At a recent Sustainability Symposium held by the Urban Land Institute North Texas, the North Texas Commercial Association of Realtors and The Real Estate Council at CityPlace in Dallas, a group concluded that sustainability is here to stay.

I love this quote from Shoanna Woodham of RaceTrac Petroleum:

As new construction has slowed, it has become more important to think about sustainability for existing buildings, not just new development, said Shoanna Woodham, senior engineering project manager for RaceTrac Petroleum Inc. Woodham leads RaceTrac’s initiatives for sustainable and efficient design.

“My opportunity is not in new construction,” she said. “It’s in retrofit.”

Woodham, who tests new products and construction methods to determine their effectiveness, said she tries to add one new technology or feature per site so she can isolate its impact on the building’s performance.

She gets it bigtime.

For more on the symposium, see this Dallas Business Journal article.