Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Companies More Likely Than Ever to Invest In Energy Efficiency Retrofits

From GreenBiz.com:

Seventy-four percent of corporate real estate executives now say they would be willing to pay a premium to retrofit the office space they own to achieve sustainability goals, a new survey has found.

That figure compares to the 53 percent last year who said they would make such an investment, according to results of the 2009 CoreNet Global and Jones Lang LaSalle sustainability survey.

The survey findings released today showed that despite persistent tough times, corporate real estate execs continue to embrace and act upon sustainability values -- and some do so more strongly than ever.

So what's holding them back (as it does individuals)?  But of course...

Sixty-seven percent of the respondents conceded that securing funds to carry out sustainability strategies is a "difficult" or "extremely difficult" challenge.

So would it really 'wreck the economy' if pollution taxes, or proceeds from sales and auctioning of government-issued pollution permits (as in the case of cap and trade), were used to establish a fund to help people and businesses cover energy efficiency retrofit costs?

Sounds like smart policy to me.  Especially since covering these one-time costs will essentially serve as an investment into economic recovery: by providing businesses and families with long-term cash savings, such a policy approach would free them up to spend their former energy dollars broadly throughout the economy (or to save it)...

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