Comments on: Legislating Greenness

By: Ohio Environmental Law Blog

Ohio Environmental Law Blog — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 02:48:43 +0000

Ohio Introduces Legislation to Mandate Green Building Certification…

The Ohio House has introduced H.B. 7 which would require new construction be certified as a green building under the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED program. Here is the text of the bill: Sec. 153.013. Whenever any building or structure……

By: BuildingEnergy’s LEED ‘Debate’: "Least informative forum yet" | Eco Friendly Mag

Thu, 26 Mar 2009 22:30:10 +0000

[...] goodies: Fred Unger’s thoughts at NESEA’s blog, and Sitephocus weighs in on the controversy. There’s another a [...]

By: Dave

Dave — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 08:44:00 +0000

have to say that made interesting reading

By: Edward J. Palma, Branford, Connecticut

Edward J. Palma, Branford, Connecticut — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 21:31:17 +0000

I would like to applaud David Foley for his opinion. For a very long time LEED has controlled the rating of sustainably designed and built commercial buildings. Recent changes in the LEED program, have begun to address communities and residential single family and multifamily housing. As the USGBC was the first private entity to develop a rating system for designers and builders to use, they created a foundation, whether intentionally or unintentionally, for a self supporting system of control. An unregulated private entity such as Leed with government mandated control of the green building movement is a double edged sword and could be a dangerous thing. Other rating systems have been develop such as Green Glodes and the ICC 700 National Green Building Standard which provide alternatives to LEED and offer procedures to verify performance after the structures are completed. At the Connecticut Department of Public Safety Design Professionals and Allied Trades Conference, the International Code Council presented their ICC 700-2008 National Green Building Standard which they developed with the NAHB. This program addresses sustainable issues involved in the building of single and multi-family housing. It is another tool with which residential building projects can be evaluated and architects, designers and builders can use as guidelines. It is not my intention to condemn any of the rating systems, and the greening of the building sector both in the commercial and residential ends would be eons behind if not for the efforts of the USGBC. I am only agreeing with Mr. Foley in stating that the building codes should mandate Sustainable Design and Construction through development of the appropriate codes. All of the rating systems should only be tools and guidelines for architects, designers and builders who wish to design and build sustainably. The supervision of adherence to the as-built design and verification of finished projects should be left up the federal and state building codes. The codes need to mandate the enforcement of strict adherence to Sustainable Design and Construction standards. We as licensed Buiding Code Officials need to carry out the job of supervision and enforcement of those standards and verification of the performance standards in the finished projects. It is a symbiotic process, and we all need to work together to promote and support Sustainable Design and Construction. We will help heal our planet in peril and secure its existence for the future generations of all living species.

By: Stephen Woodworth

Stephen Woodworth — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 20:15:07 +0000

As a building commissioning professional, I am in nearly complete agreement. LEED is far too vague to be adopted as law, and, as you rightly point out, it was never intended to be so.

On the other hand, should green building standards be codified at all? Market forces may be the best determination for building design, but the energy conciousness education of building design professionals may be a more efficient (pun intended) means of improving building performance.

We needn’t all be interned in green re-education camps – but perhaps in assigning energy a higher priority than floor and ceiling materials, we will achieve improved performance without additional government burdens.

By: Fred Unger

Fred Unger — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 10:43:57 +0000

The public forum on LEED has stirred some really interesting discussions in the last week.

Of major significance in the discussion of the appropriate role for LEED is this quote that Brendan asked me to attribute to him in my Blog Posting: “LEED is a leadership standard and it’s not built to be building code. That’s why USGBC has been cosponsoring the development of an ANSI green building code, Standard 189.1, with ASHRAE and IESNA, for over two years. We’ve been doing this because building codes serve a different purpose than rating systems like LEED and we are committed to providing policy makers with the appropriate tools to accomplish the objectives we all share.”

Personally, I don’t think we need government involved in this stuff at all. But if the larger consensus is that government should be involved, it is good to see USGBC trying to help shape a more appropriate role for government than some of its members are advocating with state and local governments.

With USGBC absolutely clearly acknowledging that LEED should not be used as a building code standard, it’s time for that organization to responsibly take the lead in actively curtailing the efforts of their members to get such standards promulgated as defacto code standards by governors, legislatures, mayors, city councils and planning agencies around the country.

For me, the key issue is not about how or even whether to regulate “greenness” in buildings, but the problem of governments at various levels enshrining a completely unregulated private entity with essentially monopoly powers in defining and charging for “greenness” certification.

While we all share the goal of improving the way buildings are built, there are far more fundamental concerns regarding defending the rule of law in our country from such totally inappropriate encroachments.

By: David Foley

David Foley — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 16:28:12 +0000

Excellent post, Fred. Of all the ways to encourage high-performance buildings, mandating LEED is among the dumbest, both for building performance AND for the USGBC, which would suffer “regulatory capture,” as it’s called. On the other hand, Alex Wilson has been calling for some mandates for “Passive Survivability,” which if crafted well, would be a real spur for better buildings.

By: BuildingEnergy’s LEED ‘Debate’: “Least informative forum yet” : Green Resouces

Tue, 17 Mar 2009 01:08:50 +0000

[...] goodies: Fred Unger’s thoughts at NESEA’s blog, and Sitephocus weighs in on the controversy. There’s another a [...]

By: bill stillinger

bill stillinger — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 12:53:45 +0000

Adopting a grading system for any purpose other than voluntary benchmarking is a dangerous matter. Moody’s and S&P’s financial ratings were enshrined in the mechanics of credit default swaps, to pick a notorious current example of what can go wrong. Once the rating agencies bent their ratings because doing so increased their profits, Wall Street was set up for collapse. I hope that we don’t see anything comparable in the efforts to improve building energy performance. The sharks, in the name of “going green”, will begin to circle around clueless state legislatures sniffing out Obama Bucks.

By: Jo Lee

Jo Lee — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 01:31:34 +0000

As a Rhodie, this post definitely makes me concerned about the LEED legislation pending in RI. Is there a site that maps the other states where similar legislation is moving forward?