Renovating Can Be Cheaper and Greener than New Construction

You may have heard the slogan, “the greenest building is the one that’s already built.”

Think about it: You’re using existing resources, and those resources are already on-site. For the parts of the existing building that you can adapt or fix, you don’t have to mine or cut down anything, you don’t have to transport anything, and you don’t have to clear a new site out of farmland or forest.

Here’s a nice article on TriplePundit about a renovation of a former military barracks in Ft.Carson, Colorado into an office building. The project cost only a quarter of what a new building would have cost, and is green enough to be submitted for LEED silver certification. And that’s particularly interesting, because my understanding is that military barracks were typically built cheaply, quickly, and with little thought for conservation.

Another great example is the Empire State Building—which spent $20 million to achieve annual energy savings of more than $4 million. That works out to better than 20 percent ROI—at a time when you can’t even get 1 percent in a savings account. Not a bad investment!

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A lifelong activist, profitability and marketing specialist Shel Horowitz’s mission is to fix crises like hunger, poverty, racism, war, and catastrophic climate change—by showing the business world how fixing them can make a profit. An author, international speaker, and TEDx Talker, his award-winning 10th book, Guerrilla Marketing to Heal the World, lays out a blueprint for creating and MARKETING those profitable change-making products and services. He is happy to help you craft your messaging and develop profit strategies. Learn more (and download excerpts from the book) at http://goingbeyondsustainability.com