A Celebration of Green Buildings in New York has initiated the runup to the Mayor's Climate Summit.  The inaugural event, "Revelry By The River," took place along the East River on Manhattan's Upper East Side on May 9th. The celebration highlighted the Green Building concept which has been advanced by the joint efforts of municipal government, public interest groups and private sector sponsors.  This year's series of events mark the city's trend setting commitment to renewable energy and environmental responsibility.  In his announcement of the Climate Summit, Mayor Michael Bloomberg noted that buildings account for 79% of New York City's carbon emissions.  High performance buildings offer a significant opportunity to reduce New York's energy use through the green building practices of intelligent design, efficient systems and onsite distributed generation.  The event was organized by the Solar One Green Energy Education Center which honored two green building pioneers:  The United States Green Building Council and Turner Construction Company.  The Council has served as the catalyst for the green building movement with the creation of their Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification program in 2000.  Under the LEED system, the organization has registered over 5,300 projects and certified another 734 for a total of 829 million square feet of commercial building space.  With LEED projects in all 50 states and 12 countries, the Green Building Council is leading the way in promoting "buildings that are environmentally responsible, profitable and healthy places to live and work."  With over 8,500 member organizations and a network of 75 regional chapters, the Council is dedicated to transforming the building industry to sustainability.

    Turner Construction Company has completed or has under construction more than 200 green projects totaling over 51 million square feet and valued at over $12 billion.  turner has 260 LEED Accredited Professional on its staff.  Charles Murphy, Senior Vice President of Turner Construction Company and General Manager of Turner's New York Office attended the East River event and thanked the organizers for recognizing Turner's contribution to green construction:  "Turner is proud to receive this honor from Solar One for our efforts and long-standing nationwide commitment to green building practices.  We are dedicated to the construction of buildings that create environmental solutions and healthier indoor environments for our homes, schools and offices through better energy and water efficiency.  In New York alone, Turner has completed LEED Certified projects in excess of $1 billion, with projects underway worth in excess of another $1 billion and there is an additional $3 billion of LEED Registered projects in the planning stages," Murphy said.  Solar One is working to educate New Yorkers about environmental issues through a unique and innovative approach that has drawn widespread acclaim.  Started as a project of Community Environmental Center, Solar One has reached tens of thousands of people in just three years.  Solar One has the strong support of Mayor Bloomberg who is actively involved in the development of municipal policies that encourage renewable energy.  As part of his plaNYC initiative, the mayor allocated $3 million from the City's budget for the construction of Solar One's net-zero, carbon-neutral building.  The self-sufficient solar powered building (Solar 2) was completed in 2008.  Mayor Bloomberg's efforts on behalf of renewable energy and environmental consciousness have propelled New York City into the vanguard of energy policy innovations.  As we enter the dawn of the solar age, local initiative can be the pivotal catalyst for rapid adoption of renewable energy and New York is setting a pragmatic example for the role of city governments in galvanizing support for the accelerated application of solar energy.