I hope business owners are already familiar with the tax rebates and incentives available to them for making green building improvements. That is, by improving the efficiency of your heating and cooling systems, upgrading insulation and roofing, using efficient light bulbs and fixtures, and so on, you can achieve savings all around. As this article points out, some of these improvements could include making upgrades to outdoor lighting options.

This means that not only will you save operational monies from upgrading your lighting from less efficient options (T12s swapped out for T5s or T8s, CFLs (compact fluorescents) used in place of incandescent bulbs in task lighting, and LEDs (light-emitting diodes) that replace inefficient outdoor lighting), you may also qualify for rebates from the government.

By upgrading your existing building, or developing a new project that uses 50 percent less energy than certain building minimums (set by the government), and then calculating the savings using the IRS's computer software, you too can realize a deduction up to $1.80 per square foot of the building. And costs not covered can be carried over into the following years.

Now, the year is almost over, and some of these rebates are set to expire on December 31, 2008. But hopefully, with a new pro-green government coming into power, many of these options will still be available for businesses willing to green up and save. So what are you waiting for? There's only a few days left in the year, so you'd better get your green building upgrade started!