CSRwire today has a release from SustainableBusiness.com that presents the first positive news I have read regarding the real estate industry in some months: Real Estate Industry Quietly Embracing Green Development, Progressive Investor Reports. Following are a few interesting snippets:

“In an analysis of the industry, Progressive Investor reports that 41% of the 300 U.S. real estate investment trusts (REITs) are actively pursuing energy efficiency and green building upgrades and another 27% plan to do so.”

Those figures are a bit too low to be firmly optimistic, but promising nonetheless. Several factors were cited for the increased interest in incorporating green design into real estate:

• Higher energy costs
• Lower cost of “building green” than in years prior
• Increasing client/tenant preference for green buildings
• Noted increase in high-profile clients establishing green corporate headquarters (Bank of America, Toyota, Goldman Sachs, and others mentioned)
• Increasing mandate for green building
• Preemptive attempt to flush non-green and/or older and more inefficient properties from portfolios by real estate firms

TAGS: CSR | green building | REIT | sustainability | sustainable design | green design

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 19th, 2007 at 9:24 am and is filed under Business Strategy, Corporate Social Responsibility, Interesting News, Social Enterprise, Socially Responsible Investing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.