Do you work in a green office? What measures has your firm taken to improve their day-to-day practices and reduce their waste, energy consumption, PAPER USAGE, etc, etc?
Recycling - office paper, cardboard, plastic and glass.
Paper usage - we use 12x18 paper for test prints and we re-use whenever possible. We are moving towards recycled content for letterhead, copy paper and plotter paper.
Compact Fluorescent lamps - we're gradually phasing out incandescents.
One staff person walks to work regularly (weather permitting).
Two staff bike to work occasionally (weather permitting).
Principal drives 10 year old car getting 30 plus mpg.
Low flow toilet
Urinal for the boys
Combine trips to project sites and meetings as much as possible
the firm has large recycling bins throughout the office for paper. Otherwise, we have an aluminum recycling bin in the kitchen area, but an ever-replenished stack of styrofoam cups and plates for coffee and lunch.
other than a bit of recycling, not much here is sustainable (as far as I can tell)...
oh! bamboo floors used in the interior reno a couple years ago...
80 person firm on 3rd floor of downtown highrise - looking to move into new space at end of lease. talk is about building leed-platinum office by rehabing old structure... tbd
carbon neutral for all employee commutes (bus, walk, ride, drive)
carbon neutral for business travel
-planted 787 trees to offset all those miles
extensive recycling effort but no limits or efforts to reduce printing/reuse of paper beyond individual efforts
ordering office stationary/business cards on recycled stock - just fired print shop who wasn't up to the task...
ipods for everybody to watch podcasts...
phasing out crts and non energy-star equipment
Purging materials library of all non-sustainable products. all vendors were asked to fill out environmental impact questionaire- those that didn't or had bad impact are being boxed up right now and either sent back to mfr, recycled or landfilled (if no other option exists)
bi-weekly green seminars (not a product lunch) prof. development time paid), quarterly special events & prizes given to 'greenest' employee...
paying for passing LEED exam and hosting open study groups
caters food occasionally from cafe brenda (slow-food pioneer) yumn
"now if we could overcome the client's resistance to register each project with LEED, I could use the 'leed-ap' that appears on my business cards."
I have exactly the same problem. All of our clients say that they 'want to be green', but 'not necessarily do the LEED thing'.
Our office recycles, we just switched to recycled paper, and for our new office chairs we're looking at getting some with recycled content. If I could just get them to turn down/off the AC....
rationalist - For some reason, companies making office chairs have really taken to the Cradle-to-Cradle protocol. Herman Miller, Haworth, Steelcase all have certified office chairs that look cool too.
i bought haworth's zody - their c-to-c entry - for myself. (my office was gonna go to home depot to get a chair for me.) i love it.
it was only about $250 because they were running a promotion to design professionals. check with you reps about these because they come and go frequently.
nothing wrong with stealth sustainability. not everyone wants a big obnoxious plaque to commemorate their decision to build in an environmentally intelligent/sensitive way...not to mention, the plaque/certification ain't free (and the documentation required to satisfy LEED adds a buck or 2 to your per sf cost)...
you can use your knowledge to deliver a 'green' project even if the client doesn't want LEED, even if they don't care about energy/the environment at all. Stealth Sustainability.
I'm sure you're aware of this. more than I am probably.
somewhere else i stated this more cogently than i'm about to, but...
if you don't have leed to back you up - because it's at least a perceived value-added - it's really hard to argue for the 'green' features of the design that you've so carefully and holistically integrated.
for example: when cost-cutting time comes, your tight daylighting/shading calculations that gave you great big windows and clerestories with beauteous shading/reflecting awnings all go out the window (so to speak). the light shelves get deleted and the building now becomes a south-facing overheated nightmare.
this is true, but when it's time to show the client things like carpets, wallcoverings, etc, bring 10 options that are all sustainable. you don't even have to tell them they're green, that way their only choice is a sustainable one.
"Nothing wrong with stealth sustainability. not everyone wants a big obnoxious plaque to commemorate their decision to build in an environmentally intelligent/sensitive way..."
I Completely Agree!
My office is going Geothermal in a few months. We have to lease the land from the city. I don't think we get any special "points" for that but it sure does cut down on the bills...after you pay for the damn thing. Apparently we are also getting 3 different types of photovoltaic’s, a wind turbine, two types of green roofs, skylights, and some kind of controls for daylight harvesting...wow...that made me really dizzy...I think I'm going to go sit down in our newly renovated "showroom" bathroom with dual flush valve system, waterless urinal, and light tubes....
