Buildings are important. They matter economically: the building sector represents 13% of America’s gross national product. They matter in terms of energy: heating, lighting, cooling and otherwise operating buildings consumes about one third of the nation’s energy. And they matter environmentally: the energy consumed by buildings results in 35% of the greenhouse gases released by human activity in this country, as well as voluminous conventional air pollution — not to mention the environmental impact of wasted building material, debris from demolished structures, and profligate water use.

For these reasons, buildings should constitute a critical focus of an integrated economic, energy and environmental strategy. We require whole buildings, constructed with an eye to minimizing energy use, environ-mental impact, initial cost and operating cost, while maximizing their users’ comfort. To transform the building market and accelerate demand for whole buildings, we require a whole building policy, which integrates all the government activities involving buildings and the building sector.

These are ambitious goals. The sprawling agglomeration of professions and activities that constitute the building sector has great inertia and complexity. Hence the attraction of using federal policy: in fiscal year 1998, the U.S. government will spend $476 million on buildings-related programs. Yet, so far, only a tiny fraction of this money addresses energy issues — for example, $9.2 million on energy efficiency R&D.

The issue is not merely the level of funding or even the goals of individual programs, but rather the lack o f coordination among myriad federal efforts — as the Passive Solar Industries Council (202-628-7400, or psicouncil@aol.com) describes in its 1998 Overview of Building-Related Programs in the Federal Sector. American practice and government policy often consider buildings themselves as collections of non-interactive components rather than as systems. In an ironically parallel manner, federal policy scatters accountability for buildings policy among isolated programs, cabinet agencies and committees.

Whole buildings will become the rule in America when consumers demand them. That day is coming: Americans are learning more about the links between energy use and the environment, between energy consumption and the cost of operating buildings, between building comfort and worker productivity, and between their buildings and their own health. Through well designed market-transformation policies and coordinated support for public-interest research and development, the federal government is in a unique position to aid in the transition. To make whole buildings a reality, government policy makers must first institute a whole building policy

Adam Serchuk, Research Director and Executive Director of the Research Report series
Virinder Singh, Research Associate
Roby Roberts, Executive Director
J. Bernard Moore, Research Intern

August 27, 1998