I wrote this advertorial using repurposed SME quotes and content for placement in RE Journals, a leading industrial real estate publication, to highlight CenterPoint Properties’ commitment to sustainable development.
National Industrial Developer Builds Reputation on ‘Green’ Building Expertise
As e-commerce sales continue to break records and drive imports to new heights, companies that manage and develop industrial real estate are benefiting almost as much as online retailers. Behemoths like Amazon, Wal-Mart, and Home Depot have an unquenchable thirst for more warehouse space and increasingly need distribution facilities and replenishment centers ensconced in densely populated areas. Amazon alone will reportedly account for as much as 50% of the total U.S. industrial space absorption in the coming year. In Q4 ’20, it announced plans to add as many as 1500 more facilities to its distribution chain in the coming years. The so-called ‘Space Race is raising eyebrows for many reasons.
The World Green Building Council estimates that residential and commercial buildings are responsible for 39% of global carbon emissions and consume about that much of the world’s energy supply. Even as more consumers expect next-day and even same-day delivery, grassroots organizations are beginning to crop up across the country to shine a light on industrial developments in their backyards. Meanwhile, landlords and developers, companies that depend on these facilities and the jurisdictions that regulate their zoning and entitlements are taking a harder look at their short and long-term environmental impact on the very communities these facilities are meant to serve.
CenterPoint Properties, a Chicago-based firm that invests in, develops and manages industrial real estate coast-to-coast is one of a growing number of companies that seek to set a high bar for green building standards, even where state and local mandates don’t necessarily require it. CenterPoint builds and retrofits buildings across the country with sustainable features that earn it “green” certifications, such as Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®) certification from the U.S. Green Building Council. While LEED-certified facilities offer tenants appreciable water and energy cost savings, especially over the long term, CenterPoint’s motivations run deeper than pure business considerations.
“We’re long-term partners in the communities we build in,” said John Lass, CenterPoint Properties’ vice president of development. “We want to go above and beyond. We want to build quality buildings. We’re going to hold onto them for a long time. We want our tenants to be happy,” Lass said.
Lass said building codes in municipalities and counties in its core markets, such as Los Angeles, the Bay Area and Seattle are written to encourage green building. Still, he says, it’s become merely the standard operating procedure at CenterPoint to construct buildings throughout the West Coast that achieve LEED certification.
California, in particular, has some of the most stringent codes for sustainable building in the U.S. Its Title 24 code, a set of requirements for energy conservation and green design and construction, has been in effect for more than four decades. In 2009, the California Green Building Standards Code, “CalGreen,” was added to Title 24 to outline architectural and engineering principles to reduce buildings’ greenhouse gas emissions and energy and water waste. While these codes force developers to build more sustainable warehouses generally, not every builder places the same emphasis on green building as CenterPoint.
“A lot of developers might say, ‘I don’t want to spend $50,000 or $100,000. I’ll just put that in my pocket.’ We try to build better buildings and be a better steward of the environment overall,” Lass added.
The Future is ‘Net-Zero’
Lass and his team recently received LEED certification for their 466,000-square-foot development, CenterPoint Landing at Oakland Seaport. The new construction at the former Oakland Army Base site was not only right in the wheelhouse for CenterPoint, which has gained national notoriety for its expertise in building premium port-proximate facilities, but it was a natural fit for its development team thanks to its prowess in sustainable building, too.
Sacramento officials recently issued first-in-the-world requirements designed to improve the quality of life for the people living near port facilities, rail lines, warehouses and interstates. California has mandated that all cars and trucks sold in the state must be zero-emission vehicles by 2045. This effort, officials say, will cut greenhouse gases by 35% and improve the level of emissions of nitrogen oxides by a whopping 80% statewide. Trucks and vans, however, are on an even faster track. Fleet owners must begin to transition from diesel to electric zero-emission vehicles by 2024. Short-haul drayage vehicles in ports and railyards must be zero-emitting by 2035, and “last mile” delivery trucks and vans must be zero-emitting by 2040.
Though CenterPoint broke ground at the Port of Oakland development well before these new mandates were announced, its focus on exceeding sustainable standards proved to be prescient. CenterPoint’s development team prepped that site as it has its other West Coast projects in recent years to meet today’s regulatory benchmarks, the ones it forecasts will come down the pike and accommodate the additional energy needs tenants will have in the years and decades to come.
