Source: Maureen Roskoski, Facility Engineering Associates PC.
which purchases meet sustainable criteria and
then determine what percentage you are at in
sustainable purchasing.
4. Material Handling
This essentially includes the
combination of purchasing
and waste management. It
can be difficult to learn the
actual tonnage of waste
information from your waste
haulers, which is needed for
LEED certification. It is important to know this figure to
determine where improvements are needed. In regard
to recycling and reuse, you
can have the most sophisticated recycling program but if
people are not putting the
right paper in the correct box,
it lowers your success rate.
This is where tracking comes
in because the impact of
these efforts can be an
abstract number until you
determine where you are at
and where you want to be.
educate the occupants of the building as to why
you are undertaking these initiatives and the
impact it will have on your organization. If you tell
them how much you are saving per year people
are more apt to accept these changes.
5. Air Quality and Cleaning
This initiative is important to
the health and productivity
of occupants. The focus is to
create a healthy and comfortable workforce. Green cleaning is becoming the norm. It
is important to not just switch
to green products, but to
look at green cleaning from
an entire operational sense.
Many of the products require
you to do things differently.
You need to train staff.
Review the equipment, for
example, to ensure there is
less strain on the staff, such
as using backpack vacuums.
Tip: One caveat to sustainability initiatives is to ensure you
