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UGC: Green Cost Premium Disappears

NEW YORK CITY-A study commissioned by the Urban Green Council finds little difference between LEED and non-LEED construction costs.

By Paul Bubny | Updated on October 06, 2009

NEW YORK CITY-The cost premium on building green has all but disappeared, the Urban Green Council says in a new report. “We must prioritize greening our cities and cost is not the barrier some have made it out to be,” says Russell Unger, executive director of the UGC, the New York City chapter of the US Green Building Council, in a release.

Prepared for the UGC by Davis Langdon, the study looked at construction costs for 38 high-rise multifamily buildings and 25 commercial interiors here. It found that LEED-certified high-rises came in at an average of $440 per square foot, compared to $436 pr square foot for non-LEED projects. The differential was less than 1%, according to the report. On commercial interiors, the cost of $191 per square foot for LEED construction was actually 6% lower than the $204 per square foot cost of non-LEED.

“This study should lay to rest the claims of skeptics who have questioned whether green building and value can co-exist,” Unger says in a release. “It shows that once you set a project budget, you can build green or non-green within those parameters.”

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