Developing policies for green buildings: what can the United States learn from the Netherlands?

Motivating Project Owners to Increase Their Commitment towards Improving the Delivery Performance of Green Building Projects

“…The attention to green building in the USA immediately followed the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) oil embargo in 1973 (Khanna, 2014), but faded throughout the 1980s, until 1990, when the attention was resurrected with initiatives such as the Austin Texas green building program in 1991 (Retzlaff, 2010). The initiative was a policy for encouraging green building practices in single homes, and later, other types of buildings such as commercial, multifamily and public ones (Retzlaff, 2010).…”

“…The initiative was a policy for encouraging green building practices in single homes, and later, other types of buildings such as commercial, multifamily and public ones (Retzlaff, 2010). In the USA, policy making and implementation through various programs is considered effective strategy for promoting green building practices (Baumert, 2015).…”

“…The governments in different countries are usually comprised of the federal, state and local government jurisdictions. Each governmental jurisdiction often makes provisions based on their needs for incentives to drive green building practices (Retzlaff, 2010). For instance, in the US, the three levels of government (Federal, State or Local governments) make provisions for incentives towards green building practices within their jurisdiction (Butler, 2008;Cotten, 2012).…”

“…In many cases, the requirements of the rating systems form the legislated conditions to be met by owners and the private sectors (Shapiro, 2011). This is to reduce the chance of arbitrary decisions about what is and is not a green building project (Retzlaff, 2010). In few cases, the legislated conditions are independent of existing standards.…”

“…When the incentive is too small, it cannot achieve the desired results, and when too large will result in a waste of resources therefore being an unnecessary drain on government finances (Retzlaff, 2010). Thus it remains a challenge for the government to adequately match the perceived value of the incentive to the perceived increase in cost associated with green building (Fletcher, 2009).…”