The Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (ACHP) recently released its Strategic Sustainability Performance Plan, required by Executive Order 13514, “Federal Leadership in Environmental, Energy, and Economic Performance.”  The Plan addresses how the agency will enhance the energy efficiency of its day-to-day operations and identifies actions that the ACHP will take to promote historic preservation as a sustainability tool and to assist federal agencies in addressing preservation.  Highlights of the Strategic Sustainability Performance Plan include:

  • ACHP management and staff will seek creative ways to achieve sustainability targets in such areas as green purchasing, reduction in travel, use of public transit, flexible work schedules, and telework.
  • ACHP has created a Task Force on Sustainability and Historic Preservation, which is addressing issues of energy efficiency and community livability. The task force advocates directly with ACHP member agencies to promote key issues and outcomes, and provides a vehicle for developing guidance to assist agencies in fully integrating historic preservation into their policies and programs addressing sustainability.
  • Executive Order 13514 requires that agencies ensure “that rehabilitation of federally owned historic buildings utilizes best practices and technologies in retrofitting to promote long-term viability of the buildings.” The ACHP is leading a workgroup to develop guidance to assist property-managing agencies in complying with this requirement.
  • Federal agencies report to the ACHP and the Department of the Interior every three years on their progress in the identification, protection, and use of historic properties. The ACHP will revise or supplement its advisory reporting guidelines for 2011 to ask agencies for information on how they are pursuing sustainability goals in their management of historic properties.

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