Sustainability Street: A Bigger and Better BREEAM

Welcome back to Sustainability Street, our podcast on the intersection of commercial real estate and the world we live in.

For this episode, I invited Breana Wheeler, director of Operations for BREEAM USA, back on the program to discuss the certification organization’s impressive growth.

She also previewed BREEAM’s much-anticipated Version 7, which will reflect the latest science in controlling carbon emissions and developments in international regulation.

Wheeler, whose knowledge about and passion for sustainability comes through loud and clear, has led the North American arm of the BREEAM International rating system since it landed on U.S. soil in 2016. BREEAM International was founded in 1990.

Here’s a sample of the topics covered:

• Inside BREEAM’s expansion (1:38)
• BREEAM’s new and improved version (4:07)
• The devil in the details of defining net zero (8:29)
• Resiliency and decarbonization (11:00)
• The question of adaptive reuse (13:21)
• Fear vs. opportunity (17:05)
• Wheeler’s “action” plan for the industry (21:24)