It Doesn't stop at the LEED Certification Plaque: Why Ongoing Building Performance Tracking Matters

Kal Wellman
Associate, LEED
U.S. Green Building Council

It has become widely accepted across the commercial real estate world that LEED certification has the potential to add value by presenting a number of benefits including higher rental yields, lower vacancy rates, reduced operating costs and improved employee productivity. The extraordinary growth of LEED over the past decade is clear evidence of this industry-wide understanding.

Receiving the LEED plaque should not be the end of the process for building owners. The plaque symbolizes the beginning of a building performance journey, one where data is at the center of attention. Having the ability to measure, track and benchmark a building’s energy and water data can help pinpoint operational inefficiencies within major building systems and can help the management team set actual reduction targets. Don’t believe us? See how it helped the Christman Company.

LEED 2012: Why Now?

Brendan Owens, LEED AP, P.E.
Vice President, LEED Technical Development
U.S. Green Building Council

LEED is a living document. Its evolution is critical to the transformation of the buildings industry, connecting the market to innovative ways of thinking about the design, construction and operation of green buildings. The power of LEED is its ability to transform.

We recently opened the third public comment for LEED 2012, a key step in compiling industry feedback and finalizing the next update to LEED. Many people ask us: Why have we chosen to update the rating system in 2012 when LEED 2009 was released just a few years ago? LEED is on a continuous improvement cycle that keeps us moving toward not just “less bad,” but “more good” in terms of the environmental impact of our buildings. But how do we define that? How do we know when we’ve gotten there?

Every Penny Counts: Tracking Building Performance to Save Money and Resources

Lauren Riggs, LEED AP
Manager, LEED Performance
U.S. Green Building Council

This post originally appeared on FacilitesNet.

In today's economy, every penny counts. And as building owners and facility managers know all too well, every penny adds up. When the lights in your 30-story office building are left on an extra hour each day, or the brutal summer heat requires an extra blast of air conditioning, your energy consumption escalates and so does your utility bill. That's precisely why building owners and facility managers are starting to "listen" to their buildings to ensure optimal operations.

Inspired by these attentive facility managers, the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) launched its Building Performance Partnership (BPP) in 2009. The organization-wide initiative positions the optimization of building performance as a fundamental goal of the green building movement. BPP engages both owners and facility managers of LEED-certified commercial buildings through data collection, analysis and action. Participants receive annual performance reports, report cards and real-time data interfaces to aid in their building performance goals.

At the end of 2010, 132 LEED-certified facilities, mainly office buildings, had joined BPP. These facilities range in size from 2,000 to 2 million square feet. In 2011, the program grew to include nearly 350 partners, triple 2010's figures. The types of organizations and facilities have grown to include retailers, offices and other building types. These participants are demonstrating their commitment to energy efficiency monitoring and are leading among their peers by sharing their experiences and contributing to the market need for building performance education.

The first year participants represented high-performing buildings from every region of the country. Those buildings eligible for an Energy Star score had an overall average score of 87. Consistent with a high average Energy Star score, BPP participants had demonstrated Source Energy Use Intensity that is on average 41 percent lower than the national averages reported in EPA's Energy Star Portfolio Manager.

Each year will bring new enhancements to the program and offer increased connectivity to other USGBC programs. This year, all participants that share data through BPP will receive their performance report through an online interface, which will contain an analysis of their current performance, from the most recent 12 months of utility data provided, side-by-side with their benchmarks from LEED certification.

To support the increased interest in building performance, USGBC is implementing automation solutions for data collection and transfer, including establishing an automatic data input and output relationship with EPA's Energy Star Portfolio Manager, and will begin work to automate additional benchmarking solutions.

The goal is for the annual performance reports to act as a helpful reminder to facility managers that their building's performance matters and benefits the bottom line. Armed with comprehensive green building performance data, BPP will enable standardization of reporting metrics and analytics and establish new performance benchmarks, ultimately transforming the way the world views building operations and maintenance.

For more information about BPP, visit usgbc.org/bpp.

Department of Education Announces Landmark Green Schools Program

Nathaniel Allen
Associate, Schools Advocacy
U.S. Green Building Council

Today, the federal government launched an initiative that may be the biggest thing to ever happen to the green schools movement.

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson, and White House Council on Environmental Quality Chair Nancy Sutley announced the creation of a Green Ribbon Schools program. (Read the Green Ribbon Schools press release from the Department of Education.)

Modeled after the Blue Ribbon Schools program, which recognizes academic distinction, the Green Ribbon Schools program will be a voluntary award, recognizing schools that are demonstrating excellence – or making notable improvement – toward sustainability. Though still in development, the program will evaluate schools across four categories: environmental education; energy efficiency and resource conservation; healthy operations and maintenance; and community engagement and service learning.

L to R: Sean Miller, Earth Day Network; Danielle Moodie, National Wildlife Federation; Jim Elder, Campaign for Environmental Literacy; Arne Duncan, U.S. Secretary of Education; Rachel Gutter, Nathaniel Allen and Jason Hartke, Center for Green Schools at the U.S. Green Building Council.

The program is a milestone in collaboration among the Department of Education, EPA and White House CEQ, and it will undoubtedly raise the profile of green schools. But more significantly, if one looks closely within the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Education and the Department of Energy, there are dozens of programs, grants and initiatives that can relate to healthy, high-performing schools. The Green Ribbon Schools program has the opportunity to help connect these dots and advance change at a level we've not yet seen.

