by Brianna Crandall — July 18, 2012—Following a joint 2011 workshop that addressed such nontechnical barriers to energy efficiency as the perception/issue that although building owners/landlords often pay for energy efficiency improvements, the immediate payback generally goes to the tenants, BOMA International and the Rocky Mountain Institute have collaborated on a free e-book filled with resources to help landlords and tenants collaborate on energy efficiency goals for buildings.
The downloadable “Working Together for Sustainability: The RMI—BOMA Guide for Landlords and Tenants” provides a framework for instituting cooperative and productive relationships between building landlords and tenants and seeks to address some of the non-technological barriers to energy efficiency, such as split incentives, tenant behavior, and transparency.
The guide outlines five actionable steps both tenants and landlords can initiate that impact and address green lease and split incentive issues: make energy use and costs more transparent; engage building occupants in saving energy; incorporate energy efficiency in tenant fit-outs; plan ahead for deep energy retrofits; and structure agreements to benefit both parties.
The e-book also includes dozens of online resources that support these five major steps of collaboration.
