As Green Building Codes and Standards Emerge – Where Do We Go from Here?

Jeremy Sigmon, LEED® AP BD+C
Manager, Building Codes Advocacy
U.S. Green Building Council

The success of the LEED green building rating systems in driving amazing amounts of green building activity, driving focus on a broader spectrum of human and environmental health issues and driving leadership in achieving a more sustainable future has created space for many other conversations to take place – from the bleeding edge to the minimum code level. A year after the launch of a previously unimaginable code framework to advance regulatory change towards better, greener building practice, where are we? And where do we go from here?

The industry is abuzz with questions about how a green building code may change their business outlook, change the laws or even change the world. There’s no doubt that broadly-applied minimum regulations for better, healthier, more efficient and environmentally sensitive building practices necessarily push a lot of buildings, professions and professionals forward. For jurisdictions that are interested in upping their minimum requirements, USGBC is encouraged that there are now tools available to facilitate that critical piece of the green building policy puzzle.

But there is nothing gained by added confusion, or by a diminished understanding of what a green building is or aspires to be. Codes can do an effective job of delivering minimum performance – and that’s important. But if you’re looking for a non-mandatory approach to build greener buildings, a green building code is not designed for you.

As we draft the updates to LEED, there is so much progress that we can point to as reasons to keep driving onward toward restorative and regenerative buildings and communities. We invite you to participate in that development (LEED is re-opening for second public comment on July 1, 2011) and also in the final rounds of development of these green building codes and standards. The balance is nuanced but codes and rating systems fundamentally serve different functions, and we need to focus on improving all of them so that they each may fulfill their maximum potential. Neither one nor the other alone is as strong as both push and pull forces working collaboratively.

It’s not a choice between codes or rating systems – one is a decidedly rigid mandatory minimum (with a handful of jurisdictional and performance pathways built in) and the other a leadership engagement tool that intentionally (and in its next version, increasingly) steps out of the way of design professionals to innovate and improve green building outcomes. We need both improved minimum codes and voluntary beyond-code rating systems to get the job done (see related policy brief).

Clearly the only way to go from here is onward, which is what USGBC intends to do. We hope you’ll work with us to achieve truly sustainable buildings and communities using all the best tools for the job.

For more information, review USGBC’s white paper: Greening the Codes.

An Integrated Approach to Solving Interconnected Challenges

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

The Institute of Medicine’s recently released report highlights the critical interrelationships that exist as our society struggles with the global and local impacts of climate change. While the report focuses specifically on the potentially negative human health impacts associated with efforts to lower carbon emissions from the built environment, we are confident that the report authors understand that interconnected problems cannot be solved in isolation of one and other. This report calls for increased focus on direct human health impacts of new technologies and strategies being employed in response to the climate change crisis our world faces. It is not acceptable to solve one set of problems by creating another. Rather, an integrated approach to these (and other) interconnected challenges needs to be employed to achieve solutions that solve problems in a systematic way. The LEED green building rating system does this by prioritizing strategies and solutions that help to mitigate climate change while heightening human health: By promoting a whole-building approach to sustainability that takes into account all areas of human and environmental health: sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials selection and indoor environmental quality.

Through its uptake, LEED has started a global conversation focused on the cumulative impact of buildings on environmental and human health. High-performing, LEED-certified green buildings are not only helping to solve the critical challenges posed by climate change, they’re leading to a new generation of contaminant-free buildings that protect the indoor air we breathe and minimize the risk of building-related health problems. USGBC applauds the study for continuing the dialogue on building impacts and for shedding light on the profound gaps in substantive building-related research.

New Report: Better Buildings = 114,000 New Jobs

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

Today USGBC, with our partners at the Real Estate Roundtable and the Natural Resources Defense Council, released an analysis conducted by the Political Economy Research Institute that concludes that President Obama’s Better Buildings Initiative (BBI) will create over 114,000 jobs.

As background, the Better Buildings Initiative is a collection of legislative proposals and federal agency actions designed to encourage the efficiency improvement of commercial buildings. The President has recommended tax incentives, grant and challenge programs, and increasing the availability of financing for the improvements. The analysis covers the major components of the initiative: the tax incentives, the financing programs, and the grant programs.

