On Monday (February 22^nd, 2010), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that planned regulation of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions under the authority of the Clean Air Act would be phased in over the next several years. As reported previously, the EPA’s proposed regulation of GHG emissions from large emitters was expected to take effect in 2010. Continue Reading

Last Wednesday, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) agreed for the first time that corporations are required to warn investors of climate change risks that affect their business. These risks included current and future greenhouse gas regulation and legislation, indirect consequences of regulation or business trends, and the physical impact of climate change.

Environmental leaders referred to the SEC’s announcement as, “a clarion call about the vast risks and opportunities climate change poses for US companies and the urgency for integrating them into investment decision making”.

Read the full story to learn how this important ruling could affect your company.

Read the full story.

Today Seth Godin launched a new and free e-book. In the e-book called “What Matters Now”, more than seventy big thinkers, each sharing an idea to think about as we head into the new year.

According to Godin;

“Now, more than ever, we need a different way of thinking, a useful way to focus and the energy to turn the game around. I hope a new ebook I’ve organized will get you started on that path. It took months, but I think you’ll find it worth it the effort. (Download here). “

A lot of ideas that have been shared in the e-book are closely related to IWMS as well. Particularly interesting is the article “Consequence” written by Saul Griffith. Saul Griffith is a MacArthur Fellow and new father who blogs at energyliteracy.com and designs solutions for climate change at otherlab.com.

Saul Griffith discusses the following:

“There is little evidence that we will solve the environmental challenges of our time. Individuals too readily allow responsibility for the solutions to fall on larger entities like governments, rather than themselves.

I find one very significant reason for hope amidst this largely hopeless topic. We are learning to measure consequence. Galileo said something akin to “measure what is measurable, make measurable what is not.” We are slowly gaining expertise in measuring our impact in terms of carbon, energy demand, water use, and toxicity production.

Why is this hopeful? Now that we can say definitively that even the production of a soda bottle has a measurable (if tiny) increase in greenhouse gases, it’s hard for a thinking individual not to acknowledge that they are working against the things they say they want. After a century of isolating the product or service from its resulting impact, the tide is turning. We are making consequence visible. We will witness the first generation who can truly know the impact of everything they do on the ecological support systems that surround them.

My hope is that we will use this knowledge wisely. We will put aside old ideas of what is good and bad for the environment and ourselves, and will quantitatively make the changes we need with new foresight.”

This is exactly why Integrated Workplace Management Systems IWMS will play a very important role. Using an IWMS enables facility managers and corporate real estate executives to quantify the organizational impact on the environment, and act sustainable accordingly. Start measuring what can be measured, and make measurable what is not. IWMS will pave the road to (corporate) environmental sustainability.

Beginning January 1, 2010, organizations will be required to track and report on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from those facilities that fall within the EPA Mandatory GHG Reporting guidelines. The EPA Mandatory GHG Reporting rule is just the first step to actually regulating GHG emissions. The EPA has taken the next step with the signing of the Endangerment Finding that officially places GHG emissions under the regulatory authority of the Clean Air Act. The EPA has also recently proposed a rule that would require carbon intensive facilities to implement “best practices and technologies” to minimize GHG emissions. In addition, both houses of Congress have proposed GHG regulation to significantly reduce emissions over the next several decades. Finally, President Obama is expected to address the United Nations Climate Conference in Copenhagen on December 18th and formally announce a non-binding GHG reduction commitment for the United States that aligns with the reduction levels proposed by Congress. Continue Reading

The Copenhagen climate negotiations (COP15) beginning today must yield an ambitious, sweeping agreement to capitalize on pledges by countries to fight global warming, UN climate chief Yvo de Boer said yesterday.

The largest and most important United Nations climate change conference in history with diplomats from 192 nations warned that this could be the best, last chance for a deal to protect the world from calamitous global warming.

It seems that most nations have realized the eminent threat of global warming for the world’s population, and will do the utmost to achieve a global agreement. As a result all important world leaders will be attending the conference, and have already announced ambitious programs to reduce CO2 emissions.

This ambitious agreement will definitively have its’ impact on Integrated Workplace Management Systems (IWMS). The question of today’s debate therefore is:

How will the Climate negotiations impact IWMS?

Please use the comment feature below this post to give your opinion.

A very interesting article about necessary changes in the Corporate Real Estate Industry has been published in the September / October Issue of CoreNet’s Leader. It is an interview with Tririga CEO George Ahn. You can download the article from the Tririga website.

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BOSTON – August 4, 2009 – VFA, Inc., the leading provider of end-to-end solutions for facilities capital planning and spend management, today announced new Energy Assessment Services to identify opportunities to save energy and reduce costs in existing buildings. The new service enables organizations to understand the return on potential energy efficiency investments, establish baseline metrics for tracking energy reductions, make the case for funding energy efficiency projects, and integrate energy efficiency programs into their overall capital plans. Continue Reading