SoCal Falls Short on Sustainability

Southern California is falling short on sustainability. According to a recent survey of the most sustainably powered cities in the US from Yardi, Los Angeles ranks 13^th and San Diego ranks 14^th for sustainability. Other major West Coast hubs, however, took the top positions, with San Francisco ranking number one in the nation, followed by Seattle, Oakland and Portland, which held the fourth position. Smaller Southern California markets like Orange County and the Inland Empire did not make the list of the top 40 most sustainably powered cities in the nation.

“The other West Coast cities had high scores across the board, plus the ATEE bonus points,” Adel Dobriban of Yardi Commercial Café, tells GlobeSt.com. “Los Angeles and San Diego scored lower because of how much fossil fuels they still use, especially L.A. L.A. scored a perfect 10 for EV stations, bike lanes and walkability, which are all green practices, but in terms of fossil fuels and carbon emissions, the new trend for solar energy and wind energy, L.A. isn’t doing great. San Diego, on the other hand, had a perfect score for the coal indicator, nuclear indicator and solar indicator.”

The survey analyzed all aspects of sustainability, from sustainable infrastructure and green programs to sustainable real estate assets. Overall, Dobribansays that the support of cities and local governments was the primary driver of sustainability, especially in the top-ranking cities. “It has a lot to do with local governments and how they are tackling the issue of sustainability,” says Dobriban. “Some of them have been focusing on sustainability for the better part of 20 years, while other cities are have only recently picked up the pace. Those cities still have goals and they are working toward those goals, but they haven’t caught up yet.”

While commercial real estate wasn’t the sole focus of the survey, Dobriban said that real estate owners can help to raise the sustainability scores of their cities by investing in green upgrades. “The most obvious thing one can do is to invests in new development that is sustainable and aiming toward a LEED certification,” she says. Los Angeles has a green score of 71.2, while San Diego earned 70.8 points. The greenest city, San Francisco, scored an 88.5.

The trend toward increased sustainability isn’t slowing, and greened practices have financial benefits, from energy cost savings to better leasing velocity. As a result, this is a trend savvy real estate owners will participate in. “There is a general trend toward encouraging sustainability in general,” says Dobriban. “The real estate community is so varied, and it is essential for them to participate in the sustainability movement.”