I guess when I said we need to practice what we preach at that office meeting, I didn’t expect them to listen...
yeah elvischyld the P+W document is hidden in an obscure corner of their website, but it's good to see that you were up to the challenge and kind enough to share.
that's a really huge commitment from your firm. it's exciting. now i'm optimistic that once i present MY recommendations to my office, they will go all-out as well!
my office and the sustainable office practices we do . . . .
-corporate 85 people in portland, or
-building rated leed gold + and is easily accessible to public transportation
-two principal cars (which employees borrow for job related issues) are hybrids [civic and prius]
-office practices, decisions, supplies, etc. based on The Natural Step
-purchase renewable energy
-product rep lunches or inhouse presentations get food from local restaurants who have sustainable practices (to varying degrees using organic local produce and deliver via bike)
-no paper napkins; have a supply of hemp cloth napkins, no plastic 'silverware'
-office pays for all or most of bus/ LR passes (depending on which zone you're in), reimursement for bike wear and tear, gas for carpooling
-bike commuters: winter= ~15/ day, s/s/f= ~25-30/ day
-dual flush toilets and sensor faucets
-a recycle center for all materials
-make notebooks out of paper scrap
-no individual garbage cans. . . we compost food waste and employees take the larger buckets home to their compost bin; have two larger garbage cans for those items not compostable
-project binders are either salvaged (from outdated projects or product binders) or recycled plastic/ cardboard/ chipboard
-do the 'stealth sustainability' in the specs
-seek clients who are like-minded
most of our practices are less obvious and not evident to the casual observer.
Devil Dog many great ideas, i'm always amazed by how enlightened the people of portland are.
i had suggested using cloth towels instead of paper napkins, but it was quickly dismissed as an "un-sanitary" solution. was this a concern for your firm? how does your firm do about receptacles for the dirty towels and washing them for re-use?
yes, that's a valid argument but the cloth/water/detergent combo is almost always a better solution.
paper napkins, even if made of 100% recycled content, require energy to produce, energy to transport, energy to take away in the trash, and usually will not/cannot be recycled again after use.
cloth napkins made of all-natural fibers have a one-time shipment, and with all natural detergents on the market, water and electricity for the washing machine and dryer are the only energy draws.
-I used public transit to commutte to work everyday...i think only 1 other person uses the same
-2 bicycle riders
-a hybrid
-couple of mini's
-recycled TP & paper towels
-1 dishwasher that we turn on after 7pm(its cheaper)
-no paper cups, plastic cutlery
-(2) 1.6g per flush tiolets
-1 shower stall
-all natural hand soaps, and detergents
-car pooling to company outings
-most people here are either vegan's or vegitarians...im nether im carnivorous
-8 or 9 LEED accredited pro's not including my self
-3 LEED projects in the office ( out of about 30 projects)
-currently re-working our typ. spec to reflect a green design
-bitching out the mechanical consultants to either become LEED accredited or to just plain think a little more enviornmentally
-recycled printer paper - we have an option in the print menu where we can use the other side of scrap paper to print out on. this sucks sometimes cause the paper is usaually a little beat up and it gets stuck in the machine
-paper shreder
-a green design commiteee
-most people bring lunch or go to the little sandwich shack 50' frrom the office
-large prints that we no long need get sent to a school near by where they use the back side of the paper for their art projects
-christmas party w/ 300+ people was held in the office with no lights on ... candle lit party...very cool atmosphere...and no fires
Settle down Blue....anyone who has read the LEED reference guide knows the benefits of natural cloth over paper towels. That said, for a business it's a hard sell.
Cloth napkins require cleaning, something your custodial staff probably typically doesn't do. It also requires equipment which your average office doesn't own. Most importantly, it takes time (which costs a heck of alotta money) for someone to wash and fold those things.
In a large office where you might go through 100+ napkins a day I wouldn't make that as a "green" pitch. Recycled paper napkins or napkins derived from a sustainable forest (rapidly renewable resource) is perfectly fine with me. Fight the bigger battles like renewable energy or resource/building reuse.
Thus recycled hemp napkins sounds granola to me. But hey, I don't think hybrid cars are that green because of those pesky heavy metal batteries.
actually, an old car is greener than a new hybrid car, because something like 90% of the energy/waste issues a car ever produces are involved in the manufacture and initial shipment of the car, not in its performance over its lifetime. So your battery comment, while correct, is only one leaf of that big green iceberg lettuce...
sorry, sorry. it's been a bit of an up-and-down day. i'm trying to get green stuff done in my office and some are super-responsive, some aren't. gets frustrating when people resist things that seem like such obvious positives to me.