The full report is available at http://www.USGBC.org/advocacy/BBIJobs. Here’s what you need to know:

• The Better Buildings Initiative would create more than 114,000 jobs.
• The greatest jobs-creating impact – over 77,000 new jobs – would derive from a revised tax incentive to encourage building retrofits.
• New job creation would ripple throughout the economy. New jobs would be created directly at construction sites, which in turn would spur more jobs in the manufacturing and service sectors.
• The Better Buildings Initiative’s federal incentives are an investment to trigger private sector spending, which in turn produces widespread benefits. For example, tax incentives would encourage at least three times as much private investment to make buildings more efficient.
• Businesses would save over $1.4 billion in energy bills as a result of retrofit projects spurred by the tax incentive, which would in turn be re-injected into the economy.

The most significant job creator considered is the revision of the existing tax deduction for energy efficient commercial buildings, section 179D. These are the same revisions supported by 86 diverse organizations and the subject of the recent letter to the Senate written about last week. The proposal with its unique structure would create 77,000 jobs while achieving real quantifiable energy efficiency improvements. Actual measured performance is required to take full advantage of the redesigned incentive.

The report also outlines how these jobs would be created in engineering and in performing the retrofits, manufacturing the new efficient equipment and materials, operating, commissioning, and servicing the buildings, and finally in the re-spending of the significant energy savings.

The conclusion that commercial building energy efficiency creates jobs, and a staggering number of new jobs is not new. This report joins and supports the conclusion of a host of others on the topic.

• McKinsey found 600,000 to 900,000 new jobs in energy efficiency over all sectors.
• ACEEE found 333,000 new jobs in proposed energy efficiency legislation last year. Over 150,000 of these jobs were from the bi-partisan yet now politically infeasible HomeStar program for home retrofits.
• UC Berkeley found that California’s energy efficiency policies on the books will create 200,000 jobs by 2020, with more jobs of higher quality possible with some additional measures.

With this new analysis we now know how much of the huge opportunity for job creation through energy efficiency may be achieved through implementation of the Better Buildings Initiative. USGBC and its member companies will continue to support the agencies moving forward with the administrative components of the BBI while working with our many allies to convince Congress to move forward with the changes to the tax code that could potentially unlock a huge number of jobs in commercial energy efficiency. Stay tuned to this blog for opportunities to get involved.

USGBC Supported Legislation Highlighted in Senate Energy Hearing

Bryan Howard
Legislative Director
U.S. Green Building Council

Today the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee continued its efforts to craft energy legislation that can gain bipartisan support in the Senate by hearing testimony on key green building and efficiency legislation.

The panel heard from leading private sector and government witnesses regarding S. 963, the “Reducing Federal Energy Dollars (RFED) Act of 2011,” which Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) announced at USGBC’s annual Government Summit. RFED, which is supported by USGBC and many others in the building community, ensures that federal buildings and future federal leases go through commissioning, or “tune-ups,” on essential building systems to maximize performance. In testimony before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee earlier this year, USGBC highlighted commissioning as one of the most cost-effective strategies for reducing utility costs in buildings and encouraged its use toward greening the federal buildings stock. The bill also makes it easier for federal agencies to use private financing tools to pay for energy-efficient building upgrades, increases clarity of agency energy use, and allows for building design updates.

The committee also heard from the witnesses on S. 1000, the “Energy Savings and Industrial Competitiveness Act.” The measure from Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) and Senator Rob Portman (R-Ohio) includes many similar proposals advanced in the “American Clean Energy and Leadership Act of 2009” or (ACELA). The broad-based bill increases efficiency standards for appliances and building energy codes. It creates new loan programs and expands existing ones to encourage efficiency upgrades, as well as boosts energy conservation within the federal government.

At the hearing, Senate Energy Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) and Ranking Member Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) did not indicate when the committee might begin the process of considering these bills to move them along to the Senate floor for full consideration. However, as energy prices continue to rise there will be continued pressure to address both the demand side of energy use as well as production.

Read the summary of S. 963 »

Read the USGBC support letter on S. 963 »

Read the industry support letter of S. 963 circulated by the National Institute of Buildings Sciences »

Read the summary of S. 1000 »

Read the USGBC letter on S. 1000 »

Read testimony from the hearing »

Pinpointing the Best Stringency Level for a Green Construction Code

Jeremy Sigmon, LEED® AP BD+C
Manager, Building Codes Advocacy
U.S. Green Building Council

In my last post I gave a very simple answer to the question, “How stringent should a first-ever model green construction code be?” In sum, the answer is that it should be above current code (but not too far), fully recognizing that these decisions will be the result of important community discussions (like this very in-depth and continually evolving conversation in New York City).

