Environment

Kansas City Office Building Announces Participation in Nationwide Campaign to Shrink Carbon Footprint

by MichelleJPRA | August 12, 2008 at 09:39 am

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<?xml:namespace prefix = st1 />NEW YORK, NY - Time Equities Inc., owner of City Center Square, is starting a nationwide campaign to shrink its carbon footprint on more than 20.4 million square feet of real estate from Kansas City to New York. The first building to "go green" in its portfolio will be City Center Square. By working in conjunction with the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification and rating system, the full-service real estate company aims to shrink carbon emissions by 20 percent before 2012.

Alice Cook, director of sustainability for Time Equities, said that this is a unique movement within the real estate business. "The entire industry is working together towards sustainability rather than focusing on gaining a competitive advantage through intelligence," said Cook.

Watch Alice Cook speak on current and future sustainability practices: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjjZwfTOHMQ

"Our vision is to develop buildings that are carbon negative and lower the overall impact of the energy grid," said Cook. "People tend to focus on cars, but buildings are key and a critical component to curbing global warming."

The focus on City Center Square's sustainability is the direct result of Time Equities' Phillip Gesue, director of acquisitions and development, who's committed to incorporating sustainability into operations and management as a fundamental practice. "Sustainability is a wise business practice in an environment of increasing energy costs and is the first step toward preserving the environment for future generations," said Gesue. Rating systems such as LEED, a nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings, are great resources for companies and cities to unite in an effort to reduce green house gas emissions.

City Center Square is an office retail building locally managed by Grubb & Ellis|The Winbury Group. Tenants range from the Kansas City Convention & Visitors Association to the Kansas City Business Journal.

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bill hicks

at 09:57 on August 12th, 2008

The designers of green buildings do not take into account cubicle wall placement. Air flow is engineered to the open space and possible fixed walls. In Boston there is a 34 story building I believe the address is 1 State Street. It is next door to the capital building north of the commons. In 1979 I had employees at Commercial Union Assurance on the 9th floor and every half hour all the people from the 9th floor down had to go outside to get air because they would fall asleep. That was the worst green building I had my people in but most green buildings throughout the years were very similar. They do not plan on oxygen flow. They do save energy though.

Amy Judd

at 10:41 on August 12th, 2008

MichelleJPRA, you cannot have a link to a commercial website in your post. I would have flagged this as spam, but it is actually quite interesting, but you need to remove the link at the bottom.

MichelleJPRA

at 13:15 on August 12th, 2008

Amy Judd

at 14:30 on August 12th, 2008

MichelleJPRA, thanks for removing the link.

Anton Schedlbauer

at 07:27 on August 17th, 2008

In Germany more than one third of energie is used for heating and preparing warm water. In private housholds even more than 90% of energie is used for heating and water warming. The situation in U. S. A. might be similar or even worst because you use much more air condition. So it's absolutely necessary to improve our buildings.