“Sustainability and power are more critical components of our facilities moving forward. As the electrification of vehicles, trucks, and vans occurs, it will require more power. We’re proactively adding conduits and charging stations and these types of amenities to our warehouses,” said William Lu, CenterPoint’s senior vice president of development. “Tenants are demanding them more now. They are evaluated on their sustainable and green initiatives, and they want to have that reflected in their supply chain,” Lu continued.
As consumer buying habits and shipping expectations prompt e-commerce companies to push to move their warehouses deeper into urban areas, the focus on industrial buildings’ impact on the environment is intensifying. Though CenterPoint has a considerable presence in Midwestern cities like Houston and its home-base, Chicago – over the past two decades, it has been developing the largest inland port in the U.S. southwest of Chicago, the 6,400-acre CenterPoint Intermodal Center in Joliet, IL – the nearly 30-year-old company has expanded to acquiring and developing infill and port- proximate properties in the top 10 industrial markets across the U.S.
In the past decade, CenterPoint has shifted its strategy to become among the most active investors in high-barrier markets such as New York City, Los Angeles, the Bay Area, Miami and Seattle, which have limited land for new developments and often comparatively older inventory. CenterPoint’s development teams are tasked with repositioning newly acquired facilities to modernize and reconfigure them inside and out to suit the needs of today’s industrial users. This presents an opportunity to institute the environmental upgrades necessary to fulfill CenterPoint’s green mission and attract the class of tenants desirous of buildings that will be considered as high-quality decades from now as they are today. The cost to retrofit a facility with sustainable features is significantly higher than building them into a new development. Still, CenterPoint is open to shouldering those costs in its quest to have a modern portfolio that is highly sought after by its most coveted users.
When CenterPoint Properties acquired the massive 1.6 million-square-foot SoCal Logistics Center in Ontario, CA, in 2019, company leaders knew they had landed one of the largest contiguous infill warehouse sites in the Los Angeles and Orange County markets. They also knew it was truly a diamond in the rough for an e-commerce tenant looking to tap into the region’s abundant labor and affluent customer base, all while having cost-effective access to the entire region’s critical shipping channels. However, to meet the needs of last-mile tenants of today and the future, execs also knew they had to devote significant resources to implement a strategic repositioning plan to transform it into an environmentally sustainable, energy-efficient and truly modern logistics facility.
So, CenterPoint put the ingenuity of its development team and project partners to the test to pull off an aggressive $20 million repositioning in just nine months. “This repositioning project perfectly showcases CenterPoint’s deep commitment to developing high-performance industrial facilities that give our customers distinct environmental, economic and operational advantages,” said Kim Rierson, CenterPoint’s vice president of construction.
The sustainability features CenterPoint installs in its ground-up and repositioned developments run the gamut from employing water-saving features inside buildings and in landscaping, using high-efficiency lighting and skylights to not only cut energy use, but also improve employee satisfaction. Its construction teams also prepare sites to accommodate future improvements that are on the not-that-distant horizon. For example, CenterPoint builds larger electrical rooms, designs roofs to accommodate solar panels, and installs conduits to allow for electric vehicle charging stations in the buildings it develops to LEED standards.
The Growth of ‘Green’ Nationwide
While California is in many respects a trailblazer among U.S. states in environmental regulation, others will surely adopt a similar tack in time, especially those along the coasts where CenterPoint operates.
Company leaders are taking steps to ensure they are ahead of the curve in environmental building practices and are betting their long-range planning will pay dividends in the years to come in its Midwest and East Coast markets, too. It has earned LEED certifications for 15 properties, including facilities in Manteca, CA, near Seattle, the Chicagoland area and South Carolina.
In 2020, CenterPoint’s first-ever development in South Florida was certified “Florida Green,” a designation similar to LEED, by the Florida Green Building Coalition, a nonprofit dedicated to improving the Sunshine State’s building environment. The two-building, 296,000-square-foot Port Everglades International Logistics Center, sits on nearly 17 acres adjacent to one of America’s busiest seaports.
