Most business leaders and/or anyone in the building industry (owners, investors, developers, designers, contractors, and other connections) has heard of the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) system proffered by the US Green Building Council (USGBC). In fact, anyone that is involved at the policy level in most states in our country would be familiar with LEED silver as the standard by which most of our tax payer-invested properties are now supposed to be constructed. This article will attempt to unveil some of the myths and fallacies in the content and program of LEED and why even though public money has jumped on the LEED band wagon, perhaps private investors should steer in an alternative direction that makes better business sense.
LEED was designed to encourage and accelerate global adoption of sustainable green building and development practices through the creation and implementation of universally understood and accepted standards, tools, and performance criteria.
LEED was initiated purposefully to be a “Market Mover.” The idea that by encouraging the building community to “stretch” toward greater and more efficient technologies, the collective “we” of the marketplace would then develop products to meet those challenges. Much of this vision was created and supported by an initiative known as ARCHITECTURE 2030 (Now operating under the name of “SUSTAINABILITY 2030” or “2030 CHALLENGE”). This program set the lofty goal of Net Zero Energy Goal set by the year 2030. This means that over the course of one calendar year a building structure that falls under this program would produce as much energy as it consumes on-site, and in the best case kick energy back into the new and coming smart grid. The milestones in the program include the following:
| • 30% below the baseline energy code in 2010, • 50% below the baseline energy code in 2014-2015, and… • 5% additional reduction every three years to 2029-2030. |
These and many other factors are of huge concern. The role that LEED plays in them can be confusing as well. We repeat that LEED has been successful in meeting its original mandate to move the market interms of product development. A greater question hangs over the LEED system, though, and that is: did moving the market really make better buildings? One major flaw is that while we are getting rapid product innovation, we have not fully conquered the design process innovation that LEED expected. It is true, many design teams have fully adopted the early-in, LEED Charrette process that fully embraces the LEED philosophy of full and equal collaboration on all levels. The reality is that the architectural community by and large, does not want to give up their traditional role in the design and construction process. Why should they? They hold the throne!. But the reality is that the throne has shifted whether they want it to or not. If LEED is to salvage any form of traction in the world I am going to describe, lead architects will have to come to the table as equals, not only with their other primarily design-oriented compatriots. Essentially the rules of engagement are different. The new leader in the clubhouse is the commissioning agent. Above him of course is the owner, but most owners actually need a translator to get what they want from the building industry. Architects have held that role virtually forever, but LEED is asking them to move to second chair and let a new form of oversight take the helm.
The degree to which these statements resonate will depend on which market you’re in, what your expertise is in it and the experiences you have had with or without LEED in that experience. But this shift and you market’s compliance with it will vary on which end of the pool you are swimming in and how much kool-aid you are willing to drink. These metaphors are used purposefully, because we are all in the sustainability pool together whether we know it or not. Those who are skeptical about whether they even want to participate are sitting at the edge with their arms on the deck waiting to see what will happen.
Others have drank all the available drink and are doing everything from floundering to thriving in the deep end and gaining experience if nothing else. While many of the exterior sustainable practices are gaining broad interest and acceptance, there continue to be learning experiences. For example, who doesn’t like the idea of a rapidly producing product like bamboo being used as flooring material, until that flooring material is found to have a friendly little boring termite species in it that doesn’t exhibit it’s presence until the floor is installed and the space climate-conditioned so that it can’t start eating away at said floor. The good news is that it is a rapidly growing and repeatable product; the bad news is that these little varmints like other types of organic material as well and once infested, you are indeed infested and the cure may be
far worse than the cause in the sustainability world at least.
The reality is that all the sexy materials in the world, don’t get around the fact that buildings in our country use over 45% of all energy, and they have been targeted as the primary way for us to impact our nations’ energy consumption. So when LEED Silver, Gold and Platinum buildings turn out not to perform up to those standards, there is a problem. Which identifies one of the key issues with LEED that we find in the industry. LEED has become (or perhaps always was) a point-chasing scheme. In simple terms, the way you get to any level in LEED is by getting enough points in the way you build the building to get the plaque that you can hang on the wall. There are numerous examples that USGBC and its affiliates will point to as
successful - even stellar - example projects. But few of those entities will point out the misery that has been exhibited in many. The example above is just a story that can probably be told in every facet of the five categories within LEED in terms of products that hit and products that miss. That is okay though when your intent is to be a market mover and go through the development process of finding new and more sustainable products. The one thing we can’t stand though from a full-cost perspective is non-compliant energy cost targets. These are costs that we live with every monthly billing cycle and in many cases determine whether a Performa will pencil out to gain funding.
