Green buildings more productive, says research

Workers in green buildings are more productive than their counterparts in more carbon-intensive offices, according to a new report from researchers at the University of San Diego.

The report, titled Green Buildings and Productivity, evaluated 154 buildings with more than 2,000 tenants that boasted either Energy Star or LEED certification.

It found that 54.5 per cent of respondents carrying the certification experienced greater productivity among their employees in terms of reduced sick days, compared with standard offices. The average productivity increase was 4.88 per cent, the survey found.

Significantly for organisations considering applying for green building certification, firms occupying LEED-certified buildings enjoyed more of a productivity increase than those that had qualified for the Energy Star label, seeing a 5.24 per cent improvement on non-certified buildings.

"We expect that future data on LEED buildings, which score high on environmental dimensions, will see similar if not better results," the authors suggested.

As well as resulting in fewer sick days among the workforce, green certified buildings were also found to result in a raft of other benefits, including more effective client meetings, greater ease of recruitment, higher employee morale and lower staff turnover.

In spite of the productivity improvements found among tenants of green buildings, the report also found that other factors matter at least as much. For example, it argued that management style is at least as important a driver of productivity as environmental factors.

Nevertheless, taking only those tenants who claimed an increasing productivity, the report found that the economic impact of improved productivity almost matched the extra cost of renting green certified buildings, even before energy bill savings are taken into account.

"If you consider the benefits in terms of recruitment, retention of employees, less sick time and greater productivity, tenants should be willing to pay more rent for such space or require steep discounts for less healthy space, " the report concluded.