Program Recognizes Green Lease Leaders

Developed by the Institute for Market Transformation (IMT), Washington,D.C., and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Better Buildings Alliance, Washington,the Green Lease Leader recognition program acknowledges firms and brokers successfully using green leasing to save energy in commercial buildings.

“As more real-estate companies look to engage tenants on energy performance, the lease is a natural starting point. Green Lease Leaders will ensure stakeholders have a reliable, easy-to-understand method to signal their willingness to engage in green leasing and sustainable building operation,” says Kristen Taddonio, manager of DOE’s Better Buildings Alliance.

The program also offers the brokerage community a chance to jump into the sustainability conversation. “As the primary conduit between tenants and landlords, commercial brokers play a vital role in the real-estate transaction,” says Andrew C. Florance, founder and CEO of CoStar Group,a commercial real-estate information company. “We support the goals of the Green Lease Leaders program and believe it will provide brokers an opportunity to facilitate a sustainable tenant-landlord relationship and earn recognition for their efforts.”

Adopting changes to standard lease language may help reduce electricity and water consumption, improve tenant comfort, and allow the landlord and tenant to better control operating expenses while minimizing waste. Some landlords, however, struggle to determine what language should be added, what their competitors are doing and whether other parties will be comfortable with proposed green-lease clauses. Green Lease Leaders addresses this problem by creating an industry approved definition of a green-lease program and by recognizing landlords,tenants and brokers nationally who are successfully meeting the standard.

“These requirements set a new standard for commercial leasing by providing a uniform definition for what characterizes a green lease, and each of the requirements aids in making a lease more equitable between landlord and tenant so that they share both the costs and benefits of improved energy performance,” says Cliff Majersik, IMT’s executive director.

The program application can be found at www.greenleaseleaders.com and the 2014 application cycle will run until April 8. The initial group of recognized firms and brokers will be announced at DOE’s Better Buildings Summit in Washington on May 7.