Tenants are seeking greener offices and are willing to pay more for sustainable workplaces. It underscores the opportunities that the cleaning industry can tap by delivering green cleaning practices.

Colliers International’s 2008 Office Tenant Survey findings showed organisations in Australia have significantly changed their attitudes towards workplace selection and design since 2005. “Tenants have become enlightened in the last three years. The findings show a real desire to maximise staff health and wellbeing. There has been a huge upsurge in the awareness and demands for better working environments by tenants,” stated research director Felice Spark.

She observed that the most notable changes in the results of the 2008 survey compared to the 2005 survey revolved around increased awareness of issues regarding environmental sustainability, including a significantly increased demand to occupy environmentally sustainable buildings and fit outs.

The independent primary research project surveyed 270 large office tenants who occupy space of 500sqm or more in a head office location in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide, Canberra and Perth. Interviews were conducted in May and June this year.

“The changes show that tenants are noticing a big change in staff demand for environmental sustainability in their workplace. The push is coming from their people and so it has become a major issue in staff attraction and retention,” Spark said.

“Tenants have noticed staff are not automatically accepting the traditional office set up. They want to work in new, modern workplaces and they are very environmentally aware,” she added.

Simon Crouch, Colliers state director – corporate services agreed. “Organisations are listening to the needs of their staff when making property decisions to assist in the critical battle for talent. Whilst costs are important in the current economic environment many of our clients consider property expenditure as an investment in their business and a major contributor to staff satisfaction and productivity,” he said.

When it came to the most important attributes for tenants in attracting and retaining staff, Colliers International found the ranking of importance of building attributes remained very similar to the 2005 results with one outstanding change: the importance of a building’s environmental performance has moved up the list from #14 to #8 in terms of importance in attracting and retaining staff.

The survey found 77% of tenants are implementing environmental sustainability in their new workplace fitout in 2008, up from 49% in 2005.

Australian professionals believe a company’s efforts to go “Green” could pay financial dividends but don’t think businesses are doing nearly enough. According to a recent survey conducted by Daemon MRA, as part of Konica Minolta’s seminar series Innovation: Mind the Gap, more than half of Australian professionals (62%) believe they would be more productive when working in an eco-friendly environment, yet only 6% rate their workplace as being ‘Green’.

Moreover, 90% of Australian professionals believe their organisation is not doing enough to reduce its environmental footprint.

The perceptions represented in the survey are backed up with mounting evidence which shows that environmental programs have the potential to reduce energy costs, regulatory risk and build competitive advantage and brand reputation.

Indeed, as the Investor Group on Climate Change (representing 315 investors with assets of US$ 41 trillion) highlighted in its most recent report, corporate responses to climate change have become a significant issue for capital markets in measuring company value.

Clearly the business landscape is shifting. Employee expectations, along with customers and investors, are expecting business to respond by managing their environmental impact in a more sustainable and transparent way.

Commenting on the findings, Gemma White, program manager of Grow Me The Money, a Melbourne-based organisation that specialises in assisting industry reduce both consumption and the subsequent costs associated with energy, water, and materials said, “Although regulators, capital markets and the community generally are demanding greater environmental accountability – and there are cost savings and competitive advantages in doing so – many businesses still face challenges when it comes choosing the appropriate initiatives and taking those first steps to enact them.”

The cleaning industry is well positioned to capitalise on the latent desire for greener workplaces, notably sites where energy use can be reduced.
www.growmethemoney.com.au

The Sydney Morning Herald (26 July 2008) published an excellent article ‘Occupants drive the push for eco-buildings’ by Keeli Cambourne. Its general tenor is tenants are demanding that their office blocks are sustainable and healthy.

Cambourne noted that, ‘Meeting environmental ratings such as the Green Star system or the NABERS (National Australian Built Environment Rating System) program is nearly as important as negotiating rents as tenants, especially large corporate clients, demand that their office blocks are sustainable, energy efficient and healthy.’

Again, it raises the question, why can’t the cleaning industry capitalise on this trend? Certainly, a number of the more savvy BSCs have been selling their green cleaning programs to profitable effect and the Australian Cleaning Institute has extolled the virtues of sustainability.

But, unhappily, paranoid interests continue to hold the industry back. Cleaning needs a strong presence when Green Stars and NABERS are being discussed or considered. A genuinely united approach to the property management sector is required.

The SMH article quoted a number of leading property managers who lent weight to the writer’s message that tenants - often Gen Y - are embracing change, and demanding change.