“We designed both buildings at the Port Everglades International Logistics Center to give tenants port immediacy, regional transportation access and every modern amenity they need with little environmental impact and significant long-term cost savings,” said Brian Hollings, CenterPoint’s vice president of development.
CJ Davila, executive director of the Florida Green Building Coalition, lauded CenterPoint’s efforts in awarding its organization’s green certifications at Port Everglades. “This achievement demonstrates CenterPoint’s commitment to construction practices that reduce negative environmental impacts, improve occupant health and well-being, and reduce operating costs,” said Davila.
Sustainability in Motion
In addition to focusing its construction teams on earning green certifications for new developments, CenterPoint continually monitors and works to reduce water usage, energy utilization, and its properties’ overall carbon footprint. That job falls on the shoulders of its vice president of environmental and social governance and corporate affairs, Elena Daniel. Among various tracking tools and methods, Daniel uses the ENERGY STAR® Portfolio Manager tool to make sure CenterPoint assets are performing at optimal levels from a sustainability perspective.
“CenterPoint has made it a priority to develop and manage best-in-class facilities in every sense: Buildings that offer superior strategic location and logistical advantages that are also beneficial to communities and the people that work in them,” said Elena Daniel, CenterPoint’s vice president of ESG and corporate affairs.
“We’re proud that our team exceeded even our high standards in our first South Florida development.”
CenterPoint recently took a significant step to weave its green building commitment into the very heart of its financial future. In Q3 ’20, it closed on its first-ever green bonds issuance pursuant to the private placement of $250 million of long-term, fixed-rate notes.
Chief Financial Officer Chris Papa, one of the issuance architects and the company’s Green Financing Framework, says proceeds from the green bonds will fund projects, including green building construction expenditures. The money will also go toward the development and operational maintenance and acquisitions of new, existing or refurbished buildings that receive LEED, ENERGY STAR and other industry-leading certifications. The green bonds’ proceeds are also eligible to fund energy-efficient projects within CenterPoint’s current portfolio related to equipment systems, operational improvements, and other sustainable maintenance.
“CenterPoint’s executive leadership team strongly believes this inaugural green bond issuance will greatly help us in our efforts to impact the environment positively,” said Chief Financial Officer Chris Papa. “This first green bond issuance is a tangible manifestation of our long-held philosophy to build better, even smarter facilities that benefit communities in a multitude of ways. We’re committed to that mission, and these bonds will help us continue that effort for many years to come.”
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This advertorial was published on Events & Adventures’ website as well as ~10 partner sites to improve backlinks, provide SEO content with CTA ads embedded on the page to generate leads, and cross-promote the E&A’s event partners.
Mission impossible? Going undercover to find love in Chicago
CHICAGO – I had walked 10 steps from my car before turning back to slip off and deposit my wedding ring in the center console. Like a classically trained method actor, tonight I was going into deep cover and fully transforming myself into a free man inside and out.
I entered the Greenhouse Theater Center 20 minutes before showtime, and was delighted to find I had my pick of the prime general admission seats. I sat center stage in the back tobe able to take in the full scene. A trio of decently-dressed 20-something women giggled as they walked to Row L directly in front of me.
A few men about my age – a little older than 20-something – milled about stage left. I pretended to study my phone as I stole glances at the crowd slowly filtering in. Some clearly had dressed for a full night on the town after this appetizer, while others seemed like this might be the main event of their Friday night.
Finally, the lights dimmed at 8:02 p.m. as the night’s emcee took the mic. “Hello Chicago!” he crowed like any good front man. “I’m Brian Howie, author of How to Find Love in 60 Seconds. Welcome to ‘The Great Love Debate!’” With that, he introduced the night’s featured experts, and the festivities were underway. An author, a professional matchmaker, the owner of a multinational social club for singles, and a comedian emerged from the wings to take their seats onstage.
Over the next 90 minutes, the town hall-style gathering bounced between the types of panel discussion you’d see at some staid conference, to a more interactive format with Howie taking his wireless mic into the seats to let people make comments, query the empaneled experts, and, well, debate questions of love, sex, and compatibility. These segments are where Howie, the love experts, and the crowd truly came alive, and are likely the reason “ The Great Love Debate” has toured in 78 cities since Howie came up with the concept in 2014.