we chose the natural hemp fiber for all of the positive reasons stated above. we have a washer and dryer in the office. Sanitary?! come on; we're not a restaurant. this was not a concern for the office. in fact, it was never mentioned as an issue. the employees are given a napkin when they're hired (a new hire gift package, if you will, to include the napkin, recycled notebook, metal silverware, our office philosophy and a Natural Step summary). that means we as employees can use the napkin as many times as we see fit (until it gets too dirty). clients/ guests use a cloth napkin and then it goes to the laundry. we have an admin person (meaning a general office person) whose responsibilities include the kitchen and laundry duties. the recycle center has a bid for laundry.
i forgot to mention that we don't have any paper plates/ cups/ etc. we have china plates/ saucers/ cups/ bowls that get reused over and over; one set for the standard employee riff-raff and another upscale set for guests/ clients.
i'm not saying we're the 'ultimate' green office but we're doing much more than our contemporaries (in general) and a whole lot more than the business/ corporate world. there is some heartache from the masses sometimes, but all-in-all every employee is onboard with our sustainable measures and sees the value in our collective efforts.
i'm desperating trying to implement many of these scenarios in a locale that isn't blessed with modern recycling and equipment. So many of the things that may seem obvious because of the facilities you have in your respective communities run counter in others. Nonetheless your argument Blue was insightful in a ver practical sense.
Jan 20, 07 8:17 pm ·
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Green Office Practices
Do you work in a green office? What measures has your firm taken to improve their day-to-day practices and reduce their waste, energy consumption, PAPER USAGE, etc, etc?
Know of any good online resources?
My office is sort of a taupe.
Here's what we do but we'd like to do much more:
Recycling - office paper, cardboard, plastic and glass.
Paper usage - we use 12x18 paper for test prints and we re-use whenever possible. We are moving towards recycled content for letterhead, copy paper and plotter paper.
Compact Fluorescent lamps - we're gradually phasing out incandescents.
One staff person walks to work regularly (weather permitting).
Two staff bike to work occasionally (weather permitting).
Principal drives 10 year old car getting 30 plus mpg.
Low flow toilet
Urinal for the boys
Combine trips to project sites and meetings as much as possible
i have a lovely little Jade plant at my desk...
the firm has large recycling bins throughout the office for paper. Otherwise, we have an aluminum recycling bin in the kitchen area, but an ever-replenished stack of styrofoam cups and plates for coffee and lunch.
other than a bit of recycling, not much here is sustainable (as far as I can tell)...
oh! bamboo floors used in the interior reno a couple years ago...
80 person firm on 3rd floor of downtown highrise - looking to move into new space at end of lease. talk is about building leed-platinum office by rehabing old structure... tbd
carbon neutral for all employee commutes (bus, walk, ride, drive)
carbon neutral for business travel
-planted 787 trees to offset all those miles
extensive recycling effort but no limits or efforts to reduce printing/reuse of paper beyond individual efforts
ordering office stationary/business cards on recycled stock - just fired print shop who wasn't up to the task...
ipods for everybody to watch podcasts...
phasing out crts and non energy-star equipment
Purging materials library of all non-sustainable products. all vendors were asked to fill out environmental impact questionaire- those that didn't or had bad impact are being boxed up right now and either sent back to mfr, recycled or landfilled (if no other option exists)
bi-weekly green seminars (not a product lunch) prof. development time paid), quarterly special events & prizes given to 'greenest' employee...
paying for passing LEED exam and hosting open study groups
caters food occasionally from cafe brenda (slow-food pioneer) yumn
that sounds serious, tk. cool.
most of my decision to join this firm was based on their green practice commitment, not the quality of design, which isn't that banal.
now if we could overcome the client's resistance to register each project with LEED, I could use the 'leed-ap' that appears on my business cards.
Excellent. I have been looking for a few ideas that most people wouldn't think of right away, such as your carbon-neutral business travel. Great tips!
"now if we could overcome the client's resistance to register each project with LEED, I could use the 'leed-ap' that appears on my business cards."
I have exactly the same problem. All of our clients say that they 'want to be green', but 'not necessarily do the LEED thing'.
