Pitney Bowes in green coalition
Pitney Bowes in Stamford is promoting environmentally friendly office spaces by encouraging commercial landlords to provide green offices at competitive rates.
The technology company joined big businesses like IBM Corp., Switzer Corp. and DuPont to raise environmental consciousness in the workplace and develop energy efficient solutions. The drive focuses on when a company occupies a smaller office space in a multi-tenant property.
An ‘Environmental and Energy Efficiency Attributes Checklist’ has been formulated and businesses committing to the scheme have agreed to make the document a standard when considering commercial leases and renewals.
Investigation into sustainable resources, materials and power have revealed that landlords need not break the bank to update offices with environmentally friendly fixtures and systems.
Pitney Bowes already leases 362 locations across the country, meaning that the new green initiative will cover approximately 2.8 million sq ft of existing company held office space.
In 2008 the technology firm that specialises in postage meters and document and mailstream software, increased their recycled output by 45 percent following EPA’s WasteWise Initiative. In improving lighting efficiency and HVAC systems, Pitney Bowes also cut its electrical consumption by 3 million kilowatt hours pocketing a saving of $873,000.
The company has spread its new ethos to its subsidiaries, notably rolling out the program in Canada and the UK. Pitney Bowes Norway now offers its employees a choice of electrical, hydrogen or biofuel vehicles, creating 40 percent less greenhouse gas emissions. The vehicle fleet currently consists of one in four green vehicles, but the goal is to replace all less efficient models with environmentally friendly ones.
James Ryan, Corporate Real Estate Manager of Workplace Strategy and spokesman for Pitney Bowes said, “Will it trump cost? It’s hard to say at this point. We started informally using this checklist in June of 2009. Now, we’re kicking it off in a more formal way. We see value in having this infrastructure in place. It pays for itself over time. Sometimes it’s about educating the landlord.”
Newmark Knight Frank Commercial Real Estate are excited about the change driven by these big companies and believes it will set the trend for smaller businesses: “Entrepreneurial tenants don’t care as much, but leaders in the industry are going to drive that change”.
Edan Dionne representing IBM commented on the scale of the project, “Collectively, these companies lease approximately 25 million square feet of commercial office space in the U.S. alone, much of which is in multi-tenant buildings”.
[...] approved computer monitors and installing motion sensors to control lighting systems. An article on Office-Suites.com reports that Pitney Bowes is joining other large corporations such as IBM and DuPont by encouraging [...]