Green commercial real estate is losing popularity around the world. The biggest decline is observed in the US, according to a survey of tenants and investors.
This is reported by The Guardian, citing a survey of members of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS).
The organization began analyzing this indicator for the first time in 2021. At that time, outside of the two American continents, demand for “clean” architecture in commercial real estate was 48%, and now it is 40%. Separately, in the US, the decline is more striking – from 25% to 11%.
The international construction community attributes this to the general political course in the United States.
"Government policy and regulation have a huge impact on market confidence. The Trump administration has made concerted efforts to eliminate a wide range of environmental protection measures, undermining confidence in environmental standards," the publication quotes Kisa Zehra, a sustainable development analyst at RICS.
Concrete polluters
The operation and construction of real estate accounts for one-third of all greenhouse gas emissions worldwide, according to data from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). Construction, including the manufacture of building materials, accounts for about 20% of this figure. The rest is accounted for by building maintenance: electricity, heating, and ventilation.
Green buildings have a significantly lower impact on the environment. To achieve this, various environmental measures must be implemented at different stages, from the use of building materials whose production is less harmful to the environment to the use of energy, water, and heat saving mechanisms.
However, RICS notes that against the backdrop of falling demand for green construction, fewer and fewer specialists are calculating embodied carbon in projects. Previously, 34% of builders did not measure it, now it is 46%.
As a reminder, the COP30 climate conference is currently underway. The US has previously announced that no senior American officials will be attending.
