Clear deliverables defined most leaders' 2025 sustainability strategies - and clarity increased as the year went on. Most started the year with a budget, a deadline, or a request from someone upstream. A lender asks about climate risk. A customer asked for a supplier scorecard. A board asked what incentives you can still capture. That is why 2025's most prominent themes were not abstract. They were practical and tied to real outcomes and real activities that affect our buildings - and the organizations that own them.
This recap connects the dots across Emerald's top 2025 blog posts, so you can see how reporting, standards, and measurable outcomes fit together, and where to start if you want progress you can prove.
Standards Raised the Floor, and Decarbonization Took Center Stage
2025 continued the shift over the last few years: standards are no longer just a nice framework; they are shaping what “good” looks like. The shift is easy to see in the new LEED v5, because LEED is being direct about priorities. USGBC has said decarbonization accounts for half of all points in LEED v5, which is a big signal about where design teams, owners, and capital are being pushed.
And the “why now” is not abstract. Buildings account for about 30% of global final energy consumption. That is the backdrop behind all the tightening scorecards and new requirements. Read More: LEED v5 Unpacked: Key Certification Changes for Buildings and Interiors
Capital Is Treating Sustainability Like a Value Driver, Not a Checkbox
Sustainability is showing up in private equity due diligence as both a value and a risk question. That tracks with the broader growth of private markets, where institutional money is pushing for clearer data across portfolios.
When buyers underwrite an acquisition or refinance, they are not just looking at today’s NOI. They are looking at exposure to regulation, energy price volatility, capex timing, and tenant expectations. Benchmarks like GRESB exist because capital wants something comparable across assets.
If you might sell, recapitalize, or refinance in the next few years, start building the “proof folder” now: utility data, retrofits, controls sequences, and a credible plan. Once you have the plan, it's time to look at the funding side, because 2025 also changed the incentive conversation. Read More: The Growing Intersection of Private Equity and Sustainability
FEDERAL SUSTAINABILITY INCENTIVES ARE SHRINKING, BUT THE WELL IS NOT DRY
The “One Big Beautiful Bill” accelerated the termination of several energy credits and sustainability incentives. For homeowners, the residential clean energy credit (25D) and energy efficiency home credit (25C) expired at the end of 2025. For developers, the energy efficiency commercial building credit (179D) and new energy efficiency home credit (45L) are expiring in June 2026. For utility-scale wind and solar, there is now a “begin construction” deadline of July 4, 2026, for the 45Y and 48E credits.
However, even as federal incentives shrink, incentives remain at the federal level for technologies like storage and geothermal, and more are available through utilities, municipalities, and states. A fast way to scan what exists where you operate is DSIRE, which tracks incentives and policies across the U.S.
Financing mechanisms also matter here, including C-PACE, which can fund efficiency and clean energy improvements. In 2026, the incentive landscaping is shifting towards local options. Read More: Beat the Sunset: Federal Energy Incentives Are Ending
The Emissions You Do Not Track Are the Ones That Bite You Later
Building Life Cycle Assessments: Whole-Life Carbon Is Not Optional Anymore
To align with many incentives, reporting, and building certification requirements, you need to track and report on your greenhouse gas emissions. This should begin at your initial design stage with Building Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). This assesses the emissions impact of the materials associated with different design choices.
The embodied carbon in building materials has a major impact on the project’s lifetime emissions. In fact, embodied emissions account for 11% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Read More: Building Life Cycle Assessments: The Key to Sustainable, Profitable Projects
Uncovering Hidden GHG Emissions in Buildings
Once your building has been constructed, you need to focus on its operations, and utility bills are only part of a building’s carbon footprint. Waste, leakage, and overlooked systems can quietly dominate a building’s actual impact.
Start with the simplest reality check: the U.S. Department of Energy says commercial buildings waste up to 30% of the energy they consume. If you are not measuring energy consumption and optimizing your systems, you are probably paying for that waste.
Then there are refrigerants, which many teams still treat as a niche topic until they show up in reporting. For example, HFC-410A has a global warming potential (GWP) of 2,088 times that of CO2, which is why refrigerant management is no longer just a maintenance detail. Many high-GWP refrigerants will be phased out starting this year.
