Super Bowl XLIX, Green Building & Energy Efficiency
By Grey Lee

As of January, our favorite utility company, formerly known as NSTAR, has changed its name to Eversource Energy.
NSTAR provided natural gas and electricity to 1.4 million customers in eastern and central Massachusetts. NSTAR's parent company, Northeast Utilities also owns the Public Service Co. of New Hampshire, Yankee Gas Services Co., Western Mass. Electric, as well as Connecticut Light and Power Co.
Under the new of Eversource, these companies will serve over 3.6 million customers in New England and the name change will help save money in the long run. The only difference customers will see is the name on the bill, so all automated payments will continue to process automatically. If you had stock in Northeast Utilities, you'll see it and a different stock ticker has changed from NU to ES. Eversource Energy offers helpful tips on how to save energy year-round on their website and they also have a special section for fall and winter that can help you cut your heating bills by 10%!
Sharon Bort, Communications Associate
Sharon Bort is thrilled to be joining the USGBC MA Chapter this spring as the Communications Associate. In May of 2014, she graduated from Clark University with a degree in Global Environmental Studies as well as Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Other than her work with USGBC MA, Sharon works as the Sustainability Coordinator at Wellesley College. At Wellesley, she tackles all things sustainability, including Wellesley's own bike share, food and water, compost and recycling, energy reduction, behavior change, student advising, and much, much more! She is excited to be learning more about LEED with USGBC as a recent LEED Green Associate and share the many great events the Chapter offers as the Communications Associate. During her spare time, Sharon loves to experiment in the kitchen, ride her bike around Boston, travel the world, and tackle DIY projects.
Ethan Lay-Sleeper, Advocacy Fellow
Ethan Lay-Sleeper is joining the USGBC MA Chapter as our inaugural Advocacy Fellow – in an internship funded by the MassCEC. He is finishing his final semester of graduate school in the Master of City Planning Program at MIT. At MIT, Ethan has studied green supply chain management, carbon foot printing, and the economics of electricity & the environment. Last summer he traveled to Taiyuan, China and worked with students from Tsinghua University to design for increased energy-efficiency and density in an existing neighborhood, while improving the community’s public amenities. Ethan comes from an architectural background and has experience working on a number of LEED certified projects; he is excited to participate in the Chapter’s mission of promoting a network of Green Buildings as well as the legislation that supports them.
Barbra Batshalom, Sustainable Performance Institute
Tiffany King, Commodore Construction
Now a Project Manager at Commodore Builders, Tiffany was previously at E.M Harris Construction Company and Paric Corporation. Through her experience in commercial and residential construction management, she has demonstrated superb collaboration skills and a passion for sustainable and high-efficiency design.
Wentworth Institute of Technology hosted us for our 2015 Annual Meeting – it was great to meet many of their students, professors and staff. Over 100 people came out to join us – we had presentations, awards, election results and GAME NIGHT!
Giant Jenga (not its real name) was a hit during the Game Night portion of the evening – though of course with all the high-achieving creative types in attendance it morphed into a “how tall can you build a tower out of loose blocks” exercise.
Don't forget that Wentworth Co-ops – students – are ready to work for your firm!
A big part of the night was our Volunteer Recognition Ceremony. Below we have the “Charging Champions of the Chapter” – up-and-coming all-star volunteers Kate Bubriski – co-chair of our Advocacy Committee, Shawn Hesse – new to our Board and a Living Building Ambassador, and Kimberly Le – new chair for our Residential Green Building Committee.
Earning our “Continuing Stalwarts of the Chapter” awards were Adrian Charest – chair of our Outreach Team (formerly Membership) and Neil Angus – our Vice Chair, and guiding light of our Education Committee (and “and Sustainable Communities” Ensurer).
A lot of folks enjoyed the paper airplane launching:
We were pitching our top three priorities (click to link to our Advocacy Resources page for more information):
Thank you to the team at ELM (pictured here: Josh Craft, Program Director and Erica Mattison, Legislative Director). Thank you for organizing and helping so many good organizations connect on so many issues!
I like this mural in the rotunda at the State House of a Minuteman rallying the militia to join the cause of freedom against tyranny!
Congratulations to ABC (A Better City) – the convener's of Boston's “Challenge for Sustainability” in the commercial real estate world.
They have recently produced a report on “Green Leasing” – providing guidance on how tenants and landlords can come together to improve lease agreements with clauses that support sustainability in buildings.
Areas of opportunity to increase the sustainability of leases include:
• Energy efficiency cost pass-through clauses
• Operational clauses
• Sustainable purchasing clauses
• Reporting Clauses
The group also identified barriers to wider green lease implementation. These include:
• A lack of knowledge of potential green lease clauses
• Brokers and lawyers being unfamiliar with green leasing practices.
We look forward to working with ABC, our Members and other industry partners to improve building performance through greener leases. Thank you to ABC, Boston's Green Ribbon Commission, and Meister Consultants for putting together this project.
Meet the LEED solution for existing buildings everywhere. Existing buildings hold incredible promise—many older buildings around the world are inefficient and resource-depleting. With some keen attention to building operations, that can be turned around drastically by using LEED for Building Operations and Maintenance (LEED O+M).
Consider that it can take up to 80 years to make up for the environmental impacts of demolishing an existing building and constructing a new one, even if the resulting building is extremely energy efficient. You may have heard the phrase, “The greenest building is the one already built.” We believe it, and LEED can help you achieve it.
While you may apply the LEED O+M rating system to any number of project types—from commercial high-rises to data centers—we’ve provided an array of common market sectors to give you a tailored experience that recognizes your project’s specialized requirements.
Still curious about LEED O+M? Visit our new LEED microsite to learn more.
In the course of just a few questions, you can help us narrow our focus and improve our activities as a Chapter.
Please use this link to take the survey. We very much appreciate your time. Thank you!
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