One of the poster child tragedies is a LEED Silver courthouse project in Florida. The project attained LEED Silver and was certified by the USGBC as such. The first year the actual energy costs were almost TRIPLE the original modeling estimates. To date, with all available corrections, the building has been brought down to roughly 1.5X the original estimates and unless the building, or the systems that are in it, are changed out, it will likely never meet the original target goals. For this and many other examples that can be found, LEED has issued Version 3.0 with the following directive (emphasis mine):
| – LEED is an internationally recognized green building certification system, providing third-party verification that a building or community was designed and built using strategies aimed at improving performance across all the metrics that matter most: energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality, and stewardship of resources and sensitivity to their impacts. |
At the end of the day, buildings not only need to be built efficiently and sustainably, but they need to stay that way. With the vast array of Green products coming to market, as a result of LEED being a market mover, many people in certified structures are finding out about true sustainability in the life-span of those original designs, control strategies, and whether or not people in the buildings are indeed as productive as proclaimed at the ribbon cutting. There are numerous additional anecdotes on buildings that have successfully skirted the breach and delivered energy efficiency, but often times at the expense of occupant comfort. Many of these building operators then forsake design protocols, to keep the receptionist happy at the always challenging front entry, and by year 3 or 4 the energy meter is operating far above the 1st year’s triumphant standards.
Again, LEED is setting a course to stem this annoying issue, but it could be that the battle is being lost or indeed the war may already be over. A key partner in the Net Zero 2030 challenge is the American Society of Heating, Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE). The body of research engineers, along with the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) or Illuminating Engineering Society of North America (IESNA), creates many of the standards under which LEED operates. So much advancement in lighting technology has occurred recently that lighting now takes 2nd place to the heating and cooling of facilities where it once was the energy consumption king, So rapid and extensive have been these advances that we are actually having to heat some buildings more in the winter time due to lack of lighting heat being contributed to the overall operation of the space. As a result, the new energy hog in most buildings, especially those older structures that have had advanced technology lighting retrofits, is the heating and ventilation systems. Therefore ASHRAE has developed a building labeling system that somewhat models a scoring program used in the European Union. In the EU this scoring of a building is a required submission in order for a real estate transaction to occur - much like an appraisal is necessary here.
The ASHRAE labeling program has the lofty goal of being posted at the entry of a rated building so all who enter can easily see and attest to its score - similar to a restaurant rating emblem or the way we read energy star labels on appliances or MPG charts on automobiles. Distilled, accessible information as simple as ABC. The scores in fact on the ASHRAE building label are like traditional report card grades with “A” indeed being best and “A+” being even better but virtually unattainable with current available technology. The idea behind the scoring is that it allows for the “As Designed” measure of conformance, but also does not award the grade until the “As Operated” portion of life comes in to play. Furthermore is addresses the source cost of energy, such as when we use fossil fuels to make electrical power and all the associated inefficiencies that come along with generation and transmission of said power.
In theory ASHRAE had hoped to bring leading edge design innovation into concert with real world application. This Labeling program is in its relative infancy when compared to LEED, but it is a well thought-out program and is being considered by some states and municipalities as part of their sustainability programs. It is proposed as a potential inducement for at least commercial real estate transactions much like the similar looking program already in place in the EU. Whether or not the ASHRAE version of building rating will catch on is yet to be determined, but even if so there is another perhaps more powerful player already in that game.
ENERGYSTAR PORTFOLIO MANAGER
This program has a large body of advantages already in place and for anyone new to energy efficiency and sustainability in buildings, an alarming breadth of existing market penetration. Some of the natural attributes of this portfolio manager (PM) are that it is paid for with yours and my tax dollars and has been for some time because it is sponsored and run by the EPA. Additionally, it is extremely user friendly, rapidly accessible, readily updated and constantly improving. There is a rapidly growing data base thathas been in place and developing over many years. It comes from what is known as CBECS (Commercial Building Energy Consumption Survey). This data base is vast and so extensive that it has corrective
calculation for geography, weather variations and a wide array of building types and applications by which you can compare and benchmark a given building’s energy use in relation to other buildings. The data is normalized and the relationship between buildings is constantly updated as buildings improve via renovation, retrofit and remodeling. This may be the coolest, but perhaps most unnerving part, of PM. If you get a good score today (75 out of 100 is considered a good Energy Star PM score), you might be tempted to rest on your laurels. But the reality is that as your nicely rated building moves forward in time, and we even assume that you are maintaining and operating it correctly to maintain those consumptions
levels and scores, you are actually going backward.
