Page 111 - The Green Building Bottom Line The Real Cost of Sustainable Building

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ment sustainability programs. Two in particular that help organizations reduce their
carbon footprint are the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Climate Leaders
program and the World Resources Institute (WRI) publication, A Service Sector Guide
to Greenhouse Gas Management.
The EPA Climate Leaders program is a partnership between the EPA and industry
to develop comprehensive climate change strategies for organizations. 16 Companies
that join this voluntary program commit to audit and reduce their corporate green-
house gas emissions over an agreed-upon timeframe and to report progress annually
to the EPA. In return, the EPA provides extensive technical support, including site visits,
software, and phone support from contracted firms, which are individually assigned to
each partner. Additional benefits accrue to industry partners through EPA recognition,
access to resources and case studies, and credibility of participating in an externally
validated greenhouse gas reduction campaign.
The organizations comprising the Climate Leaders program represent a broad range
of industry sectors including cement, forest products, pharmaceuticals, utilities, infor-
mation technology, and retail, with operations in all fifty states. The ever-growing
number of partners range from thirty-person organizations such as Melaver, Inc. to
Fortune 100 companies such as 3M, Anheuser-Busch, and Intel. No matter how large
or small the organization, each partner receives the same level of ongoing technical
support to facilitate the reporting and reduction process. In recent years, increased par-
ticipation in the program seems to augur a general tipping point of awareness in the
business sector of global warming and the need to address this problem proactively.
(See Figure 3.2).
The Climate Leaders Greenhouse Gas Inventory Guidance is based on an existing
protocol developed by the World Resources Institute and the World Business Council
for Sustainable Development. Climate Leaders Partners develop their GHG emis-
sions inventory using the Climate Leaders GHG Inventory Guidance. Companies are
required to document emissions of the six major GHGs (CO , CH , N O, HFCs,
2 4 2
PFCs, and SF ) on a company-wide basis (including at least all domestic facilities)
6
associated with:
■ On-site fuel consumption and energy use.
■ Industrial process-related emissions (as applicable).
■ On-site waste disposal.
■ On-site air conditioning/refrigeration use.
■ Indirect emissions from electricity/steam purchases.
■ Mobile sources.

For many smaller firms, especially service-based organizations, this may seem like
an arduous task. Fortunately for these firms (Melaver, Inc. included), very little data
needs to be collected. The Climate Leaders program is very user friendly. The free
technical support will help each organization establish what is included in the inven-
tory, how to collect the data, how to input data into the software, and finally, how to
interpret the results. This program is a great way to begin to audit your greenhouse gas