In the states however, green building is just now coming into vogue in cities like Chicago, Seattle, Portland, Los Angeles, and New York, which have put initiatives in place to lure developers into the sustainable building market.

One of the first studies to address the cost vs. benefit issue was The Costs and Financial Benefits of Green Building. The study was created by forty California agencies which pooled their resources to relate the added cost of using renewable and sustainable green building materials to the benefit of a cleaner, healthier life as a result of living and working in buildings that offer green features.

According to the study, the average person living and working in green buildings gains five (5) minutes of productivity each work day. The study assumes average hourly pay, building economic life, and a discount rate, then calculates the added value per square foot over the life of the building. For LEED Silver rated projects, the added value is almost $40 /sf and for Gold and Platinum rated projects the added value is nearly $56 / sf. A 20,000 sf green office building should then fetch over $1,120,000 more than its traditionally built competitor. With numbers like that it's not hard to understand why companies like CBRE are recommending their clients give green development a closer look.

Many studies have been completed since the California cost and benefit study, and the U.S. Green Building Council (creator of the LEED certification) tracks them in its research library. Recent studies include national trends for green building, new LEED certifications, and several green building white papers by industry leaders and other academia.