Engineering Case Studies
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LEED: Solution or Just a Work-Around?
| Tipping the Green Balance | |
| posted 10-29-2008 |
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 There is one rating system for green construction that stands above all others—LEED—Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. LEED was drafted by the U.S. Green Building Council and uses a points system to measure a structure’s “greenness.” The system is not without its problems. When builders in Aspen, Colorado, were constructing The Sundeck—a restaurant that was going to be LEED-certified—they pondered whether to install a reflective roof and gain more LEED points. Standard commercial roofing uses a black tar surface that absorbs solar heat and contributes to the heat island effect, which raises cooling costs in dense neighborhoods. Reflective roofs lessen this heating effect and save money and energy. So if the builders could save on energy costs and earn LEED points, it makes sense to install a reflective roof for the restaurant, right? Wrong, says Auden Schendler, executive director of sustainability for Aspen Skiing Company, the builders of The Sundeck. The Sundeck was being built 8,000 feet up in the Rocky Mountains, where heat islands are not an issue, says Schendler. He says this is an example of how sometimes the LEED system can award points for something that does not actually improve the building’s green potential. “That heat island issue is an example of a point that’s not relevant to us, but at the same time if it’s easy for us to get that point …” he adds, calling that “gaming the process.” The spirit vs. the letter of the code Through the complex system of LEED points, some builders have complained that these methods of “gaming” the process can muddle the definition of green building. Dennis Darcy is a New York City builder who has also encountered some LEED rules that seem counterintuitive to the green process. Darcy, who owns Brooklyn Interiors, is currently building a LEED-certified radio and television studio in Manhattan for the non-profit Democracy Now! “‘Recycle and reuse’ is kind of the mantra for every LEED project. But according to LEED, by sending, let's say, light fixtures with your carting company to be shredded and recycled, you receive more points for LEED certification than ‘re-using’ those items. And the value is an arbitrary monetary system, based on what those lights are worth in real money, similar to a tax write off. The balance is definitely tipped towards recycle rather than reuse.” Darcy, whose current project for Democracy Now! is donor-funded, says there is pressure to achieve a high LEED status, and his project is striving for platinum. “It is so precise, if you screw up. If you lose a credit, you could go from platinum to gold or from gold to silver.” Code fails in specialized situations Schendler, from Aspen, says one area where the system could be improved is making it site specific. “Some of the credits are credits that you either have or you don’t, and they don’t represent action on the part of the developer,” he says, citing community connectivity as one example. “If you’re close to mass transit you get a point. And you either are or you aren’t.” Location plays a big factor in how LEED points might be unevenly awarded. Schendler adds that whether you are building in rural Montana or downtown Manhattan, the same points apply. He says that’s one area where the LEED process could be easily revised to more precisely meet its goal and certify buildings. “You could say, if you’re in a city, you can get this point, you could say if you’re in a rural area, you don’t get this point. That would be pretty easy to fix.” Currently, Schendler is working on another restaurant in the Rockies, and this go-round, he says, recent improvements made to LEED rules make it both easier to follow the point system and have a more significant positive environmental impact. “When we did LEED the first time, we had two telephone books worth of paper documents, and now it is 100 percent online, which is a huge benefit.” He adds that the exchange of information between the builder and the LEED organization has also gotten better. “The actual communication on credits has gone from a faceless person trying to prevent you from being certified to someone who is helping you get certified.” And Schendler says that certification also means more now than it did the in the past, because LEED added a requirement this year that in order to obtain certification, the commercial buildings need to be more energy efficient—they need to at least beat code requirements by at least 14 percent. Before this new rule, builders could earn ten LEED points for improving energy efficiency, but it was not a requirement to be more energy efficient. “One of my gripes earlier was you’d LEED certify a building, and it didn’t mean anything,” says Schendler, “because a building has to be energy efficient to be green.” Despite these improvements, Schendler adds there is room to grow as far as the LEED criteria are concerned. Recently, he worked on a building with one project manager who expressed his frustration with complex and intricate rules that hindered, as he felt, his ability do the job. He told Schendler that the building had already met a lower LEED certification, but in the pursuit of a higher, less-realistic LEED certification, he was wasting his time building parking spaces for hybrid cars and installing particular vent fans instead of focusing on the fast-track schedule originally proposed for the project. But after years of sustainable building experience, Schendler is quick to defend the LEED certification process. “To someone who knows nothing, it helps you understand what green building means,” he says. “That’s the good.” He adds that where the process goes bad is when people use LEED as a way to learn specifically how to build green. “It’s a certification process. It’s not a guide to green building. That’s not LEED’s fault, that people use it as a guide. It’s the same issue as studying to the test.” Darcy agrees. “LEED is providing an outline. You don’t need to follow it to the letter of the law.” ______________________________ The U.S. Green Building Council on LEED Patagonia builds a LEED-certified distribution center ______________________________  COMMENTSHas LEED certification affected your headquarters? Leave your response in the comments below.
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