by Shane Henson — July 1, 2013—The C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group (C40) and the Urban Land Institute (ULI) have just announced a global partnership created to advance investments related to energy conservation and carbon emission reduction in existing buildings in cities around the world.
Together, the organizations will forge better connections between public sector officials and private building owners in C40 cities that are actively engaged in reducing the energy consumption and carbon emissions of buildings. According to C40, research has revealed that, on average, 45 percent of total citywide emissions are from energy consumed in buildings, approximately two-thirds of which from private buildings.
C40 and ULI hope that through supporting city officials to more effectively engage private property owners, they can greatly impact the ability of cities to meet their energy conservation and greenhouse gas emission reduction goals.
The partnership will specifically leverage the knowledge and networks represented by ULI and ULI’s Greenprint Center for Building Performance, a dedicated research initiative that provides real estate owners and investors with benchmarking tools to evaluate a building’s environmental performance, including energy consumption, carbon emissions, water usage, and waste diversion. Between 2011 and 2012, buildings in the portfolios of Greenprint members showed a 4.4 percent reduction in energy use and an 8.2 percent reduction in carbon emissions.
“By leveraging the global networks of ULI with those of C40, we can advance the peer-to-peer learning that is necessary to build consensus for investments in better building performance,” said ULI chief executive officer Patrick L. Phillips. “This partnership is an exciting opportunity to build on ULI’s work involving environmentally conscious and energy efficient development.”
