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According to the Environmental Protection Agency:
- Each year, nearly 170,000 new commercial buildings are constructed in the United States.
- In 2002, they accounted for 45.4 percent of total energy consumption and 48.8 percent of total electricity consumption.
- Commercial buildings alone comprise 17.5 percent of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States.
- Occupants of commercial facilities use 25.6 percent of the total water consumed in the United States; impermeable materials used to construct buildings replaces natural surfaces, creating wastewater run-off into nearby bodies of water.
- Americans spend an average of 90 percent of their time indoors, sometimes in environments where the air is 100-times more polluted than outdoors.
