Page 118 - The Green Building Bottom Line The Real Cost of Sustainable Building

GREEN FROM THE INSIDE OUT 97

vation of our main office in Savannah, Georgia to LEED for Commercial Interiors
standards and the build-out of a new office in Birmingham, Alabama, also to LEED
Commercial Interiors criteria.
Every organization has unique opportunities to reduce emissions based on its foot-
print and operational procedures, from simple lighting retrofits such as Melaver, Inc.
undertook, to system-wide computer energy usage monitoring software and building
automation controls. Other opportunities exist in the commute and travel sectors, from
encouraging and rewarding carpooling to investing in hybrid vehicles. These mea-
sures can have a significant impact on the carbon footprint of an organization, often
with a financial payback (from reduced energy consumption and reduced fuel for vehi-
cle fleets) as well.

What Comes Next?
Melaver, Inc. committed to achieve carbon neutrality when we joined the EPA Climate
Leaders program in 2005 (Climate Leaders allows participants to set a range of goals,
from holding emissions steady to achieving carbon neutrality), and we have made
strides in reducing our emissions. However, the company is still emitting over 200
tons of eCO annually. So how did we become carbon neutral? By involving ourselves
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in a variety of carbon offset programs. Carbon offsets are credits to your carbon emis-
sions by claiming eCO reductions elsewhere. This can be from reducing emissions
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from another, non-company related source or by investing in clean energy generation.
Businesses realistically cannot immediately begin to operate without generating car-
bon emissions. Unless a company’s staff does not drive or fly, unless all employees
walk or bike or use mass transit to get to work, carbon dioxide is still going to be gen-
erated. This is where carbon offsets come in.
There are two forms of offsets—investing in actual emissions reduction projects
and the purchase of green electricity or renewable energy credits (or green tags). We’ll
first look at investments in actual emissions reductions.

Emissions Reductions Projects
Here the possibilities are endless, though it may be harder justifying the expense if all
you are concerned about is a payback, because there often is none. Melaver, Inc. cre-
ated a multifaceted program to offset emissions. For example, the company partners
with the Savannah Tree Foundation to plant hundreds of trees in the community each
year, trees that begin to absorb carbon dioxide immediately and will continue to do so
for the next fifty years. Planting trees helps sequester carbon dioxide from the envi-
ronment, where it is used in photosynthesis to allow trees to grow, producing oxygen.
Tree planting has taken its knocks by critics for carbon storage. After all, once the tree
dies and decomposes, won’t all that CO be released back into the atmosphere? To an
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extent this is true. Also, many tree-planting programs are not beneficial to reforesta-
tion—planting one hundred acres of monoculture does not a forest re-grow! In Melaver,
Inc.’s case, trees are planted throughout the community, not in one large area, which
helps foster ecosystem diversity and reduce the heat island effect. If local tree plant-
ing is not an option, many national non-profit organizations partner with industries to