"You can't green a building without tenant support. The key to successfully greening an existing building is taking a partnership approach across owners, occupiers and building management," stated Simon Cox, national director of real estate management for Colliers International. "Gone are the days when sustainability was just a landlord-driven requirement or purely tenant demand: it really is now a partnership approach to low wastage."

Other property industry executives quoted in Cambourne's article included Jean-Paul Mather, director of facilities management for Knight Frank; Michael Greene, regional director of corporate solutions for Jones Lang LaSalle; Chris Wallbank, Jones Lang LaSalle's head of energy and sustainability services Asia-Pacific; and building and environmental consultant John Goddard.

To read the complete article, check out: http://business.smh.com.au/business/occupants-drive-the-push-for-ecobuildings-20080725-3l16.html

INCLEAN has been fortunate to secure the services of highly respected industry consultant Brian Clark. One of his first assignments was to attend a Green Building Council of Australia event late June. He quickly discovered that the cleaning industry has a long way to go before being recognised for the contribution it could make in the quest for a more sustainable environment. Brian's copy follows...


The Green Building Council of Australia (GBCA) awarded Australia's first 6 Star Green Star rating for a Shopping Centre project to Mirvac’s Orion Springfield Shopping Centre at a recent breakfast meeting in Brisbane.

According to Suzie Barnett, Executive Director of GBCA, the Springfield Orion project has become a shining example of the new generation of green developments and a leader in sustainable design. She went on to say that Queensland is fast becoming the leader in sustainable building development with 13 registered ‘as-built’ Green Star projects and the Queensland Government’s commitment to a Green Star rating for leased Government office space. According to John White, Mirvac’s Development Director, the Springfield centre uses just over half the energy of a similar size shopping centre and use of potable water is reduced by 95%.

While the 6 star rating is a credit to Mirvac, the anomalies are glaringly obvious. For instance, according to a Mirvac spokesperson in a panel discussion, the Green Star rating tool does not apply to tenants or relate to anything other than the landlord. Indeed, the only controls on tenant practices are individual metering for water and power usage and a suggested green checklist for fit-out. When the panel was questioned about what parameters are written into the contracts for cleaning and grounds maintenance in relation to the methodologies employed, the choice of the contractors, the auditing of green outcomes and environmental impact of maintenance of the facility it became obvious that the ongoing sustainability of maintenance practices had not been considered.

There is considerable scope for real innovation in cleaning practice to greatly reduce the ongoing environmental impact of Shopping Centre development. For instance, in a commercial high-rise there may be 20 tenants but only one cleaning contractor. However, a shopping centre often has in excess of 50 tenants, each with different standards and different service providers. What this represents in environmental and economic terms is considerable duplication in effort & resources, higher costs and inconsistent outcomes. A developer that was truly concerned with environmental outcomes would look at cleaning on a holistic basis. This would involve careful consideration of design layout, taking into account client sensitivities and security issues, to provide accessible floorspace across the entire centre for one dedicated cleaning team.

With the landlord responsible for all cleaning within the facility, cleaning becomes an exercise in value engineering, tailoring design to outcome and an ongoing sustainability initiative could easily be introduced. Ideally the program would include strict guidelines on contractor selection, water efficiency guidelines, chemical management, equipment selection and utilisation, minimisation of waste water, staff training and recycling of packaging, waste and used materials.

Mirvac certainly deserves a pat on the back for the 6 star green rating for the design and construction stage of this development, but the green looks decidedly grey for the long term sustainability of the project.

Last week's Interclean Amsterdam was bigger and better than ever. For INCLEAN, it's the perfect time to catch up with our clients, both Australian and internationally based. The fact is, the cleaning supply world makes Interclean a must.

While there was the pervading 'green' theme, what struck me most was the constant focus by the majority of exhibitors on healthcare hygiene - notably products dealing with hospital acquired infections (HAIs). The conference program too concentrated on healthcare (as well as green).

As usual there were practically no Australian contractors attending the show although there was a pretty decent turn out of distributors, including Rapid CEO Martin Smith, and a group hosted by Hako Australia.

It was good to catch up with INCLEAN'S UK correspondent Jan Hobbs (www.thecleanzine.com editor) and US correspondent Bill Griffin (www.cleaningconsultants.com). The ISSA Interclean media team again welcomed the press warmly and the hospitality was first class.

Our June/July issue will carry a complete Interclean wrap.

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