Case Study Background
Major real estate developer and owner, BXP, owns and operates more than 10 million square feet of Class A office space in Greater Boston. Some of BXP’s best-known City properties include 200 Clarendon (formerly John Hancock Tower), the Prudential Tower and several neighboring buildings, including 101 and 111 Huntington Avenue and 888 Boylston Street, along with 100 Federal Street in the Financial District and Atlantic Wharf. BXP also serves five other major metropolitan areas: New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Washington, D.C. One of their key corporate mottos is: “If it’s not green, it’s not an investment.”
Strategy
“Our carbon-neutral operations strategy is not the end goal—it’s a milestone as we journey towards a broader low carbon economy in the years ahead,’’ says Ben Myers, BXP’s SVP of Sustainability, who is based in Boston and reports directly to the President. “BXP’s carbon-neutral operations strategy is about doing the hard work first—cutting emissions where we can, sourcing renewables responsibly, and ensuring we’re future-ready. It’s a value-creating, risk-reducing, and climate-aligned strategy that benefits our investors, our tenants, and the communities we serve.’’
At BXP, sustainability metrics are integrated into risk management, capital planning, and project development/acquisitions decisions. BXP also ties executive compensation in part to progress on sustainability goals, reinforcing accountability and performance.
In addition to deploying top-tier real-time energy monitoring systems to identify and eliminate energy waste, one major strategy BXP has been pursuing in Boston and other markets is what’s called “retrocommissioning” of its buildings’ HVAC, electrical, and other systems. This means not just fixing but fine-tuning every operating piece of machinery to ensure it is performing as designed and intended. More than 13 million square feet of space has been retrocommissioned, and projects typically pay for themselves in under 24 months, delivering energy efficiency and thermal comfort in support of client productivity. As Myers said, “A decade ago the low-hanging fruit was lighting retrofits and variable frequency drives, today it is retrocommissioning, building management system programming and fault detection. I’m excited by the advances in cloud-based analytics and AI applications that will drive the next wave of efficiency over the decade ahead.”
BXP procures 100 percent renewable electricity and has enabled the development of more than 50 megawatts of on-site and off-site solar installations through commercial offtake agreements, direct and indirect power purchase agreements (PPAs).
In Boston, BXP has been a leading supporter of and participant in PowerCorpsBOS, the equitable workforce development program. Launched in 2023 PowerCorpsBOS offer expanded in-service learning, training, and job access in building operations
Next year will mark the 10th anniversary of the opening of BXP’s 888 Boylston Street, which the company committed to making “Boston’s Most Sustainable Building.” The 17-story, mixed-use building, which features a 14-story office tower atop three floors of retail, maximizes natural lighting to cut artificial lighting demand by 60 percent compared to a typical building, harvests rainwater, and features a green roof that provides both a welcoming space for tenants and visitors and also helps BXP meet its sustainable stormwater management goals. The project was one of the first regional applications of dedicated outdoor air system (DOAS) air handling unit technology with advanced heat recovery and active chilled beams.
The Results
In the Boston market and company-wide, BXP achieved carbon-neutral operations across Scopes 1 and 2 GHG emissions as of December 31, 2024. Since 2008, BXP has cut its overall energy use by 39 percent and water use by 49 percent. More than 96 percent of its actively-managed office buildings are certified under green building rating systems. BXP has been widely recognized for many years as a leader in sustainable buildings, including LEED Platinum and Gold rankings for multiple buildings from the U.S. Green Building Council and a company-wide 5-star rating for the ninth consecutive year in 2024 from the Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark (GRESB). Locally, BXP was named a Mass Save Climate leader by the Commonwealth’s premier energy efficiency initiative. “Sustainability continues to matter to many of our stakeholders,” Myers said, “In addition to certain clients and investors, there is interest from our employees who find purpose in working for a company that is doing well by doing good.”
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