The Construction Source America

Business World | February 2015 68 rection for the six-year-old company. BUILT GREEN Implementing green initiatives as part of their business practices has its challenges. As influencers and thought leaders in the space, however, Ichijo USA understands that it is not a one-size-fits-all solution. “In King and Snohomish County there is a green home certification program called Built Green. We apply the Built Green Cer- tifications - about 4-Star and sometimes we get 5-Star for some other projects,” Ohno said. Built Green is an environmental rating sys- tem that scores 2-5 stars depending on the number of requirements met. Ichijo USA aims high to exceed expectations. “Built Green 4-Star is our goal for all the homes we build, but it sometimes exceeds that to 5-Star and net-zero energy homes,” Tovel added. Harnessing technology as a means to en- hance quality of life is something Ichijo USA are constantly striving for. By identify- ing issues in other parts of the world, it spurs the company to continually innovative and discover incentives for using its proprietary green technology. “As you know, in Japan they’re dealing with the nuclear crisis so the price of energy is sig- nificantly higher there than it is here,” Tovel said. “There is a big incentive to take that on and Ichijo did just that.”