HowToPlatinum.

com: Momentum Bay® helps Texas Developer Jacob White Achieve Triple
LEED® Platinum, Like Hines and Adobe
In late 2010, three Jacob White real estate developments achieved LEED Platinum
certification, ranking Jacob White, Adobe and Hines as the only three private de
velopers, owners and/or managers globally to have earned three or more Platinum
certifications. Headquartered south of Houston, Texas since 1992, Jacob White is
one of the world’s leading sustainable real estate innovators, providing integrat
ed, healthy, high performance green building development, design, construction a
nd management.
Houston, TX, January 04, 2011 -- Wrapping up a great 2010, Momentum Bay recently
helped local real estate firm Jacob White secure the U.S. Green Building Counci
l s rare LEED Platinum certification for three Jacob White green buildings: 1294
1 Gulf Freeway in Houston, 253 Medical Center Boulevard in Webster, and its head
quarters at 2000 West Parkwood in Friendswood, all just south of Houston, Texas
near NASA.
Globally, Adobe Corporation, Hines and Jacob White Construction are the only com
panies to have achieved at least three LEED Platinum certified projects (see FAC
T SHEET below for all organizations with two or more LEED Platinums).
Notably, Jacob White’s headquarters is the first LEED for Core & Shell 2009 certif
ied in the world. And, the Gulf Freeway office center is the world’s third highest
scoring LEED CS 2.0.
Of the world’s 7,321 LEED certified green building projects, Gold certification is
the most popular, but fewer than 400 have achieved the LEED Rating System’s highe
st level Platinum, that is, 5.4% by project count and 4.7% by gross square feet
(as of November 2010). Texas is home to roughly three percent of the LEED Platin
um projects in the U.S. by square feet and project count. Roughly 60 million squ
are feet (397 projects) have achieved LEED Platinum certification globally and n
early 40 million of those square feet (351 projects) are in the United States.
Fortunately, the real estate industry’s cumulative experience over the past 13 yea
rs on 12,600+ ENERGY STAR labeled buildings (2+ billion square feet), and 7,300+
LEED certified projects (1.3 billion sq. ft.) has nearly eliminated the former
premium for sustainable real estate. Almost 30,000 more LEED projects totaling 6
billion square feet are pursuing accepted best practices as registered projects
in the green building pipeline.
Prior to its LEED certification, the Gulf Freeway / Kurland Office building earn
ed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)’s rare “Designed to Earn the ENERG
Y STAR®” (DEES) certification - placing it among only 250 others with this certifica
tion in the U.S. and among the nation’s top four percent of buildings designed for
energy efficiency.
Each of the three LEED Platinum Jacob White buildings has received ENERGY STAR T
arget Finder scores of 94 to 96 out of 100, placing their intended energy perfor
mance among those of the top four to six percent of comparable buildings.
Jacob White’s expanding green building portfolio is a project of President, CEO an
d technology enthusiast Jeff Mickler. Jeff’s wife and business partner Holly Mickl
er said, “For Jeff, green building is simply good business. It’s fun and feels right
as parents, good neighbors and business owners.”
Joe Webb, the projects’ lead architect with Webb Architects said, “Jeff is a true in
novator, yet very practical and hands-on. He challenges teams to do their best w
ork, designing award-winning high-performance environments for generations to co
me.
“The challenge on projects like these for many teams has been the learning curve r
elated to auditing and documenting intended performance. Working at the cutting
edge – pushing the limits of LEED and ENERGY STAR – makes it difficult to know where
we would end up. It wasn’t easy, but it was definitely fun.”
Sustainability consultant and energy management advisor Mark Robinson at Momentu
m Bay (www.momentumbay.com) said, “Jeff has a great team that works well together.
While his team stayed focused on design and construction, he retained Momentum
Bay’s team of experts – particularly Green Building Services – for all energy modeling
and LEED documentation.” GBS managed the publication of the LEED 2009 Rating Syst
em Guides, and has consulted on roughly five percent of all LEED certified proje
cts globally.
“We have always built, owned and managed healthier, more resource efficient buildi
ngs,” said Jeff Mickler. “The most successful green building rating systems -- LEED
and ENERGY STAR – happen to give us globally recognized, meaningful scorecards and
metrics, helping us benchmark our buildings’ design and performance.”
Dr. Norm Miller’s and CoStar’s longitudinal real estate study entitled “Does Green Pay
Off?” shows a clear market advantage for developers and owners of LEED and ENERGY
STAR certified buildings: certifications yield consistently higher rents, lower
cap rates / higher sales prices, higher occupancy rates and faster absorption.
Jacob White’s experience confirms CoStar’s research. These three LEED Platinum build
ings’ innovative, certified combination of visible green features – green roofs, rai
nwater catchment, outdoor views, and even some wind turbines – along with healthie
r, resource efficient strategies have yielded faster rental velocity, higher occ
upancies and even traffic jams by passers by.
