Buildings are some of the biggest emitters of greenhouse gas emissions in cities, and some cities are passing initiatives to update buildings so they pollute less. The latest one is Evanston, Illinois, where on March 10, the city council passed the Healthy Buildings Ordinance (HBO), an initiative that aims to transition existing buildings into achieving net zero by 2050. The ordinance targets approximately 500 of the largest buildings in the city, which emit around 50% of Evanston’s greenhouse gas emissions. 

Setting a new standard

Jack Jordan, Executive Director of Climate Action Evanston, says the ordinance is essentially a standard for building performance. 

“When we think about a building, how does a building perform? Can you think about an athlete performing? A building performs for how much energy it’s using, where that energy is coming from, how energy efficient it is,” Jordan said. 

Buildings emit greenhouse gases a number of ways, depending on the type of building it is. Residential buildings using natural gas appliances, such as stoves and furnaces, emit more than buildings that use electrical appliances. An example of a modification that could be implemented through the HBO is the electrification of natural gas appliances, such as water heaters, stoves and furnaces. 

Jordan emphasizes that the transformation of these buildings will not only reduce emissions, but it will also improve indoor air quality as residents make the switch to electric appliances over natural-gas ones. 

Connecting the community

The HBO also outlines a rulemaking process that creates two public bodies, the Healthy Buildings Accountability Board (HBAB) and the Healthy Buildings Technical Committee (HBTC). 

The HBTC will focus on the technical aspects of transforming a building to use clean energy, while the HBAB will be focused on equity concerns that arise as the buildings are modified. 

The two rulemaking bodies will take input from local community members and building owners over the course of the next year to design a plan for each building to begin to meet its net-zero goal. 

“The intent is not to raise rents, in particular, for folks that are in buildings that are either designated affordable housing or that we just want to maintain affordability,” said Paula Scholl, chair of the Building Electrification Working Group and member of the Evanston Environment Board. “There will be a process by which at least 20% of the buildings will be considered equity prioritized. Those would not only include affordable housing, but could also include our schools and houses of worship.”

Most of the buildings included in the ordinance are located in Evanston’s First, Third, Fourth and Seventh Wards. The Seventh Ward, home to Northwestern University, has 91 buildings listed to be updated as part of the ordinance. Other buildings included in the HBO are local schools, such as Evanston Township High School, apartment building complexes, the NorthShore Evanston Hospital, among others. 

Councilwoman Clare Kelly, the only dissenting vote during the city council meeting that led to the passage of the HBO, argued that the ordinance was rushed, saying during the meeting that the city is “jumping to the end” of the process rather than laying out specific details and plans for each building before passing the ordinance. 

Sustainable buildings of the future

The HBO will not only provide health benefits for Evanston residents, but it will also create jobs, including for technicians to make upgrades, and lower energy costs for building owners in the long-term, Jordan said. 

“This is a pathway to very well-paying sustainable employment, you know, technical employment that I think a lot of our young people would really appreciate, hands on work that is actively saving the planet,” he said. 

New York City and St. Louis, among others, have established building codes focused on sustainability and energy efficiency. In St. Louis, the Building Energy Performance Standard was passed in May 2020, and it targets municipal, commercial, institutional and residential properties 50,000 square feet and larger. 

“The more cities that do it, the more we get ideas, too. No ordinance is static. You can always change it and revise it and make it better over the years. So that’s the other thing is we want to encourage other folks to try something, and we’ll try to get the best ideas from everybody,” she said.