I'll admit to entering the halls of Greenbuild — the mammoth green building conference and expo, held last week in Phoenix — with a cynical theory: Greenbuild would be filled with greenwash. I assumed that with nearly 1,100 exhibitors, up 25% from the previous year amid a horrid economy, the U.S. Green Building Council, the event's organizers, had lowered its standards, accepting anyone that had a green story to tell. It would be, I surmised, a case study in what happens when green goes mainstream: that good intentions and high standards give way to the lowest common denominator of the mass market. We'd seen it before with organic foods, where just about any fat-laden, additive-intensive food could be deemed "organic." I assumed history would repeat itself here.
I'm happy to report that I was wrong.
Greenbuild was by no means a hype-free zone, but as I walked the miles of aisles, looking for examples that would prove my theory, I was profoundly disappointed — and duly impressed. Green building has matured from the exception to the rule, with the market rising to the occasion, producing an increasingly gushing pipeline of products and services that, increasingly, are reducing the environmental toll of the built environment.
As my colleague Rob Watson — executive editor of GreenerBuildings.com and one of the founders of the green building movement, in particular, the LEED green building rating system — found in the recent Green Building Market & Impact Report, the potential to reduce those impacts is enormous. LEED in 2009 is estimated to grow by over 40% compared to 2008, for a cumulative total of over 7 billion square feet worldwide since the standard was launched in 2000. The free report details the energy, water, land, and employee commuting savings of LEED.
Given this success, it's no surprise that everyone is rushing into the green-building market. And with green building's rise has come a new wave of big companies. It's all reminiscent of the world of energy, where, as I noted more than three years ago, just about every big company seems to now be in the energy business.
So, too, with buildings. The expo floor at Greenbuild has become populated with billion-dollar companies. Many of these you'd expect to see — large construction companies (DPR, Turner), building automation and controls manufacturers (Honeywell, Johnson Controls), office furniture makers (Herman Miller, Steelcase), architecture firms (Gensler, HOK), flooring manufacturers (Interface, Shaw), and others. But there were some unexpected ones, too.
Firestone, for example. What was the venerable tire company (since 1988 owned by the Japanese conglomerate Bridgestone) doing at a green building show? Seems that the company has migrated from roadways to rooftops, and nearly everywhere in between. It offers an "Enviroready Roofing System," a rubber membrane married to a layer of insulation and other materials, that can accommodate everything from solar panels to vegetable gardens (both of which Firestone also sells). The company also offers permeable asphalt, zero-discharge stormwater collection systems that minimize toxic runoff into sewers and streams, and a range of metal products, from wall panels to sunscreens.
There were others. BASF, the chemical giant, offered a similarly bewildering array of environmental construction solutions — adhesives, solar panels, wall coatings, waterproofing, concrete, insulation, sealants, gypsum board, even termite control — each with its own green story.
(Therein lies one of green building's dirty secrets: To make buildings resource-efficient and less-polluting requires a host of not-always-friendly chemicals and materials, which is why BASF was joined by Dow, Dupont, and other old-line chemical companies at Greenbuild. As always, there are trade-offs: Constructing energy-efficient buildings requires using more synthetic materials derived from oil.)
There were a few pleasant surprises. Like Sanyo, offering a "synergetic hybrid bicycle," a two-wheeler that seemed to borrow the best of the Prius, featuring regenerative braking and seamless transition between electric drive and manual pedaling modes.
And there was more than a little hype — for example, the aforementioned Sanyo ("Think GAIA"), Steel ("The New Green"), Cold Spring Granite ("Releasing Rock's Full Potential"), and Armstrong, the flooring company, with a "Greenstock" hippie theme, including tie-dyed t-shirts and a VW bus. (What were they smoking?) There were green nails, green asphalt, green plumbing, green ceilings, green floors, and — for good measure — green artificial turf.
But I'll overlook a little irrational corporate exuberance in favor of the greater, greener good.
There's good reason for this exuberance: Green building is one of the few bright spots in an otherwise dismal building market. Consider Turner Construction, one of the world's largest construction companies, with $10 billion or so in annual revenue. This year, fully half of its projects will be built to LEED standards, a 20% growth from 2009 — a year when the company's overall revenue dropped. Put another way, green is propping up the building market.
Which is to say: Green building is no longer mere marketing hype — it's become nothing less than the status quo.
Great summary, Joel. I was there as well, and had some similar impressions. The energy and ingenuity pouring into the Green Building movement is awe-inspiring, as were the parade of global GB programs that were represented at the (mega) keynote - all growing quickly, all inspired by the USGBC and LEED. China, Brazil, India, England, Germany, New Zealand, and on and on.
I'm also a new member of the USGBC's Material and Resources Technical Advisory Group this year. Let me share an impression from our all-day meeting the day before GreenBuild began: A room filled with hundreds of incredibly bright, committed people, all volunteering their time to propel LEED into the future. The official estimate was 200,000 hours of volunteer time last year from the committees, and everyone believes it is really 4-5 times that. Since green building now includes landscaping, neighborhood development, and existing buildings, it is truly one of the big tents in the progressive movement.
Posted by: Chris Geiger | November 15, 2009 at 11:00 PM
Joel,
Thanks for this great recap! I wasn't able to attend, so I appreciate you bringing this great insight to me.
Posted by: Ann Ranson | November 16, 2009 at 10:34 AM
Ditto to Ann. I made it to Greenbuild last year, and also to it's conventional counterpart IBS (International Builders Show) in Vegas January. It is terrific to hear that exhibition space was up - any attendance stats, I recall it was 28,000 last year?
Here are some stats on IBS from http://www.professionaldoordealer.com/articles/ibs-2009--annual-builders--show-weathers-the-.html
"02/17/2009 - Crowds were expectedly smaller at the annual International Builders’ Show this January — a reported 60,000 attended, down from more than 90,000 in 2008 and more than 100,000 in 2007 "
At that pace, it won't be long before Greenbuild becomes the mainstream building show!
Posted by: David Fox | November 16, 2009 at 11:59 AM
A pretty accurate summary, Joel, of the Greenbuild show. As the chair of the conference committee, I can tell you that there is quite a bit of behind the scenes exhibitor "education" on what constitutes greenwashing and what are legitimate claims. Show attendance was down just a little from last year in Boston, but given the state of the economy, that was amazing. Green building is a permanent part of the landscape, and for all the good reasons you cite. See you in Chicago next November for Greenbuild 2010!
Posted by: Jerry Yudelson | November 16, 2009 at 01:01 PM
It's good to hear this news about the green building sector's current success! I have just one caveat to make regarding organics (I know this is not at all what the article is about, but I've seen this confusion made before). Whether something has fat in abundance are not, has nothing to do with whether it is grown with organic standards. In fact, I regularly buy organic certified butter, knowing full well that it is fat. My hope in purchasing organic certified butter (and I am particular about the brand, because of the organic washing going on) is that it will be less chemical laden and hopefully full of better fats for me and my family. Better fats are more Omega 3s. Fat is not wholly unhealthy and does not contradict organic standards.
Posted by: Danna | November 16, 2009 at 02:10 PM