But before you consider dropping everything to start from scratch, remember that’s where we started. Without a national model, fragmentation and regulatory dissonance will only grow. If you’re a developer or building owner who builds or manages real estate in more than one jurisdiction, you’re already familiar with how challenging it is to comply with a different set of rules nearly everywhere you go. The International Green Construction Code and the Standard 189.1 compliance option are working together to offer uniformity, consistency and a focused forum for deliberation of what to leave in, what to leave out, and… how stringent it should all be.

Beyond the simple answer listed above, there are a lot of smart people working hard to figure out how to answer this question within the text of the national model codes and standards. If you map the current technical content, its trajectory and the development schedule of the base building codes (including fire, plumbing, mechanical, zoning and other codes) you’ll get a sense for where “the floor” is.

The so-called “floor” is today’s minimum acceptable safety codes and standards that draw a line between legal and illegal building design and construction. You can trace all the way back to the federalism vs. anti-federalism debates of the late 1780s to explain why a simple one-size-fits-all “floor” does not exist in this country¹ – neither in theory nor application – but the International Code Council’s I-Codes may provide the best-available starting point. No matter the threshold, there isn’t much about a regulatory line in the sand that galvanizes excitement about moving above and beyond, so that’s where beyond-code green building rating systems come in.

If you map the current technical content, its trajectory and the development schedule of beyond-code rating systems like LEED, Energy Star and the Living Building Challenge, you’ll get a sense for where “the ceiling” is. The so-called “ceiling” is today’s upper limits of what the building community is striving to build for the reward of a beyond-code label, like a LEED plaque. Naturally a LEED Platinum label describes a more vaulted ceiling than a LEED-certified label. Even still, you get the idea that beyond the “push” of minimum regulation, rating systems are pulling building practices and technologies into a space beyond the base codes, but at a level at which most firms can participate and compete.

Map all of these points and graphs against increased demand for minimum code protections as well as geographic, climate and ideological diversity and you’ve pretty much got your answer of where – on the stringency continuum – this next generation of regulatory minimums should be. But there’s more.

Take a very close look at green building rating systems and credit-by-credit compliance to determine achievable thresholds, methods and technologies that have been tried-and-tested enough to be code worthy, and plot those on this same graph. If the data tells us that certain measures in rating systems are commonly avoided or that compliance has been somewhat challenging, it would be difficult to argue that these measures are “street-ready” for codes that will serve as a new mandatory minimum for all buildings. If compliance with rating systems looks good and cost-effectiveness is a no-brainer, let’s put it in code language and get it out there.

But relinquishing even simple ideas and credits from rating systems to codes without an understanding of what compliance will look like through the codes may not be in anyone’s best interest. As jurisdictions begin implementing first-generation green building codes and standards we’ll have a better idea of what ideas that LEED pioneered can be left to code enforcement alone.

USGBC is currently working on parts of this analysis that will help to inform these types of decisions. Through the emerging Green Building Information Gateway we expect to unlock the potential for data- and outcome-based decision making, resulting in a smarter LEED, better codes, and a better informed building industry.

¹Here’s a topic better suited for another day: if a 2009 McKinsey report tells us that 23% of the potential energy efficiency savings is available through the effective application of energy codes and standards, it seems a bit ludicrous that state and local jurisdictions have almost absolute authority to effectively direct a major piece of our national energy policy – let alone the consequences to owners and tenants of inefficient buildings.

Learning to Speak Green: Urban Green Council Conference Highlights Successful Green Messaging

Amy King
Director, Chapter Community Development
U.S. Green Building Council

Ever feel tongue tied when you are out there advocating for green buildings?

How do you explain the environmental, health and financial benefits of green buildings to the media? To your mom? What about to a local union rep, or a school teacher? What kind of story do you tell?

This week on June 8, Urban Green Council, the USGBC Chapter based in New York City, will host Speak Green, a conference for green building professionals on how to message the value of green buildings and communities to the general public and other critical stakeholders. Sponsored by Carrier Corporation, the conference will feature panel discussions exploring lessons learned, roadblocks to widespread adoption, and messaging strategies from a variety of perspectives. USGBC’s own Judith Webb, Senior Vice President of Marketing and Communications and 30-year media strategist, will lay the foundation for the conversation on green building messaging – and an array of expert speakers will offer expert advice from around the industry. Speakers include Duane Bray of global design firm IDEO, Pat DiFilippo of Turner Construction, John Mandyck of Carrier Corporation, Kim Slicklein of OgilvyEarth Worldwide, and many more. Curtis Ravenel, Global Head of Bloomberg’s Sustainability Group, will deliver the keynote.

