Green building has received increased attention over the past decade from both environmental economists and policymakers. While there is no single definition of “green buildings” or its related policy, researchers and organizations tend to emphasize resource efficiency in building and reducing the impacts of buildings on human health and the environment.

First adopted in 2007, and most recently renewed in 2015, New Mexico’s Sustainable Building Tax Credit supports the greening of many building types across the state. Released in October, 2017, this case study captures the impacts of this landmark policy and highlights the context and people that helped to create and sustain this nation-leading green building policy.

This is an example of LEED being used in an innovative tax policy across the United States and potentially serve as a tax model elsewhere.

This evaluation, conducted by Industrial Economics Incorporated on behalf of BTO, centers on a retrospective cost-benefit analysis of selected Building America program activities in the new residential market. It estimates the economic rate of return by comparing the economic benefits attributable to a subset of key practices advanced by Building America to DOE’s total investment in the Building America program from its inception in 1994 through 2015.