Around Southeast Louisiana, the green craze is in full swing. With Global Green’s Green Building Directory (with 400 “green” vendors), press from the Make It Right Foundation, and a host of other things contributing to the green momentum in the area….we asked the question last week: How much of it all is Greenwashing?

The Greenwashing topic has been subject to some press lately, as Earth Day approaches with the usual proliferation of “green” claims. Further, just last week, green marketing, industry and government officials participated in a workshop in Arlington, VA to discus how to make green labels more credible.

To put things simply, there simply aren’t any real enforceable standards.

The newly revised FTC’s “Guides for the Use of Environmental Marketing Claims” are a good starting point, but it has no enforcement mechanism [read our summary of the guide].

Isn’t This A Consumer Problem? Not a Builder Problem?

Short answer: No. It’s has huge applicability to the builder world.

As a matter of fact, Joel Bittle at GreenBuildingElements.com published a great article on this subject last year: How Not to Greenwash Your Building Product.

His full article can be read here, but here is a summary – a list he prepared of 7 things to keep in mind when writing out what green building credits your product may satisfy:

1. Make sure your product satisfies at least one green building requirement
2. Do not claim credits that do not apply to your product or to the current building project;
3. If you are not unique, don’t try to sell yourself as unique;
4. Don’t claim that yours is a local product if it’s not harvested/extracted or processed locally;
5. No product is a LEED certified or LEED qualified product;
6. Your manufacturing practices do not affect LEED credits;
7. Don’t sell yourself short.

So what is the future of greenwashing?

There are a few organizations trying to combat Greenwashing. Check out the GreenWashingIndex.Com for example, or Consumer Report’s GreenerChoices.Org. Moreover, there are constantly reports on how to evaluate green products – like this report from BuilderOnline.com.

The future of greenwashing is a bit uncertain. On the one hand, if the advertising continues to work, the advertisers will continue to greenwash. On the other hand, if it stops working, the problem of decreasing green choices surfaces.

Many argue that simple enforcement is needed.

While regulatory penalites are not a clear and present danger for “greenwashers,” there is certainly the danger that they will be sued civilly for the misrepresentations. This can be especially relevant when a greenwashed product or service negatively affects a construction project seeking LEED certification.

For this reason, builders and construction service providers should be more dilligent than the average joe, as the potential damages associated with messing up a LEED accrediation can be significant.

The New Orleans Times Picayune ran a story last week that lead off with these two paragraphs:

Louisiana is expected to get $122.3 million in federal economic recovery money to improve the energy efficiency of homes, government buildings and public transportation over the next three years and to jump-start renewable energy projects for electricity generation.

The money should create scores of new jobs for tradesmen willing to learn green building practices. It also will help moderate-income households around the state improve the energy-efficiency of their homes and lower their utility bills.

Over the next three years, authorties estimate that over 6,000 homes will be weatherized under the program.

In addition to this, President Obama has recently come out to designate New Orleans as the “U.S. Blueprint” for green construction and environmental protection, invigorating urban centers and stressing volunteerism.

Perhaps the promise of the Global Green USA’s Build It Back Green program, Brad Pitt’s Make It Right Foundation and other similar programs are finally making its impression, and the New Orleans area will see real investment in green building over the next few years.