Once you can explain the “what,” the next reality is the “who,” because most reporting work starts when a buyer asks for it. Read More: Beyond the Obvious: Uncovering Hidden GHG Emissions in Buildings
Supplier Scorecards Made Sustainability a Supply Chain Requirement
Companies are not chasing scorecards because it sounds fun. They are doing it because someone upstream told them they have to. That is the real shift behind the growing popularity of the EcoVadis and CDP frameworks.
The market signal is strong. Nearly 89,000 companies across 250+ industries and 150 countries have an EcoVadis rating. CDP is at a similar scale. In just 2025, almost 45,000 suppliers were requested to disclose data through CDP’s Supply Chain program.
The practical takeaway is simple: build a repeatable “data pack” once, then reuse it. There is a major overlap between EcoVadis and CDP. The teams that win are not the ones reinventing answers for every questionnaire.
With the measurement in place, the next step is to make changes to improve efficiency and reduce operating costs. Read More: EcoVadis & CDP: The Surprise Sustainability Audit and How to Ace It
Existing Buildings Were the Big Opportunity Hiding in Plain Sight
Most portfolios cannot demo-and-rebuild their way to lower emissions. They must renovate and operate better. A key point is that you do not need a futuristic tech stack to get results. Focusing on high-impact categories such as HVAC modernization, envelope improvements, lighting, and smarter controls addresses both operating costs and comfort simultaneously.
Retrofits also matter because so many of the buildings that will be standing in the coming decades already exist. 80% of the 2050 building stock has already been built, which makes existing buildings critical to decarbonization. Read More: Revitalizing Aging Buildings: Top Energy Efficiency Upgrades
The “Waste” Signs Owners Kept Recognizing in Their Own Portfolios
Once you understand the role of existing buildings, the next question becomes straightforward: where do you start, and how do you avoid spending money on the wrong things? You need a clear picture of what your building is doing today, when it is doing it, and what is quietly running up the bill.
Some common signs your building is wasting energy are simultaneous heating and cooling, comfort complaints that never end, weird after-hours loads, and systems that run “just in case.”
Benchmarking is one of the fastest ways to make those tells visible. Research from ENERGY STAR’s Portfolio Manager has found that buildings that consistently benchmark energy use save an average of 2.4% per year. Consistently tracking energy use data highlights problem areas and cost-effective upgrades.
However, data and analysis only work if you can clearly explain them, especially when audiences are divided. Read More: 5 Signs Your Building Is Wasting Energy (and What It’s Costing You)
Sustainability Messaging Got More Careful, and More Practical
The political climate changed, greenwashing scrutiny increased, and sustainability discourse adapted. It’s important to use politically and socially loaded trigger words carefully. Alternatively, focusing discussions on universally accepted ideas that align with environmental and financial goals is key. Lead with concepts such as reliability, cost control, risk reduction, tenant comfort, and performance, and then connect those outcomes to emissions.
This approach is not “watering it down.” It matches how decisions get made in real organizations, especially when you are trying to get projects approved and executed.
Which brings us to the last theme, because once you can effectively explain the numbers, you can budget for them. Read More: What You Say Matters: How to Talk About Sustainability in a Politically Divided World
Budgeting Turned Sustainability Into a Line Item With Dates
Emerald’s Budgeting for Sustainability 2026 is a strong closer because it ties everything together: reporting pressure, operating cost, and climate disruption. The shift is that sustainability spend is being pulled by disclosure pressure, utility risk, and continuity risk.
Rules like California's SB 253 and the EU's CSRD are turning Scope 3 data into a business requirement, so budgets need tracking systems, supplier outreach, and assurance-ready documentation. At the same time, EIA expects retail electricity prices to continue rising through 2026, and NOAA recorded 27 U.S. billion-dollar disasters in 2024.
Spending on these categories now results in significant future savings. That is why budgets are increasingly integrating efficiency, decarbonization, and resilience into a single plan. Read More: Budgeting for Sustainability in 2026: A Strategic Imperative
The Thread Through Our Top Themes
Across certifications, investor pressure, supplier scorecards, and changing incentives, the pattern is the same: the winners are building a clean data foundation and then using it to prioritize actions that save money and reduce risk. If you are building your 2026 plan, the goal is not to chase every new trend, it is to choose a few priorities you can measure, fund, and execute.
When you are ready to turn the plan into measurable results, Emerald Built Environments, A Crete United Company, can help you scope the work, build the data backbone, and improve building performance in a way that holds up under real scrutiny.
