McKinney Green Building: sustainable ROI project


An engineering consulting group, HDR, based out of Omaha, Nebraska has developed a new process that is used to evaluate sustainable project benefits.  The process and its viability are becoming accepted by the building industry as a means of justifying the value of sustainable investments.  Now project owners can compare a financial return on investment to a sustainable return on investment and clearly see a reason to build sustainably or not.  In addition, the process can save owners money in pre-planning and expensive feasibility studies.  

The fundamental approach to this process is gathering information about the project site, building, energy consumption and waste.  Using this information the group’s economists monetize sustainable qualities of these aspects.  An example would be considering improved productivity that is encouraged by sustainable amenities an investment that will see financial return.  While the results of the analysis are based on probability, the reports provide a full range of possible ROI outcomes.  

At a first glance, the process may seem skeptical to provide practical results without further investigation.  However, HDR has been of service to many clients that have received acceptable results from the process.  It is also responsible for optimizing the total value of a project by analytically suggesting which sustainable aspects deliver the most return.  For this reason it is gaining a reputation as a useful and proven tool in the industry.  

The sustainable return on investment process is a strong tool that develops a proposal to gain interest of investors and help increase funding for a sustainable project.  Standard ROI studies overlook many aspects of a sustainable project that provide financial benefits.  

A return on investment that incorporates sustainable qualities is just what our nation’s building sector needs.  Many large project proposals have to cut sustainable construction aspects from the budget.  An ROI that includes these aspects is crucial in receiving the necessary funding to complete these projects sustainably.