In our professional training efforts as green building advocates and leaders, the critical topic of messaging and persuasion is often overlooked. No matter what your role or experience in the green building movement, effective communication is something we can all practice and improve. In the end, our movement is all about people. The relationships we build and people we engage will truly help us reach our vision of green buildings and communities for all within this generation.

Tickets are still available to Speak Green – significant discounts are available for LEED APs and students.

Learn more and register for Speak Green »

Building Industry and Environmentalists to Congress: This is How to Encourage Better Buildings

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

A few weeks ago USGBC, along with the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Real Estate Roundtable, spearheaded the development of a letter sent to several key Senators on proposed changes to the tax deduction for energy-efficient commercial facilities, as put forth by President Obama as a component of the Better Buildings Initiative. The letter outlines a few key principles uniting an extremely broad stakeholder community around commercial and multifamily energy efficiency, and you can take a look here.

As background, the tax policy, known as Section 179D, was designed to encourage the construction of energy-efficient commercial buildings. The section allows a building owner to take a deduction of up to $1.80 per square foot of space for buildings that are constructed to be 50% better than the 2001 energy code. Enacted in 2005, back before the recession decimated new construction, the policy has been dogged by a lack of clarity on how to document compliance and take the deduction. Multiple requests have been made to DOE and IRS to fix these problems, and it appears that the agencies are finally working to provide some more usable guidance.

Helpful as that will be, 179D was not designed to encourage the large-scale retrofits of existing buildings. Changing times have made encouraging retrofits not only a component of the President’s plan to “Win the Future,’ but also the focus of stakeholders in the commercial real estate industry.

To illustrate, consider the internationally recognized retrofit of the Empire State Building. Owner Tony Malkin decided to not just renovate and update the iconic building, but also to make it as energy efficient as possible. He assembled a team of the Clinton Climate Initiative, Jones Lang LaSalle, Johnson Controls, and the Rocky Mountain Institute to create a showcase project for efficiency innovation. The retrofit team managed to slash energy consumption by 38%, saving more than $4 million each year. The entire process considered more than 60 different energy efficiency measures and was optimized with eight simple measures executed under a performance guarantee contract. The measures (such as renovating the windows in a pop-up factory on the fifth floor of the building) have maintained the historic character of the facility. The project has been submitted for LEED EB:O&M certification, and according to the project team, targeting the LEED-Gold level. This success story (www.esbsustainability.com) has raised awareness of what is possible in a quantitatively driven energy efficiency retrofit in even the world’s most iconic buildings, but this project would not qualify for the existing tax deduction.

Why not? The issue is one of baselines, where the existing policy has a code baseline as used in new construction, where as the Empire State Building cut consumption compared to where it began. Shifting the baseline for an existing building to compare to previous performance is one of the principles that united the industry in support of this proposal.

The principles in a nutshell are:

• Measure energy savings compared to the existing building baseline. Rather than requiring existing buildings to meet and exceed the requirements of the energy code for new construction, as is the case currently in 179D, measure improvements in how much energy consumption was reduced compared to where the building started.
• Link the amount of the incentive to energy savings achieved. Greater energy savings and deeper retrofits warrant larger incentives to reward innovation and to reflect the larger investments and greater environmental benefit. Energy savings in excess of 50% are possible, and will be encouraged by this approach.
• Tie a portion of the tax incentive to implementation of efficiency measures and a portion to demonstrated energy savings. There are good reasons to reward a building owner for implementing energy savings measures, and even better reasons to reward energy savings actually realized on the energy meter. This proposal uniquely does both and maximizes accountability by allowing the building owner to claim 60 percent of the incentive at the time the energy efficiency measures are put into service, and the remaining 40 percent of the incentive after two years of demonstrating the expected savings have occurred.

This last principle would be groundbreaking for energy tax policy. Instead of providing an incentive up front when the measures are installed but not requiring follow up, we are suggesting that 40% of the incentive be held until there is confirmation of success. This unprecedented level of accountability will encourage the proper operations and maintenance in high performance buildings, an Achilles heel of efficient designs that depend on the operators to live up to their full potential.

In the end, more than 85 organizations representing real estate owners, builders, contractors, building managers, energy service companies, building efficiency manufacturers and suppliers, energy efficiency financiers, environmental advocates, architects, engineers and other stakeholders supported these principles. Stay tuned for updates on our progress as we work to turn these principles into a bill in Congress and then generate support for its consideration.