Regarding water consumption, the company is now building a water footprint management system along similar lines to what they have done for carbon.

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"It's been no secret that we've embarked on building our own global footprint, " says Yousef Javadi , chief of globalsales for Sprint.

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The Cleveland Clinic deal, along with a somewhat different arrangement at the Mayo, the Mayo Clinic Care Network, suggests a way for some universities to expand their footprint without building new campuses .

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We are not seeking to increase the size of the existing footprint of the building.

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Broadly speaking, this means carbon footprint reporting and building energy efficiency and monitoring, analyzing, reporting and reducing energy consumption.

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The building sector has a huge energy footprint and uses a great mass of materials, so efficiency experts have targeted it for improvement.

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This year Architecture 2030 introduced the 2030 Challenge for Products, which set benchmarks for reducing the carbon footprint of materials used in the building industry.

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Simply, the manufactured high-rises of today allow greater economies of scale regarding energy use, building materials, sewage and waste, and overall footprint on the land.

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This high profile means that sports organizations operate on a different calculus than, say, a bank, a government office, or an apartment building when it comes to choosing how to lighten environmental footprint.

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"Abu Dhabi wanted to show that it's aware of its carbon footprint today, " says Khaled Awad, the man in charge of building Masdar City.

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