Your facilities might be "green," but are they really green? When it comes to roofing systems, there is a difference because some roofs really are green, as in the color of vegetation.

The growing interest in all things green for institutional and commercial facilities shows no signs of slowing. But as any manufacturer will tell you, interest is mostly a phantom. Only actual sales count.

And when it comes to green roofs, end users — building managers and owners — seem to be mostly phantoms to manufacturers.

As one manufacturer told me at the International Roofing Exposition in Lax Vegas, "If I could turn all of the questions I've gotten (about green roofs) into sales, we'd be doing very well."

Why the hesitation?

In large part, practicality.

First, roofing contractors also are new to the green roof market, and many of them are having trouble coming up with accurate prices for installing green roof systems.

Second — and most importantly here — managers and owners remain skittish, mostly about installing roofing systems that put materials over their heads that require watering and other, less worrisome types of maintenance. Traditional roofing systems are one thing. An entire layer of living, breathing vegetation is quite another.

Will institutional and commercial facilities ever buy into green roofs? I'm guessing they will, though how soon and how much depends on a common customer requirement — the ability of manufacturers and contractors to move the systems from bleeding-edge investments to practical solutions.