Market transformation towards creating green communities happens because of three main reasons. Consumer demand, shift in professional practices or policy and top down legislation that make green development a requirement.
Generally, the trend towards green building has been responding to all three conditions. Institutions tend to make demands on their design professionals to build to LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) standards, architects have been increasing in their commitment to a higher level of practice in achieving high-performance buildings and more recently, there has been a flurry of green building policies popping up all over the country at various levels of local government.
For a database of such policies, visit the US Green Building Council (USGBC) website: usgbc.org/resources/government resources.

One of the landmark pieces of legislation coming out of our region in the past two years put Boston on the map as the first city in the country to require green building of the private sector. Boston is continuing its role as a green leader by working on other unique policies to support smart growth and environmentally conscious development.
The Green Roundtable (GRT) has been working with the city of Boston for over five years providing resources and expertise to support the development and implementation of green policies such as Article 37.

In recognition of the important work that has been done, and the goals for achieving greater impact, GRT just received a $630,000 grant from a private anonymous foundation to support another three years of work on policies with the city of Boston. This grant will allow GRT to provide education and training to more Boston city staff, development of resources and tools for city departments to use in the implementation of all green policies and the expansion of GRT's NEXUS Green Building Resource Center in downtown Boston. NEXUS is a key resource and serves as a meeting place for the green building stakeholders at the city level as well as for the public and private developers. Additional educational programs and policy implementation resources will be offered in an effort to better integrate green building practices into these new Boston projects.