“The biggest challenge to finding love in Chicago is what?” Howie asked an attractive woman in the sixth row.
Moments later, Howie summed up her answer. “Too many choices. You poor thing! Alright, sit down,” to the amusement of the crowd. Mark Owen, the founder of an aptly named social club that sets up daily events for singles, Events and Adventures, interjected. “Cell phones. How many promising dates have been ruined in the past 10 years since cells became ubiquitous? It’s funny. We started our club in 1991 to give singles a way to network and hang out with people like them. There were no cell phones. Then, in about 2005, everyone started walking around with their heads buried in their devices, and social lives definitely suffered.
Things have come full circle, though. Our club members tell us they love being able to put their phones away and interact, and actually really connect with people. Now we’re finding people join our club to be able to focus on creating real memories, engaging with real live people, and sharing time and space with people in fun ways, doing the things they love to do anyway, like going to wine tastings or hiking,” Owen said.
Many in the crowd nodded their head in agreement. Could it really be that people were ready to have more experiences IRL – in real life?
Cell phones weren’t the only target suffering slings and arrows. Social media, women “setting their proverbial bars too high,” and bars themselves all took their lumps as thenight unfolded. “The Great Love Debate” really hit its comedic stride when the subject of the dating app, Tinder, came up. A few people were goaded into letting Howie see their profiles, and the panelists took turns critiquing their “online personas.”
“Tinder was a real threat a few years back to clubs like ours, but we’ve seen that its effect has diminished in recent years,” Owen said. “But I think people seem to have had their fill of the swiping and fakeness that abounds there. The one-night stands, the feelings of rejection, the element of danger, even. Our members say they love meeting people in relaxed and safe environments, and not feeling pressured to have to hit it off or end their night early. If they find someone at one of our events, great! And many do, and many, many have over the last 30 years. But, if not, they can still hang out with other people like them, have fun doing things mutually like doing, and enjoy being free.”
There’s that word again: Free. A few minutes later, I was in my car, my wedding ring back in its familiar place as my right-hand man. My brief mission undercover as a “freeman” was complete. I had gotten what I came for, though. I saw firsthand that love is still in the air in Chicago, at least among the 300 or so people who paid $30 a head to attend “The Great Love Debate.” The recurring theme of the night, though, was unmistakable: While finding love isn’t always free, per se, the rewards can be rich and last a lifetime.
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I used a new lease announcement as a way to promote two other vacancies for CenterPoint Properties in this advertorial in New Jersey Business Journal.
CenterPoint Leases to Bunzl in Exit 8A, Readies Two More Near Port for Lease
CenterPoint Properties has signed a five-year lease for a 223-thousand-square-foot warehouse in the tight Exit 8A submarket to Bunzl, a global distributor of products to food processors, supermarkets, and various other users. Closer to the port, CenterPoint’s construction team is also wrapping up repositioning work on a pair of logistics facilities available for lease.
“We’re thrilled to continue to serve this top-flight tenant in a highly desirable submarket and to be putting the finish touches on two other extraordinarily well-located assets that offer outstanding access to port operations and critical roadways,” said David Nenner, CenterPoint’s senior vice president of asset management for the
East Region.Nenner said 180-thousand-square-feet of space is available for lease at 30-100 Pulaski St.in Bayonne. The building has 28 dock doors – six interior – and a 3,000-square-foot office, while the 10-acre property can accommodate parking for more than 100 cars.
“The Pulaski Steet location is appealing to New Jersey users and those in New York’s boroughs looking for a New Jersey footprint,” said Nenner. “This is simply a solid distribution facility located minutes from the Global Terminal and Lower Manhattan through the Holland Tunnel.”
Cushman & Wakefield’s Bill Waxman, Jeff Volpi, and Morgan Nitti represent CenterPoint in leasing the available space on Pulaski Street.
896 Frelinghuysen Ave. in Newark. Cushman & Wakefield’s Larry Casey and Robin Ritter-Ceriello represent CenterPoint to lease the 82,360-square-foot building. The 5-acre property offers users a strategic location minutes from Newark Airport, among other high-value features, including a fenced and secured yard.
“896 Frelinghuysen definitely stands out in this area thanks to its combination of easy access to the port and Newark Airport along with a high door count and plenty of parking,” Nenner said.
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