Our office recycles, we just switched to recycled paper, and for our new office chairs we're looking at getting some with recycled content. If I could just get them to turn down/off the AC....
rationalist - For some reason, companies making office chairs have really taken to the Cradle-to-Cradle protocol. Herman Miller, Haworth, Steelcase all have certified office chairs that look cool too.
link
You mention recycled paper, any resources for companies with high recycled content plotter paper?
ooh, not that I know of. That's something to look into.... I just meant all our copy paper, small printer paper, etc. is recycled.
on the chairs, we're looking at some lower-budget type stuff.
my last office recycled 5oo sq feet of plotter paper a day. The bin was right next to the plotter tray, allowing for one smooth movement....
i bought haworth's zody - their c-to-c entry - for myself. (my office was gonna go to home depot to get a chair for me.) i love it.
it was only about $250 because they were running a promotion to design professionals. check with you reps about these because they come and go frequently.
nothing wrong with stealth sustainability. not everyone wants a big obnoxious plaque to commemorate their decision to build in an environmentally intelligent/sensitive way...not to mention, the plaque/certification ain't free (and the documentation required to satisfy LEED adds a buck or 2 to your per sf cost)...
you can use your knowledge to deliver a 'green' project even if the client doesn't want LEED, even if they don't care about energy/the environment at all. Stealth Sustainability.
I'm sure you're aware of this. more than I am probably.
/rant
somewhere else i stated this more cogently than i'm about to, but...
if you don't have leed to back you up - because it's at least a perceived value-added - it's really hard to argue for the 'green' features of the design that you've so carefully and holistically integrated.
for example: when cost-cutting time comes, your tight daylighting/shading calculations that gave you great big windows and clerestories with beauteous shading/reflecting awnings all go out the window (so to speak). the light shelves get deleted and the building now becomes a south-facing overheated nightmare.
this is true, but when it's time to show the client things like carpets, wallcoverings, etc, bring 10 options that are all sustainable. you don't even have to tell them they're green, that way their only choice is a sustainable one.
perkin + wills has a 'green operations policy' manual available on their website & HOK published that book...
reviving this thread.... almost the same day Steven mentioned it, my office discovered (not through me) the deal on Zodys, and we're getting a bunch.
Our office policy is
"If it's brown, flush it down. If it's yellow, let it mellow."
"Nothing wrong with stealth sustainability. not everyone wants a big obnoxious plaque to commemorate their decision to build in an environmentally intelligent/sensitive way..."
I Completely Agree!
My office is going Geothermal in a few months. We have to lease the land from the city. I don't think we get any special "points" for that but it sure does cut down on the bills...after you pay for the damn thing. Apparently we are also getting 3 different types of photovoltaic’s, a wind turbine, two types of green roofs, skylights, and some kind of controls for daylight harvesting...wow...that made me really dizzy...I think I'm going to go sit down in our newly renovated "showroom" bathroom with dual flush valve system, waterless urinal, and light tubes....
I guess when I said we need to practice what we preach at that office meeting, I didn’t expect them to listen...
i spec'd 2 wind turbines, and 1200sf of photovoltaics for our new office in the new town, throwin the budget up 5x...I was told I was being "****lish"
i have been trying to find the perkins + will 'green operation manual' on their site and can't locate. may you please post the link? thanks.
wait, i lied.
here it is:
http://www.perkinswill.com/files/sdi/gop_condensed.pdf
yeah elvischyld the P+W document is hidden in an obscure corner of their website, but it's good to see that you were up to the challenge and kind enough to share.
(I wasn't so nice)...
that's a really huge commitment from your firm. it's exciting. now i'm optimistic that once i present MY recommendations to my office, they will go all-out as well!
my office and the sustainable office practices we do . . . .
-corporate 85 people in portland, or
-building rated leed gold + and is easily accessible to public transportation
-two principal cars (which employees borrow for job related issues) are hybrids [civic and prius]
-office practices, decisions, supplies, etc. based on The Natural Step
-purchase renewable energy
-product rep lunches or inhouse presentations get food from local restaurants who have sustainable practices (to varying degrees using organic local produce and deliver via bike)
-no paper napkins; have a supply of hemp cloth napkins, no plastic 'silverware'
-office pays for all or most of bus/ LR passes (depending on which zone you're in), reimursement for bike wear and tear, gas for carpooling
-bike commuters: winter= ~15/ day, s/s/f= ~25-30/ day
-dual flush toilets and sensor faucets
-a recycle center for all materials
-make notebooks out of paper scrap
-no individual garbage cans. . . we compost food waste and employees take the larger buckets home to their compost bin; have two larger garbage cans for those items not compostable
-project binders are either salvaged (from outdated projects or product binders) or recycled plastic/ cardboard/ chipboard
-do the 'stealth sustainability' in the specs
-seek clients who are like-minded
most of our practices are less obvious and not evident to the casual observer.
Devil Dog many great ideas, i'm always amazed by how enlightened the people of portland are.
i had suggested using cloth towels instead of paper napkins, but it was quickly dismissed as an "un-sanitary" solution. was this a concern for your firm? how does your firm do about receptacles for the dirty towels and washing them for re-use?