Sustainability strategist Robinson said, “What makes a green building hot is simil
ar to what makes a hybrid vehicle hot. According to Business Week, the Toyota Pr
ius’ radically new driving experience and visibly green design drove sales five to
seven times faster than those of other hybrids. Similarly, Jacob White’s radical,
visible, authentic approach to green building stops traffic and really makes se
nse. Two of the three buildings are 100 percent leased even in a down economy an
d in the suburbs.”
Beyond the visible features, two green building strategies are paramount to Jaco
b White: 1) ensuring a healthy, productive environment for occupants, and 2) red
ucing long-term operating costs through energy efficiency.
Energy modeling and ENERGY STAR’s Target Finder tool confirmed both. Jacob White’s t
hree buildings are projected to prevent 30% to 54% more greenhouse gas emissions
than conventionally designed commercial offices and medical office buildings, a
nd use 30% to 54% less energy, saving more than $2,126,250 on utility bills over
the next 25 years.”
Mickler said, “We are delighted to have achieved such high scores for exemplary de
sign from the USGBC’s and ENERGY STAR’s green building programs. We are already purs
uing ongoing certifications of these buildings’ performance via ENERGY STAR labeli
ng and LEED for Existing Buildings Operations & Maintenance certification.”
Jacob White recognizes that designing, building and operating healthy, sustainab
le real estate requires a combination of green building strategies: not only en
ergy efficiency, but also conservation and especially green power, starting earl
y with offsite utility green energy and graduating to onsite generation.
For example, in 2007, Jacob White began purchasing 100% Green-e certified utilit
y green electricity through GREEN POWER 4 TEXAS (www.greenpowerbroker.com), Mome
ntum Bay’s full-service energy advisory division. Since then, Jacob White has join
ed the EPA Green Power Partnership as a 100% Purchaser, and became a member of i
ts Leadership Club.
“Clearly, Jacob White knows that striving for a healthier, more sustainable future
is economical and easy,” said EPA Green Power Partnership’s Director Blaine Colliso
n. “Their green power purchase not only eliminated nearly all of the company’s carbo
n emissions, but also made Jacob White one of more than 100 Texas members of the
EPA’s Green Power Partnership or 100% Purchasers group.”
From 2006 to 2008, Houston (Harris County) experienced 74 orange ozone warnings
and scored an ‘F’ for air quality with The American Lung Association.
With grid parity already a reality in some parts of the United States, in 2010 J
acob White upgraded some of its headquarters’ offsite green power to onsite genera
tion with the installation of two 4-kilowatt vertical axis wind turbines (VAWTs)
by Urban Green Energy.
Savings secured by Momentum Bay and its GREEN POWER 4 TEXAS more than paid for a
ll three projects’ energy modeling and LEED documentation, as well as even the two
wind turbines at Jacob White’s headquarters.
“Like most real estate professionals, we get excited about energy efficiency techn
ologies,” said Mickler. “But, we are most interested in how building performance imp
acts occupants’ and communities’ health.
“Working in a green building can provide savings on operations and maintenance exp
enses at a reasonable payback. But, the most important benefit is employee produ
ctivity increases of two to 20 percent. These benefits resonate with our health
care, financial and business tenants.”
In early 2011, Jacob White will also co-host a media event day with The Monarch
School - Texas’ healthiest, most sustainable K-12 school among 10,000+ schools (Ho
wToGreenSchools.com).
Jacob White hopes that its small family business success story will inspire Texa
s’ other owners, developers, designers, contractors managers and tenants to join t
hem in creating a healthy, sustainable Texas.
To schedule a tour of any of these green buildings, call 281-286-6666.
To learn more about evidence-based strategies for building green, contact 877-EC
O-TEXAS.
FACT SHEET
Jacob White’s most notable green building strategies and achievements with these t
hree buildings were:
• 100% offsite, utility Green-e® Certified green power since 2007
• 100% irrigation water from extreme rainwater catchment, gray water & green roof
systems
• 100% lush & even edible extensive green roofs
• 90-100% direct outdoor views in regularly occupied spaces
• 82-90% construction waste diverted from landfills
• 21-57% recycled materials
• 32-60% regionally manufactured materials
• 29-67% of sites are permeable
• 30-54% less energy and carbon than average, comparable buildings
• 24-39% more energy efficient than baseline in 2004 code
• ENERGY STAR Target Finder scores 94-96 out of 100, worth $2,126,250 in 25-year p
rojected energy savings.
