Putting It Together USGBC’s Kimberly Lewis said she was particularly pleased with Greenbuild 2011’s reduction of greenhouse-gas emis- sions, due in part to the elimination of shuttle buses. “That’s a tribute to Toronto,” she said. “They’ve done an amazing job of building up the infrastructure around all of their main ven- ues so that hotels are all within walking dis- tance.” Which, she added,
—isn’twhat it’s allabout. “It’saboutsharingknowl- edge ... andmaking sure thatweleave places better thanwhenwecame,” Lewis said.“If we’re creating this huge carbonfootprint,what canwedoto min- imize thenegative effectsonthecityandthedestina- tion? It’s really the responsibility of all.” To facilitate that level of sharing, Lewis sets up
a conference call betweenthe convention center that just held Greenbuildandnext year’s host convention center — shortly after the conference concludes, “while it’s fresh in our minds,” she said.“We want to share both the successes aswell as the challenges. It needs to beaholistic effort of includingnot just the operationfolksandthe housecleaning folks, but also the food-and-beverage folks.” The conference call between thetwoconvention
center staffs is a frank, “peer-to-peer conversation,” Lewis said. “It’s about everyonelearning. There isno dress rehearsal for any conference.So[the conversa- tiongoes like,]‘Youknowwhat,wethoughtthis, but when it happened on site, we realized immediately we shouldhavedone this.Wewereable tocorrect it, but I want to give you a heads-up.’”
Since USGBC believes that moving the green
meetings industry forwardis its responsibility,“we let [each host destination]knowthat every yearwe want tochallengeourselves,”Lewis said.“Andcities love that. They want to be able to say that this is whatUSGBCwas able toaccomplishin 2009, but look what we’ve been able to do in 2011, based uponall of this learning.Wedon’t want tooffer the minimum—wewantto seewhatwecandoto take it to the next level.” Since taking Greenbuild up a notch each subse-
quent year requires exact measurements,USGBC’s contract languagemandates that all facilities, hotels, vendors, general-service contractor,AVteam, and other on-site vendors involved in the conference pro- vide performance data to USGBCwithin 30 to 45 days after the conference ends. “We’vewontheIMEXGreen MeetingsAward
three times just because of the data and the measur- ables on what we’ve been able to do year to year at Greenbuild,” Lewis said. “We are a leadership organization.Howcouldwenot measure ourown performance?”
is “a huge deal— for attendees to be able to walk, see the city, and get some fresh air. That is a part of sustainability. People want to separate the human health, behav- ior, and welfare from this conversation, when it’s all tied together. One of the reasons why green buildings exist is because of the way the air quality and nat- ural daylight affect people and their pro- ductivity within the building—those things are not sepa- rate issues.”