I'm LEED AP and like to practice what I preach but hearing about an office using hemp cloth napkins sounds a bit granola to even me.
cloth vs paper napkins - won't that just bring up the argument of having to use water/detergent for cleaning up after?? Or have I missed the point?
yes, that's a valid argument but the cloth/water/detergent combo is almost always a better solution.
paper napkins, even if made of 100% recycled content, require energy to produce, energy to transport, energy to take away in the trash, and usually will not/cannot be recycled again after use.
cloth napkins made of all-natural fibers have a one-time shipment, and with all natural detergents on the market, water and electricity for the washing machine and dryer are the only energy draws.
thanks for that piece of knowledge...feel greener already
no, thank YOU for that piece of sarcasm...
was your question rhetorical because from your last post it doesn't seem like you were expecting or cared to get an answer to your question.
-I used public transit to commutte to work everyday...i think only 1 other person uses the same
-2 bicycle riders
-a hybrid
-couple of mini's
-recycled TP & paper towels
-1 dishwasher that we turn on after 7pm(its cheaper)
-no paper cups, plastic cutlery
-(2) 1.6g per flush tiolets
-1 shower stall
-all natural hand soaps, and detergents
-car pooling to company outings
-most people here are either vegan's or vegitarians...im nether im carnivorous
-8 or 9 LEED accredited pro's not including my self
-3 LEED projects in the office ( out of about 30 projects)
-currently re-working our typ. spec to reflect a green design
-bitching out the mechanical consultants to either become LEED accredited or to just plain think a little more enviornmentally
-recycled printer paper - we have an option in the print menu where we can use the other side of scrap paper to print out on. this sucks sometimes cause the paper is usaually a little beat up and it gets stuck in the machine
-paper shreder
-a green design commiteee
-most people bring lunch or go to the little sandwich shack 50' frrom the office
-large prints that we no long need get sent to a school near by where they use the back side of the paper for their art projects
-christmas party w/ 300+ people was held in the office with no lights on ... candle lit party...very cool atmosphere...and no fires
Settle down Blue....anyone who has read the LEED reference guide knows the benefits of natural cloth over paper towels. That said, for a business it's a hard sell.
Cloth napkins require cleaning, something your custodial staff probably typically doesn't do. It also requires equipment which your average office doesn't own. Most importantly, it takes time (which costs a heck of alotta money) for someone to wash and fold those things.
In a large office where you might go through 100+ napkins a day I wouldn't make that as a "green" pitch. Recycled paper napkins or napkins derived from a sustainable forest (rapidly renewable resource) is perfectly fine with me. Fight the bigger battles like renewable energy or resource/building reuse.
Thus recycled hemp napkins sounds granola to me. But hey, I don't think hybrid cars are that green because of those pesky heavy metal batteries.
actually, an old car is greener than a new hybrid car, because something like 90% of the energy/waste issues a car ever produces are involved in the manufacture and initial shipment of the car, not in its performance over its lifetime. So your battery comment, while correct, is only one leaf of that big green iceberg lettuce...
sorry, sorry. it's been a bit of an up-and-down day. i'm trying to get green stuff done in my office and some are super-responsive, some aren't. gets frustrating when people resist things that seem like such obvious positives to me.
we chose the natural hemp fiber for all of the positive reasons stated above. we have a washer and dryer in the office. Sanitary?! come on; we're not a restaurant. this was not a concern for the office. in fact, it was never mentioned as an issue. the employees are given a napkin when they're hired (a new hire gift package, if you will, to include the napkin, recycled notebook, metal silverware, our office philosophy and a Natural Step summary). that means we as employees can use the napkin as many times as we see fit (until it gets too dirty). clients/ guests use a cloth napkin and then it goes to the laundry. we have an admin person (meaning a general office person) whose responsibilities include the kitchen and laundry duties. the recycle center has a bid for laundry.
i forgot to mention that we don't have any paper plates/ cups/ etc. we have china plates/ saucers/ cups/ bowls that get reused over and over; one set for the standard employee riff-raff and another upscale set for guests/ clients.
i'm not saying we're the 'ultimate' green office but we're doing much more than our contemporaries (in general) and a whole lot more than the business/ corporate world. there is some heartache from the masses sometimes, but all-in-all every employee is onboard with our sustainable measures and sees the value in our collective efforts.
Blue furthest from. Sorry if you mistook my last comment as sarcasm
i'm desperating trying to implement many of these scenarios in a locale that isn't blessed with modern recycling and equipment. So many of the things that may seem obvious because of the facilities you have in your respective communities run counter in others. Nonetheless your argument Blue was insightful in a ver practical sense.
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