Well Worth the Sleepless Nights: Fourth Public Comment Period for LEED 2012

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

Earlier this week, USGBC announced a Fourth Public Comment period for LEED 2012, running from May 1 – 15. While we’re not particularly looking forward to the upcoming sleepless nights required to keep things on schedule, staff is excited about other aspects of this upcoming comment period. As we engage in what we expect to be the final public comment period prior to ballot, we can take stock of the contributions of thousands of volunteers and stakeholders who are all dedicated to balancing technical advancements in the system with market ability to continue to show leadership in design, construction and operation of LEED projects.

We’ve known it since the beginning, but the nearly 20,000 public comments submitted to date about LEED 2012 development are positive proof that we continue to benefit from an incredibly knowledgeable and engaged stakeholder base that directly inspires the technical and market development of LEED. The input from those who have commented has been used to dramatically improve every iteration of LEED 2012 since the first public comment period and we’re confident in a similar outcome this time as well.

Hungry for Data: LEED Targets Data Centers

Corey Enck
Director of Rating System Development, LEED
U.S. Green Building Council

Quick: How did you get to our blog? Did you click on a link via Twitter, or see the article pop up in your RSS reader? However you arrived here, you probably used around 180 KB of data to load this webpage.

Though somewhat intangible, and certainly not of upmost concern to most of us and our rapid-fire browsing, data requires huge amounts of energy to process. Data centers power our appetite for data at all hours of the day. They are the physical embodiments of our everyday data usage – using Google or Yahoo! to search the most recent March Madness upset, posting photos of a recent vacation to Facebook, loading an app on the new iPad 3 - and like every other structure, they can (and should) be built green.

Facebook's LEED-certified data center in Prineville, Ore. Source: Flickr, IntelFreePress

For that reason, we’ve adapted LEED for New Construction and LEED for Existing Buildings: Operations & Maintenance to the particular needs of data centers to ensure that new construction and facility retrofits can successfully pursue and apply LEED.

May I Borrow Your Jumper Cables?

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

“May I borrow some jumper cables?” The brick building asked the building next door. The brick building’s energy use was out of control; It needed to kick-start its efficiency. The building next door answered with Energy Jumpstart, the new pilot prerequisite in USGBC’s Pilot Credit Library. USGBC hopes that this pilot can act as a set of jumper cables to stir up a segment of the buildings market that has the potential to make huge energy efficiency gains.

Source: Charles Williams via Flickr

On March 1, when the third public comment period for LEED 2012 opened, USGBC launched Pilot Credit 67 (aka Energy Jumpstart), a Pilot Alternative Compliance Path for EA Prerequisite 2 in LEED 2009 for Existing Buildings: Operations & Maintenance.

Confused?…let me explain.

If you’re familiar with LEED, you know each LEED prerequisite has mandatory pathways for compliance. For Energy and Atmosphere prerequisite 2, the traditional entry point for most buildings has been an ENERGY STAR rating of 69, a benchmark that certain market segments, such as older buildings, have a particularly tough time meeting. Cue Energy Jumpstart, an alternative path for this prerequisite (and the first pilot alternative compliance path ever), targeted at older buildings with energy challenges.

We Asked, You Answered: #LEED2012

Rick Fedrizzi
President, CEO & Founding Chairman
U.S. Green Building Council

Last Thursday, many of you – architects, writers, USGBC chapter members, activists, consultants – joined me on Twitter for a live tweet-up on LEED 2012. It was a doozy – and I mean that in the best way. Your questions were thought-provoking and interesting, spanning from building performance to market transformation to the cost of LEED. Thanks to your participation, we covered a lot of ground in one fast-paced hour. If you missed the chat, I’d encourage you to check out my Twitter feed for a recap.

Our Twitter conversation was a snapshot of the vital insight our community has in regards to LEED. I encourage all of you to participate in LEED 2012 public comment, open for just a week more!

I closed the Twitter chat with a question: Tell me about your favorite part of the changes proposed in LEED 2012.

Without further ado, here’s what you had to say:

How Will You Impact LEED 2012? Third Public Comment Period Opens Mar. 1

Doug Gatlin
Vice President, LEED
U.S. Green Building Council

Are you an architect? A facilities manager? A building owner?

How about a professional working in a big city high-rise? A father with kids in elementary school? An unabashed shopaholic?

Great, let’s talk LEED 2012.

The third public comment period for LEED 2012, the newest update to the LEED green building program, opens in just five business days on Mar. 1, giving anyone with a stake in our built environment (in other words, everyone) the opportunity to influence the direction LEED takes: seasoned green building pros to college students just beginning their sustainability journey. Building owners to occupants of any kind.

LEED engages and impacts millions (billions?) of people around the world. Its success is in part due to the fact that it is developed by the people who use it. LEED is an ongoing, global project that anyone can join. There’s no other rating system out there that engages the public quite the way LEED does, and we hope you’ll consider voicing your opinion about LEED in the approaching public comment period.

LEED and Forest Protection: Thank You for Your Important Input

Rick Fedrizzi
President, CEO & Founding Chairman
U.S. Green Building Council

This week, ForestEthics and others reached out to USGBC to express their views on an important issue: How LEED plays a role in forest protection. I want to thank these organizations and individuals for expressing their passionate views. Since the beginning, USGBC and the process that it set up for the ongoing development of the LEED rating system has encouraged public comment and open dialogue. There are thousands of issues that need to be addressed if we are to achieve our mission of wide-scale market transformation to a built environment that saves energy, saves water, saves precious resources, reduces waste, improves indoor environmental quality and creates jobs. BUT WE NEED YOUR VOICE AND YOUR VOTE.

If your company is not already a member of USGBC , we urge you to become one so that not only your voice can be heard, but your vote can count when we take the rating system to the membership for ballot. We anticipate that LEED 2012 will come up for vote in 2012, so becoming a member now will allow you to be part of the process. As an individual, we encourage you to become an active participant in your local chapter so we can be sure our mission is front and center in every community in America.

Because this is an issue of high interest, we invite you to follow me on Twitter at @rickfedrizzi, and also follow @USGBC for up to date info on this and other key news about USGBC.

Thanks for taking the time to voice your opinion.

Reorganization of LEED EB: O&M in draft version of LEED 2012 Highlights Performance Monitoring, Key Metrics

Lauren Riggs, LEEP® AP
Manager, LEED and Building Performance Partnership
U.S. Green Building Council

In the draft version of LEED 2012, which opened for public comment yesterday, USGBC has taken its first steps towards a streamlined and simple ongoing certification program for LEED. After consideration of how project teams should implement the strategies in LEED EB: O&M, and what we know about how teams implement them, we have reorganized the prerequisite and credit structure of LEED EB: O&M.

The new structure of LEED EB: O&M allows LEED projects to enable high performance during the performance period by emphasizing a two-step process for applying the credit strategies: (1) write, vet and verify your policies, plans and-one time activities before you begin your performance period, and (2) conduct your performance period confident that your building will do well.

Image created by Christopher Davis, GBCI

This reorganization highlights the importance of performance monitoring and what metrics should be tracked in preparation for the building’s next certification. Our first application of this new structure is reflected in the second public comment version of LEED 2012 for Existing Buildings: O&M.