Thank you.
The key message here is that new construction is a huge driver of the economy, and our members do that, but on the day-to-day operations, our core message is to resist the temptation to say that the new, shiny building is the best one. Sometimes they are; sometimes they aren't. It's how you operate it.
If you look at the cars on the streets, you see a Tesla or a Prius go by. If you're a car guy or a car woman, you say, “There goes an environmental car.” In fact, if that Tesla or that Prius has deflated tires, or the air conditioning is on but the windows are down, or they haven't changed their filters in a while, I can drive my humdrum Honda or Ford, or even my Mack truck—well, maybe not a Mack truck—more efficiently than the person who is driving the flashier car or that statement car more poorly.
The key way is, yes, to design buildings green, but then you must not stop the conversation and you must continue it and operate them green, and focus on operations, retrofits, and technologies. There's an axiom in our industry: the greenest building is the one that's already built.
There was an article in theGlobe a couple of days ago about 24 Sussex Drive. That house has a lot of commotion around it for a whole bunch of reasons. It's built, and with all the embedded environmental costs, it's always going to be a more efficient building than building something new.
I'll leave it at that.