I’ve often talked about the trends towards sustainability and green buildings and how this is something that is with us to stay.

Work environments that are both green and user friendly are definitely in demand with employees, and also with organisations wanting to walk the talk around their commitment to the planet and people. Being green is certainly becoming good business.

However, research is showing us that even though more and more organisations want a “green lease” they don’t want to have to pay more for it.

International research shows that 66 percent of global corporate executives are not prepared to pay higher rents to lease offices in green buildings despite the fact 70 percent of them view sustainability as a critical business issue.

The poll of more than 230 corporates showed that only 37 percent would be prepared to pay a premium of between 1 and 10 percent for a “green” rental while another 20 percent said they would pay a premium but only if it was offset by lower building operation costs.

The research suggested that organisations were focusing on green strategies that are easy to implement and offer short-term savings, such as water recycling.

Overall the research offers evidence that sustainability concerns are impacting on corporate real estate decision making.

In New Zealand this poses some interesting questions for us and I believe a challenge to utilise that kiwi ingenuity to investigate low-cost ways of greening buildings.

An Auckland architect just back from The World Architecture Forum said the interesting thing about designing green buildings in Europe is that developers there can work with manufacturers and developers of high-end green technologies to build custom solutions.

These solutions may not always come at a low cost, and here we don’t have the option.

Kiwi ingenuity has never been high cost, so perhaps we simply apply ourselves to some low-cost green solutions so we can meet the dual demands of keeping both costs and environmental impacts low.

Tags: commercial property leasing, Sustainable Green Building

This entry was posted on Tuesday 17th November 2009 and is filed under Sustainability. Both comments and pings are currently closed.