By Guest Blogger
Nadine Block, Senior Director of Government Outreach

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack made a major announcement this week, strongly promoting wood as a green building material and recognizing multiple green building rating systems, including Green Globes and the National Green Building Standard. The Secretary’s remarks came during the U.S. celebration of the International Year of Forests in Washington. We are excited to see Green Globes and the National Green Building Standard be part of the strategy, as they both recognize multiple forest certification standards, including SFI, and reward the use of wood.

The announcement was welcome news to all who attended the celebration, which was co-hosted by the American Forest Foundation, the National Association of State Foresters, and the USDA Forest Service.  SFI was a proud sponsor of the event, which featured great turnout by Administration officials, Members of Congress and the forest and conservation community.  Along with hearing Secretary Vilsack’s big announcement, we heard some great music from our friend Chuck Leavell, legendary keyboardist with the Rolling Stones and American Tree Farm System® Certified Tree Farmer, and the Second Amendments band, led by Congressman Collin Peterson (D-MN), Ranking Member of the House Committee on Agriculture. Congressmen Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) and Kurt Schrader (D-OR) – both of whom have been champions on the use of wood in green building and the need for green building rating systems to recognize all forest certification systems – also provided remarks at the event hailing the news from Secretary Vilsack.

I caught up with Chuck Leavell and Steve Koehn, Maryland State Forester and SFI Board Member, at the event.   Take a look at some of their thoughts about the event in these videos:

Chuck Leavell Discusses IYOF & How Domestic Tree Farms Boost U.S. Economy

Steve Koehn Discusses USDA Announcement at IYOF U.S. Celebration

Visit the “Celebrate Life.  Celebrate Forest.” campaign website to learn more about the official U.S. celebration and to see how you can participate in IYOF.

Nadine Block, Senior Director of Government Outreach, discusses President Obama’s new commercial building initiative.

This week, President Obama announced his Better Building Initiative, a plan aimed to improve energy efficiency in commercial buildings. The White House blog notes that the goal is to reach a 20 percent improvement by 2020, which is estimated to save $40 billion per year. A portion of this initiative includes the Race to Green program, which encourages building code reformation for states and local governments to improve commercial energy efficiency.

The Better Building Initiative is a great opportunity to think about the benefits of wood in commercial building, including efficiency. The use of structural wood composites in construction requires only one-third to one-fourth the energy in comparison to structural steel.  Furthermore, using wood in place of steel in construction results in half the fossil fuel emissions and massive storage of carbon over the long term. Durability and renewability make wood an exceptional, sound building material, and using certified wood is an added proof point that it came from a responsible source.

Using SFI-certified wood is also an added bonus to our economy. The SFI forest management standard applies specifically to North American forests and it benefits the livelihoods of forest owners and other forest sector professionals here. With SFI, you know you’re creating demand in local markets rather than sourcing wood from overseas.

Over one hundred government leaders – 87 Members of Congress, 13 Governors, and others – have publicly recognized that wood is a great material for green building construction and renovation, and that all credible forest certification systems should be recognized under any green building rating system.

The International Green Construction Code (IgCC) already recognizes the environmental benefits of wood and is a clear, science-based tool for jurisdictions considering adoption or amendment of regulations for green and high-performance construction or renovation. It requires that wood and wood products, other than salvaged or reused wood products, must be certified to SFI, FSC, PEFC or an equivalent certification scheme. We encourage decision-makers in building projects to look at solid, inclusive systems like this already in place to influence choices that improve energy efficiency.

While there are lots factors and products to consider in green building projects, there’s no denying the benefits that come with using certified wood. We’re excited to hear the announcement of a White House program dedicated to improving energy efficiency through building construction and renovation, and we hope this leads to broader recognition and use of wood from responsibly-managed forests.

Despite the position of their American counterpart, Green Building Council programs in other parts of the world are taking an inclusive approach to forest certification instead of limiting themselves to just the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC).

The latest is Green Building Council Italia, which signed a protocol agreement (here is a link to an English translation) with PEFC Italy to promote the benefits of forest certification and the use of certified wood products in the building sector. You may recall that at the start of 2010, the Green Building Council of Australia began to give equal consideration in its Green Star rating tool to forest certification standards accepted by the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC) as well as FSC.

Italy and Australia join many respected green building rating systems that recognize certified wood as an excellent choice for green building. Others that offer credits for products certified to FSC, as well as PEFC-endorsed standards like SFI, include the ANSI/ICC 700-2008:National Green Building Standard, the ANSI-GBI 01-2010 Green Building Assessment Protocol for Commercial Buildings, Built Green Canada, Green Globes, CASBEE (Japan) and BREEAM (United Kingdom).

We are seeing growing evidence that there is widespread public and professional support for recognizing all credible forest certification standards – check out our newest fact sheet SFI: What Others are Saying. I am optimistic that this reality, when combined with the fact that U.S. Green Building Council members turned down a proposed LEED certification benchmark last year, means we can work with USGBC to find a way to recognize the value of wood and certification as a proof point of responsible forestry. You will find the latest news about USGBC, LEED and SFI on our update website.

Nadine Block, Senior Director of Government Outreach, discusses SFI’s role in GOVgreen, a conference held in Washington, DC November 9-10.

Earlier this week I was at the first annual GOVgreen conference and had the privilege of speaking with professionals working in various parts of the government, many who have jobs relating to implementing President Obama’s Executive Order on Federal Leadership in Environmental Energy and Economic Performance. These professionals are looking for solutions that not only comply with the order and help them achieve their sustainability goals, but are a good fit for their department’s specific purchasing, building, and policy needs.

Efficient procurement decisions are as simple as purchasing SFI-labeled cups like the ones used by conference participants, including by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. during his keynote address at GOVgreen. This provides an excellent example of consumer products that are sourced responsibly and demonstrates how simple purchasing decisions can make a difference. Our presence at the conference included sponsoring water stations, where SFI-labeled ecotainers were used, and staffing an exhibit where we interacted with dozens of conference participants. Additionally, I participated in a panel discussion about “Environmentally Preferable Purchasing Programs,” along with Christine Chase, Certification Manager at Green Seal and Graziella Siciliano, Senior Program Associate at the Alliance to Save Energy. These forums gave me an opportunity to show how forest certification works with recycling for well-rounded procurement policies. I was also able to demonstrate how SFI certification supports North American jobs and communities and how using forest products from responsibly managed forests helps keeps forests as forests. When organizations demand responsible wood and paper products, they are giving our domestic forest landowners markets for their products and incentives to continue to responsibly manage their forests. Forest certification like SFI is a necessary proof point of responsible behavior.

Thanks to all who were able to stop by the SFI booth or my presentations during the show, and we look forward to working with government organizations in finding preferred options and practices around using forest certified products.

It’s fitting that the themes for our 15th Annual Conference, is Power of Partnerships.  The world of responsible forestry and certification is so immense there is not a lot one organization can do on its own. The conference is set to explore the many ways collaboration leads to improved forest management, education & outreach efforts and implementation of the SFI Standard.

If you take a look at our conference agenda you will see we have lined up local and international speakers who will talk about partnerships yielding benefits for the forest products marketplace, communities, First Nations, and government agencies throughout North America and globally. Keynote speaker Linda Coady, Distinguished Fellow, University of British Columbia and Vice-President of Sustainability, Vancouver Olympics Organizing Committee will talk about Certification, Corporate Social Responsibility and Sustainability – The Next Generation.  We’ll also be making some exciting announcements.

We will be posting video from conference speakers as well as pictures from the event on our Annual Conference webpage – so check it out if you are not able to join us in Vancouver and take part virtually.