4747 Bethesda Avenue lobby
JBG Smith, a real estate development firm headquartered at 4747 Bethesda Avenue, announced this morning that it has achieved carbon neutrality across its entire operating portfolio of properties. It accomplished this by purchasing verified carbon offsets for scope-one carbon emissions, and renewable energy credits (RECs) for scope-two electrical consumption.
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| Galvan development in Rockville |
In order to maintain carbon neutral status in the coming years, the company said it will have to take further actions. Those actions will include:
1. Driving down energy consumption across its existing portfolio
2. Reducing anticipated energy consumption and embodied carbon for its development pipeline
3. Deploying onsite solar where most impactful
4. Exploring offsite solar opportunities and bringing additional renewables to the national electrical grid
5. Addressing the remainder of carbon emissions with verified carbon offsets and renewable energy credits (RECs)
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| 7200 Wisconsin in Bethesda |
“Achieving carbon neutrality across our operating portfolio provides JBG Smith with a strong and compelling competitive advantage," JBG Smith CEO Matt Kelly said in a statement. "Our office, residential, and retail customers increasingly demand this from their real estate space and service partners and our investors expect that we are doing all that we can to address this looming and critical threat, Our collective actions over the next decade are essential in offsetting the current carbon emission trajectory and, through sustainable best practices, JBG Smith remains committed to positively impacting the communities we serve at every level.”
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| Terano in Rockville |
JBG Smith has developed, owns or manages many properties in Montgomery County, including the Trader Joe's-anchored 8001 Woodmont and 7200 Wisconsin in Bethesda, the Rock Grove shopping center in Shady Grove, and the Galvan and Terano in Rockville. Its most prominent venture is the Amazon HQ2 National Landing project in Arlington County, Virginia.
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| Rock Grove shopping center |
RECs are a scam. JBG Smith virtue signals to dumb liberals by purchasing electricity generated by renewables (wind and/or solar) in some other geographic market (eg. Texas), and this is supposed to offset electricity consumed by its customers in its own geographic footprint, regardless of whether the electricity was generated by gas (relatively clean) or dirty coal plants. And the electricity generated by renewables doesn't have to meet actual customer demand to serve as an offset, so for all we know it was a completely unnecessary waste of resources (and renewables aren't carbon neutral anyway -- eg. solar panels manufactured in China using coal-powered electricity). Also, the idea of driving down energy consumption across the developer's portfolio sounds ominous -- living in a high-rise with power blackouts is even more unpleasant than in a single-family home (you need a generator to operate the water pump so that toilets can flush). Good luck with that.
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