New green building competition budding.

Saving the environment is becoming a fashionable pursuit in New York, with several new green building projects and a City Hall-sponsored design competition.

Although the place best known for sustainable design so far has been Battery Park City, the Mayor's office is trying to cast the net wider and get more developers involved in saving energy and water.

In announcing a competition for a green building design on September 24, Mayor Bloomberg noted that "Sustainable development is crucial to New York City's future. Creating new buildings, retrofitting old ones to be more energy efficient and incorporating new technologies that are less expensive and environmentally friendly is vital for the continued growth of our City. With major renewal projects in Lower Manhattan, Downtown Brooklyn, Western Queens, Greenpoint/Williamsburg and the Far West Side of Manhattan, the need for sustainable development is [great]."

The competition's winning designs, which will showcase strategies for better power generation, brown field development and water conservation, will be put on public display throughout the five boroughs. They will cover every kind of development, from industrial to residential.

According to George Aridas, senior vice president of the Albanese Development Corporation, who oversaw the development of The Solaire at Batter Park City, the first environmentally sustainable residential building in New York, saving the environment brings its own financial benefits.

"It does cost more to build green, but it's an investment that has a market-rate return," he said. "With the right array of technologies, the decreased operating costs will generate returns. And there is a growing demand for that kind of project. Health care facilities and educational institutions are getting particularly concerned with air quality."

In addition to Albanese, such developers as Forest City Rattner and Jonathan Rose Companies are trying to incorporate environment friendly features into their projects.

"We know that the New York Times headquarters will have a lot of green design incorporated into it, including water saving features," said Edward Carey, of the Office of Environmental Coordination. "And the owners of the Conde Nest building are doing a billion different things. So environmentally sustainable design is taking on."