HOUSTON—An Energy Star partner since 2002, Transwestern was honored as a Partner of the Year in 2004 and 2005. Transwestern has been recognized once again by the Environmental Protection Agency with a 2017 Energy Star Sustained Excellence Award. As a Sustained Excellence recipient from 2006 through 2017, it is the first third-party commercial real estate services provider to achieve both designations.

“We are truly honored to be recognized by the EPA for 14 consecutive years in this capacity,” said Larry P. Heard, CEO of the Transwestern family of companies. “Transwestern's commitment to our clients includes positively impacting their bottom lines through efficient operation of our assets under management. This recognition states once again how important achieving this goal is to our entire company because our team members across the country drive these outstanding results.”

Transwestern was recognized for its sustainability practices and reducing overall energy consumption at its managed properties. Having benchmarked more than 145.9 million square feet of commercial space, Transwestern has an Energy Star average portfolio rating of 75 and has reduced total site energy consumption across its managed portfolio by 2.9 billion kBtu.

Additionally, Transwestern's sustainability efforts have saved more than 64.28 million gallons of water and reduced CO₂ emissions by more than 695 million pounds. Transwestern's approach to sustainability and energy conservation includes Energy Star benchmarking, energy audits, energy consulting, building commissioning and LEED certification.

An example of Transwestern's energy-efficiency efforts in a local property is 1300 Post Oak, GlobeSt.com learns. This property's Energy Star score of 97 has resulted over time from the efforts of the entire Four Oaks Place team, with the support and encouragement of the owner, TH Real Estate, the real estate investment arm of TIAA.

The engineering staff worked with senior management in developing and implementing the strategies necessary to the achievement, such as building fluorescent light fixtures that have been upgraded to 25-watt low mercury bulbs and energy efficient ballast, variable speed drives installed on building air handling units, variable speed drives installed on chilled water pumps, building air handling units upgraded to Merv 11 filters which consist of a 2-inch Merv 8 pre-filter and a 6-inch Merv 11 final filter, UV light fixtures installed in about half of the building air handling units with the other half to be completed during the next two years, building variable air volume box controls upgraded to direct digital control on approximately 21 floors with the other floors to be completed during the next two years, and upgrading the domestic water pump system to triplex 20 HP multi-stage variable speed system.

Transwestern's accomplishments will be recognized on April 26 in Washington DC. The Partner of the Year–Sustained Excellence Award winners hail from family-owned businesses to Fortune 500 organizations–representing energy-efficient products, services, new homes, and buildings in the commercial, industrial and public sectors.

In 2015 alone, Energy Star and its partners saved American businesses and consumers 503 billion kilowatt hours and $34 billion dollars on energy bills, while also achieving broad emission reductions.

Instant Insights /

EPA Recognizes Energy Reduction in Portfolio

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