About Jacob White
Headquartered just south of Houston, Texas since 1992, Jacob White is one of wor
ld’s leading sustainable real estate innovators, providing integrated, high perfor
mance green building development, design, construction (design-build) and manage
ment, such as commercial office, medical office, health care and banking project
s. Jacob White is best known for its green roof systems, rainwater catchment, hi
gh scoring “Designed to Earn the ENERGY STAR” and ENERGY STAR buildings, and highly
ranked LEED® Platinum certified projects. Jacob White is both an ENERGY STAR Partn
er and a U.S. Green Building Council member – the 15th contractor and builder amon
g 255 to have joined the USGBC in Texas. Jacob White is also the 100th Texas mem
ber in the EPA’s Green Power Partnership, and a member of its 100% Purchasers grou
p and Leadership Club.
About LEED
The U.S. Green Building Council s LEED green building certification system is th
e foremost program for the design, construction and operation of green buildings
. Over 36,000 projects are currently participating in the LEED system, comprisin
g over 7.8 billion square feet of construction space in all 50 states and 127 co
untries.
Other owners with two or more LEED Platinum certified projects include:
Organization # Platinums Total Platinum GSF
Adobe Systems & Cushman & Wakefield as Agent for Adobe 4 1,242,727
Hines 3 111,329
Jacob White Development 3 82,001
Bank of America 2 2,215,021
City of Sacramento 2 950,000
Albanese Organization, Inc. 2 632,759
BP 2 411,000
Akridge Real Estate Services 2 297,369
The Tower Companies 2 216,347
Las Vegas Valley Water District 2 112,749
Autodesk 2 100,327
The Christman Company 2 81,090
Perkins+Will 2 64,769
National Audubon Society 2 29,200
National Park Service 2 24,222
Adobe and its agent Cushman & Wakefield earned LEED EB 2.0 (for Existing Buildin
gs) Platinum certifications for 601 Townsend in San Francisco, as well as for 32
1 and 345 Park Avenue and 151 Almaden in San Jose, California.
Hines earned Platinums under the LEED-EB:OM (Existing Buildings: Operations & Ma
intenance) version 2009 rating system for 560 Mission and 50 Fremont in San Fran
cisco, and under LEED CS 2.0 (Core & Shell) for 1200 19th Street in Washington,
DC.
About the EPA s "Designed to Earn the ENERGY STAR" certification
Created in 2004, the EPA s "Designed to Earn the ENERGY STAR" designation is one
of two prominent methods to distinguish the building developers , owners and d
esign teams commitment to energy-efficient design. (Certification under the US
Green Building Council s LEED for New Construction or LEED for Core & Shell Rati
ng Systems is increasingly pursued in conjunction with the EPA’s DEES designation.
) Once a building’s Architects of Record has completed the schematic design phase
and energy modeling, the architect can submit the building’s DEES application. To
date, 264 buildings in the U.S. with roughly 36 million square feet have achieve
d the rare “Designed to Earn the ENERGY STAR” certification.
About the EPA’s Green Power Partnership and 100% Purchasers Group
The Green Power Partnership is a voluntary program that encourages organizations
to buy green power as a way to reduce the environmental impacts associated with
purchased electricity use. The Partnership currently has hundreds of Partner or
ganizations voluntarily purchasing billions of kilowatt-hours of green power ann
ually. Partners include a wide variety of leading organizations such as Fortune
500 companies, small and medium sized businesses, local, state, and federal gove
rnments, colleges, universities and K-12 schools. Since Texas leads the nation i
n wind power generation, Texas is among the most affordable states to purchase h
ealthy, renewable electricity and to improve air quality for kids.
About Momentum Bay & GREEN POWER 4 TEXAS
Headquartered in Houston since 2002, Momentum Bay is a full-service management c
onsulting, marketing and energy management advisor focused on sustainability. Th
e firm equips executives and their teams to plan green strategies and execute sp
ecific projects, primarily related to green business, green building and/or gree
n power, from strategy to procurement to messaging.
The firm’s business unit GREEN POWER 4 TEXAS is also a full-service energy managem
ent advisory providing effective energy management strategies related to demand,
procurement, planning, messaging and monitoring. For example, the firm brokers
offsite, onsite and mobile green energy – from Renewable Energy Credits (RECs) and
carbon offsets to utility green electricity to wind turbines and solar photovol
taic systems to plug-in hybrid electric (PHEV) battery conversion upgrade module
s for the 2006-2009 Toyota Prius.
Jacob White Development’s green design team includes:
Webb Architects
Jacob White Construction Company
Buford Goff Associates, Inc.
Commissioning: Code Consultants, Inc.
MEP Engineering & Electrical: McDonald Electric, Inc.
HVAC: J&S Mechanical
Plumbing: Belknap Plumbing
Green Building Services
Sustainability Strategy: Momentum Bay
Energy Management, Electricity Aggregator-Broker-Consultant, and Wind Turbine Br
oker-Dealer: GREEN POWER 4 TEXAS
Contact:
Mark Robinson
Momentum Bay Associates, LP
1177 West Loop South
Suite 500
Houston, Texas 77027
281-451-3841
media@momentumbay.com
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