractices that reduce the lifetime costs of state-fundedbuildings rather than focusing exclusively on their up-frontcosts. The Capital Budget Instructions are online at:http://morefinance.state.mn.us/budget/capital/maincapitalbudget.shtml .

Glossary

British thermal unit (or BTU) is astandard measure of heat energy equal toabout 252 calories, or the quantity of heatrequired to raise the temperature of onepound of water one degree Fahrenheit.

CFC and HCFC refer tochlorofluorocarbons andhydrochlorofluorocarbons respectively.These are a class of nontoxic,nonflammable organic compoundscontaining carbon, flourine, chlorine andhydrogen. Scientists believe they areresponsible for eroding the earth’sprotective ozone layer.

Commissioning is a systematic processfor checking the finished building againstits original goals and design specificationsto see that it is working properly.

Embodied energy is the amount ofenergy used during the entire life cycle of acommodity, including its manufacture,transportation and disposal.

Emergy units are measures of the energyused in the past to produce a given productor service, as distinct from current energyuse. The concept was originally developedby Dr. Howard T. Odum at the University ofFlorida in Gainesville.

High performance buildings are theresult of a comprehensive and integrateddesign approach that strives to maximizehuman comfort and productivity whileminimizing the building’s lifetime economicand environmental costs, including siting,water, energy, materials use, indoorenvironmental quality and solid andhazardous waste impacts.

Low-emissivity windows (often called“low-e”) allow visible light to passthrough them while blocking somepercentage of the heat-producing infraredportion of the light spectrum.

MINNESOTA PLAN NING C R I T I C A L I S S U E S

Room 300658 Cedar St.St. Paul, MN 55155651-296-3985

www.mnplan.state.mn.us

January 2002