In the late 1980s, the American Institute of Architects (AIA) created the
Committee on the Environment (COTE), which has outlets today in just
about every AIA chapter across the country.All across the US and Canada,
architects have led the charge toward sustainable design, working through
local COTE chapters, as well as the US Green Building Council chapters.
Created in 1993, the US Green Building Council (USGBC) aims to
transform the building industry into a more environmentally responsible
activity. Beginning in the mid-1990s, the USGBC undertook, with Šnancial
assistance from the US Department of Energy, the development of a
rating and evaluation system to deŠne what a green building represented.
The Šrst system, dubbed Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design
or LEED, for new construction and major renovations, was piloted or
beta-tested in 1998 and 1999 on about 50 projects in the US. In March
2000, version 2.0 of LEED was introduced as an updated, revised and expanded
version of the original LEEDversion 1.0. Since then version 2.0 has
had two major changes; LEED for New Construction (LEED-NC) version
2.2, eªective since late 2005, is the current standard.
The USGBC enjoyed rapid growth from 1998, when it had only about
100 members, to the beginning of 2007, when membership stood at more
than 7,700 corporate, institutional, governmental and nonproŠt organizations
(it does not have individualmembers).1 Representing all segments of
the building industry and environmental community, the USGBC has
been able to craft a consensus standard for evaluating the environmental
attributes of buildings and developments, by drawing on the resources of
this large ($1 trillion annual construction value) and diverse industry.
Established in 2004, the Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC)
now has more than 1,300 member organizations, with chapters in many provinces.2 The CaGBC uses the LEED evaluation system but has adapted
it for Canadian conditions. By 2007 the CaGBC had more than 225 projects
registered for certiŠcation under the Canadian LEED standard.Green
building in Canada is a fast-growing movement, with a special focus on
energy e‹ciency and indoor air quality suitable for a more northerly and
colder climate.
Current Situation
Owners and developers of residential, commercial and institutional properties
acrossNorthAmerica are discovering that it is often possible to build
green buildings on conventional budgets.Many developers, building owners
and facility managers are advancing the state of the art in commercial
and large residential buildings through new modeling tools, design techniques
and creative use of Šnancial and regulatory incentives. For the past
ten years, in ever-increasing numbers, we have begun to see development
of commercial structures using green building techniques and technologies.
With more than 1,200 corporations issuing sustainability reports of
some formin 2006, it is clear that thismarket will not be a short-lived fad.
Companies want to locate in a space that rešects their values, and a highperformance
building goes a longway toward satisfying that requirement.3
Most long-time participants in the real estate, architectural design
and building construction industries realize that sustainable design is the
biggest sea change in their business careers. The urgency of global warming
and the increasing US dependence on imported fuels have led architects
to urge more concerted action to reduce energy use in buildings. In
late 2005 the American Institute of Architects (AIA), representing more
than 70,000 architects, released amajor policy statement that sets a goal of
reducing the fossil fuel consumption of new buildings by 50% by the year
2010, with additional 10% reductions every Šve years thereafter, to reach
90% reduction from 2005 levels by 2030. While this declaration has no
legal force, it does add pressure to incorporate superior energy performance
into the goals for each project.4 As architect EdwardMazria observes,
one can achieve a 50% reduction with existing building technology at no
extra cost by simply using the right design strategies, such as proper orientation
and form, daylighting, solar control and passive heating and cooling
techniques.
Understanding Green Buildings
What do wemean when we speak of green Architecture or high-performance
buildings? According to the USGBC, these buildings incorporate design
and construction practices that signiŠcantly reduce or eliminate the negative impact of buildings on the environment and occupants in Šve broad
areas:
• Sustainable site planning.
• Safeguarding water and water e‹ciency.
• Energy e‹ciency and renewable energy.
• Conservation of materials and resources.
• Indoor environmental quality.5
Typically, green buildings are measured against code buildings — structures
that qualify for a building permit but do not exceed the minimum
requirements of the building code for health and safety. In addition, green
buildings are often measured according to a system such as the LEED rating
system (usgbc.org), the Collaborative for High-Performance Schools
(CHPS) ratings (chps.net), the Advanced Building™ guidelines (power
yourdesign.com),Green Guide for Healthcare (GGHC)6 or, in some cases,
local utility or city guidelines (a number of utilities have rating systems for
residential buildings). Such buildings must score a minimum number of
points above “standard building” performance thresholds to qualify for a
certiŠcation, or a rating as “green” or high-performance.
Since the introduction of LEED in 2000, it has become essentially the
US national standard for commercial and institutional buildings. LEED is
primarily a performance standard; in other words, it generally allows a developer,
architect or building owner to choose how tomeet certain benchmark
numbers — saving 20% on energy use versus current building
codes, for example — without prescribing speciŠc measures. In this way,
LEED is a šexible tool for new construction or major renovations in almost
all commercial and institutional buildings throughout the US.
Canada has an almost identical version of LEED,7 which has achieved signiŠcant
popularity. Since its inception, LEED has proven to be a valuable
design tool for architectural teams tasked with creating green buildings, as
well as a way to evaluate the Šnal result.
LEED provides for four levels of certiŠcation, in ascending order of
achievement: CertiŠed, Silver, Gold and Platinum. In 2003 and 2004 three
projects in southern California achieved the Platinum rating: one project
for a local utility, another for a county park (in cooperation with the local
Audubon Society) and another for the Natural Resources Defense Council.
By early 2007 the largest LEED Platinum project was the Center for
Health and Healing at Oregon Health & Science University, in Portland, at
412,000 square feet. At the same time, more than 500 projects had completed
the certiŠcation process under LEED for New Construction
(LEED-NC). Platinum-seeking projects that are under construction in
2007 promise to extend the size of the top-rated buildings to more than
onemillion square feet.
Who Is Using LEED?
By the end of 2006, LEED-NC had captured about 4% to 5% of the total
new building market, with nearly 4,000 registered projects encompassing
more than 477 million square feet of new and renovated space. At the beginning
of 2007, more than 100 new projects each month were registered
for evaluation under LEED-NC. Since a project can only be LEED-certiŠed
after it is ready for occupancy, many projects are just nearing completion
of their documentation to qualify for a LEED rating. Given that it
often takes two years ormore for projects tomove fromdesign to completion
(and certiŠcation can only take place after substantial completion of a
project), growth in the number of certiŠed projects will be rapid. Many
Fortune 500 Šrms, universities, government agencies and non-proŠt organizations
are beginning to participate signiŠcantly in the development
of LEED projects.
Just about every conceivable project type has been LEED-registered,
including amostly undergroundOregon winemaking (barrel-aging) facility! For example, the Šrst 150 LEED Gold project certiŠcations (through
the end of 2006) included 10 non-US projects (7 in Canada) and such varied
building types as:
• Renovation of a 100-year-old warehouse into a modern o‹ce building
in Portland,Oregon.
• A developer-driven technology park conversion of an old hospital in
Victoria, British Columbia.
• An o‹ce-warehouse building for a major auto company in Gresham,
Oregon.
• An elementary school in Statesville,North Carolina.
• Two high-rise apartment buildings in NewYork City.
• A new o‹ce building and an o‹ce building renovation for Herman
Miller, Inc., in Zeeland, Michigan. (Commenting on this project, architect
William McDonough observed that moving from a windowless
building to a daylit building increased annual revenues 40% and
that the increase in proŠts paid for the building in about four
months.)8
• Apublic o‹ce building leased to theCommonwealth of Pennsylvania.
• An environmental learning center near Seattle,Washington.
• A city hall in Austin, Texas.
• An aªordable housing complex in SantaMonica, California.
• A new convention center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
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