Foreign Policy Blogs

Empire State Building

This world icon is getting a makeover.  The ESB is “…undergoing a major sustainability retrofit to become a leading example of economic and environmental revitalization.”  This is a critical milestone in the battle to lower energy use and thus lower GHG emissions because the building is so famous and glamorous.  The project partners have created an informative website.  You can “Solve the Retrofit Puzzle” in an interactive graphic and get a ton of more in-depth information.

There’s been plenty of media on this, as one would naturally expect.  Retrofit of Empire State Building to Slash Energy Use by 38% is the story from EERE Network News.  They report “Perhaps the greatest achievement of the retrofit project is the process used by the project partners, a process that can be applied to other building retrofits. The project partners used both existing and newly created modeling, measurement, and projection tools to analyze the Empire State Building and establish a full understanding of its energy use, as well as its functional efficiencies and deficiencies.”  The excellent GreenerBuildings says here that the five partners are heavyweights in real estate and sustainable building design.  They are the Empire State Building Company, Johnson Controls Inc., Jones Lang LaSalle, the Clinton Climate Initiative and the Rocky Mountain Institute.  (I’ve written about the RMI and its guiding genius, Amory Lovins, a number of times, including at Good Grief, More Efficiency last June.) 

As you know by now, energy efficiency upgrades, weatherization, and green building are on the agenda to stay.

 

Author

Bill Hewitt

Bill Hewitt has been an environmental activist and professional for nearly 25 years. He was deeply involved in the battle to curtail acid rain, and was also a Sierra Club leader in New York City. He spent 11 years in public affairs for the NY State Department of Environmental Conservation, and worked on environmental issues for two NYC mayoral campaigns and a presidential campaign. He is a writer and editor and is the principal of Hewitt Communications. He has an M.S. in international affairs, has taught political science at Pace University, and has graduate and continuing education classes on climate change, sustainability, and energy and the environment at The Center for Global Affairs at NYU. His book, "A Newer World - Politics, Money, Technology, and What’s Really Being Done to Solve the Climate Crisis," will be out from the University Press of New England in December.



Areas of Focus:
the policy, politics, science and economics of environmental protection, sustainability, energy and climate change

Contact