Kudos to our friend Jim Elder, Director of the Campaign for Environmental Literacy, for originally conceiving this idea. We've been proud to work closely with Jim, as well as our colleagues at the National Wildlife Federation and Earth Day Network, to help advance this concept to reality. (Read our shared press release.) In total, 75 state and national organizations signed on in support of this program prior to today's announcement. This is a landmark day for green schools, and we give the federal government tremendous credit for advancing an initiative that will help ensure the vision of green schools for everyone within this generation.

EPA To Recognize Well-Planned Communities

Aaron Lande
Sustainable Cities Specialist
U.S. Green Building Council

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced the opening of the nomination period for its 10th Annual National Award for Smart Growth Achievement. This award allows EPA to recognize and support communities that use innovative policies and strategies to strengthen their economies, provide housing and transportation choices, develop in ways that bring benefits to a wide range of residents, and protect the environment. Is it just me, or could that description be applied to LEED for Neighborhood Development communities as well?

The award is open to public- and private-sector entities, though all applications must include a public-sector partner. Applications can be submitted in one of four categories:

Programs, Policies and Regulations: Recognizing regulatory and policy initiatives that support the principles of smart growth, especially actions that remove barriers to or provide incentives for smart growth.

Smart Growth and Green Building: Recognizing development, in either single or multiple buildings, that combines smart growth and green building approaches as building design and materials are integrated with land use and location efficiency.

Civic Places: Recognizing projects in the public realm that improve a community's sense of place while adding environmental and economic benefits. EPA is particularly interested in projects that create well-designed and vibrant public spaces.

Rural Smart Growth: Recognizing communities that preserve and encourage rural economies and character. EPA is interested in thriving rural areas that have used smart growth approaches to encourage economic development and job creation, improve transportation choices and housing options, and support the economic viability of working lands.

Applications are due Apr. 6, 2011.

To give a sense of what the EPA is looking for, here are last year’s winners:

Overall Excellence in Smart Growth: Smart.Growth@NYC: Policies and Programs for Improving Livability in New York City — New York City Department of Transportation with the Departments of Health, Design and Construction, and City Planning

Smart Growth and Green Building: Miller’s Court — Baltimore City Department of Housing and Community Development, Seawall Development Company, Hamel Builders, and Marks, Thomas Architects

Programs, Policies, and Regulations: Making the Greatest Place: Metro’s Strategic Implementation of the 2040 Growth Concept — Metro, Portland, Oregon

Rural Smart Growth: Gateway 1 Corridor Action Plan — Gateway 1 Communities and Maine Department of Transportation

Civic Places: Mint Plaza — City and County of San Francisco, Martin Building Company, CMG Landscape Architects, and Sherwood Design Engineers

Congressional Outlook Uncertain, but Executive Branch Opportunity Abounds

Lane Burt
Technical Policy Director
U.S. Green Building Council

There has been a whole lot of negative talk about the prospects for energy, climate or other significant legislation coming out of our newly divided Congress, and that is not the best news for the green building industry. However, this does not imply that green building advocates should pack up and go home – in fact, it means quite the contrary. It turns out that a renewed focus on utilizing the legal authority already granted to federal agencies by Congress could reap huge benefits for architects, engineers, builders, developers, manufacturers and others involved in the green building process.

The shocking size and scope of the United State’s potential energy and water savings were highlighted by a 2010 study on existing authorities held by the executive branch to push efficiency in commercial and multifamily buildings. USGBC commissioned this study with a diverse group of building sector organizations (e.g., the Natural Resources Defense Council, Real Estate Roundtable, and Building Owners and Managers Association).

The findings of this report were clear. There is something, and usually something very impactful, that nearly every agency can do to improve the public and private building stock. The more digging we did into the existing authorities, the more opportunities we discovered to “stoke the fire” of the building industry and its sustainable potential. I wrote about the highlights of the report when it was released, and the opportunities I noted then remain before us—still knocking—today.

In many ways, the sheer quantity of opportunities identified by the report (and sheer size of the report itself) is daunting. Where should the White House, the Department of Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, etc. start? Which potentially transformative policy must come first?

That’s why the full report was just the beginning of a broader federal push. Over the weeks and months to come, we will be reaching out to our 16,000+ member companies and working with our other partners on the report to generate support for industry- and agency-specific recommendations—ones that are targeted, actionable, and potent. We want to make sure that the voices of our member companies and the larger green building community are heard by the executive branch. We expect to deliver real results from their advocacy and leadership. We have already sent our top three recommendations over to the Department of Energy. Our January 21st memo recommends action on a green real estate appraisal standard, the tax deduction for commercial energy efficient commercial buildings, and loan guarantees for financing retrofits.

And the executive branch is paying attention! The President recently announced the Better Buildings Initiative (BBI) to improve commercial building energy performance, and he touched specifically on two of the three priorities. The BBI calls on Congress to take action but also lays out the steps the Administration is going to take by utilizing their existing authorities to create better buildings, better jobs, and lower energy bills.

By targeting executive branch action— along with continuing to push Congress to make progress on BBI and our other priorities like energy and water efficiency, healthy built environments, livable and walkable communities— we will continue to push forward toward the transformation of the built environment. Elections may change our strategy, but they certainly don’t change our priorities—or our expectations for meaningful results.