With nearly 450 retail properties across the country, maintaining outdoor landscaping seemed to present the prospect of ever-increasing costs for Regency Centers.
     
Late last year, however, the company tapped into the technical expertise of HydroPoint Data Systems, which specializes in "smart controllers" that dramatically reduce water consumption for irrigation and deliver significant cost savings. As a result of the formal agreement announced in December, Regency is installing smart controllers at 36 properties in Colorado, Arizona, California, Oregon and Washington.

"The measures we are taking represent a significant commitment to outdoor water conservation," says Mark Peternell, vice president of sustainability for Jacksonville, Fla.-base Regency. "Combined, we anticipate that we'll save more than 42 million gallons of water per year which will result in significant cost savings to our company and our tenants."

Those millions of gallons translate to a reduction of 35 percent in the amount of water used for irrigation – a significant figure, given that irrigation accounts for approximately 60 percent of the water consumed at a shopping center, Peternell says.

Additional savings accrue from solving the problem of over-watering, which can be deadly for trees and plants. There is also the issue of requiring less energy to pump all that water, as well as the less-tangible benefits that can be derived from undertaking green initiatives.

"There is something to be said for being a leader, an innovator, a responsible steward and a good neighbor in the communities where we have our properties," Peternell says. Referring to the positive image that comes from Regency's green programs, including its own "greengenuity" initiatives, he notes that the pilot project with HydroPoint and others like it have prompted "increased interest from investors, especially those interested in REITs (real estate investment trusts) seen as sustainability leaders."

Regency has been selected to partner with the U.S. Department of Energy's Net-Zero Energy Commercial Building Initiative and was one of 21 companies from retail, finance and commercial real estate to support DOE efforts to "speed market adoption" of energy saving technologies and produce buildings with significant and measurable energy savings.

Financial impact
Peternell expects all 36 properties included in the pilot program to have smart controllers by spring, with continued expansion of the system to other Regency properties as warranted by the verification of savings.

Wasting water "has a financial impact in areas where there is water scarcity, like in the Southwest, but the same is true from Virginia to Texas, Arizona to Seattle," says Christopher Spain, chairman and chief strategy officer for Petaluma, Calif.-based HydroPoint.

The company's WeatherTRAK evapotranspiration controllers monitor local soil conditions and are linked to the National Oceanic Atmospheric Association and thousands of weather stations originally created by government agencies to serve the agriculture industry. Through this network of information gathering and sharing, the company's on-site controllers can answer the most basic, most important question: Should the on-site controller deliver water to trees, shrubs and flowers today?

"There is a profound amount of water being wasted," Spain says. "It is an extraordinary resource that has the ability to go where you want it least."

Over-watering, he says, "is a primary cause of death for trees and plants and can lead to [building] foundation damage. And there is a profound lack of interest and focus on something that is critical to our survival. You cannot have energy generation without water, and you cannot have water without energy."

HydroPoint reports that, since 2002, its smart controllers have achieved overall outdoor water savings of 59 percent and a 71 percent reduction in runoff compared with traditional irrigation systems. For 2007, HydroPoint reports that its 15,000 WeatherTRAK subscribers saved more than 6.7 billion gallons of water, 26.9 million kilowatt hours of power and 36.1 million pounds of CO2, while also contributing some $60 million in savings to their collective bottom line.

Year after year
Altruism is a factor in clients' motivation, Spain says, but "the main driver is the economy … it is all about the bottom line. The first thing customers ask is, ‘How can I do the cost takeout?' because water is a huge cost and a future liability. The next issue is, ‘How can I take out the risk?' by avoiding unrealistic goals from this green initiative.

"It's important to have an immediate return," he says, but "you can't just get results the first year — you have to do it year after year after year."
Once installed, the WeatherTRAK solution requires no maintenance or hands-on updates. Data on each client's annual water savings are provided automatically as a standard service.

Initial investment for HydroPoint's smart controller hardware and installation ranges from $5,000 to $7,000 for a large shopping center, Spain says. For Regency, HydroPoint provided initial set-up and training, which included some computer programming for the local controllers. Regency also received ongoing measurement and verification, along with customer support.

While shopping center managers remain divided on the issue of climate change and global warming, there is far less debate about the issue of conserving water.

"Water is a finite resource and with increasing population growth, there is an increased need to conserve," Peternell says. "There are some areas of the country that are subject to severe drought, and the water supply is dwindling. In those areas, water conservation is changing and becoming critical."