As more and more buildings improve, that age old and oft detested bell curve actually moves! Those buildings that were getting D’s and F’s fall off the scale because they either can’t or won’t comply and are destroyed or moth balled, or they do get better with all new lighting and HVAC systems and suddenly your old 75 now functions more like a 60 in comparison.
What’s the problem you say? 60 is still better than ½ the other kids right? True. However, the new dilemma is in the teeth of this animal. While most of our public money that results in new buildings is chasing what has essentially become a points-grabbing scheme in LEED Silver, PM is actually scoring how buildings truly run, based upon utility meter draws. Those are the only scores the PM cares about, and those same states and municipalities are not just wanting to see their own buildings listed on PM, and watch how they rate and stay rated, they also want to see larger private buildings be rated highly and most especially those that they might be leasing space in. That’s right. Washington State has straw proposal legislation,
(Washington State House of Representatives Office of Program Research; BILL ANALYSIS: Technology, Energy & Communications Committee HB 1747; Brief Description: Reducing climate
pollution in the built environment. ) this bill actually sets targets for all buildings in the state to reach certain Energy Star/PM levels and that state agencies cannot lease space in buildings with a score less than 50. (Remember a 50 today is not necessarily a 50 tomorrow).
Washington State is not even a leader in this area. California (of course) already requires certain buildings to be rated and that rating to be revealed in order for them to be sold. Cities like Denver, CO, West Chester, PA and the States of Virginia, Ohio, Minnesota, Michigan and Illinois already have laws in place that related to or require some attachment to PM in the buildings those entities own and/or occupy and in the case of Denver in any new buildings have to fall under this compliance. Many other states and
municipalities are considering or have already enacted similar laws.
That means that privately held buildings that lease space to tax -payer-funded entities will not only have to register and score their buildings on PM but they will have to have a score that pleases those to whom they lease. The power in this initiative beats any marketing program one might want to have regarding LEED certification. The power is in…well, the power. How much of it are you using? How much does your meter read? How does that make you look when that meter is automatically connected to PM through your utility and keeps score for you on the Energy Star website data base and further enhances the CBECS data base by default? Some might say “That’s really cool!” while others might take a deep breath and say, “that is a pretty deep reach with a powerful data base maintained by the federal government dictating who the good and bad actors are in the energy consumption world.” Does anyone not believe that with that amount of information readily accessible and available for public consumption that a revenue collection system of some order is not far behind, which on its best day might reward the best performers while penalizing the lesser ones? Oregonians are already somewhat familiar with how this looks via the process of the Energy Trust (ETO). Essentially, the program is paid-for by every rate payer. The amount you pay is directly related to the amount you use by some fairly simple percentage math. This means that those who are smart enough can not only reduce their contribution to that system by being better managers of their energy use, but they also get to let the bad performers help pay for their improvements. It is a classic case of “we all pay equally, but some chose to benefit more than others.” I am in absolute favor of these measures, because it encourages people to do the right thing for the right reasons with visibly measurable results. We could debate for undetermined length whether the federal government can duplicate an ETO approach as effectively as it has been done in Oregon, but we should be certain that with this much information on a voluntary basis, the federal government will get real excited about what they can do on a mandatory basis with the objective of deficit reduction looming as perhaps the most critical issue of this
century.
One of the greatest legacies that could be left to our heirs is one of energy independence in this country. We use an inordinate percentage of it; why can’t we figure out a creative way to generate it without needing other countries to provide it for us? What about an Apollo program? Except, instead of going to the moon we go to the greatest heights right here, but figuring out a way to do what we do the way we like to do it - without eating up all the limited fossil fuel reserves on the planet. I don’t know exactly what that looks like, but an Apollo-like initiative and the leadership vision that was modeled there could certainly serve us well now. At the very least the secondary technologies would benefit much like they have as a
result of scientific advancement after WW II and the Apollo program. PM can be a partner in this, because the score for our buildings is based upon source energy. If the source is better the scores will continue to be better. I’d like to think there will be a growing number of Net Zero Energy buildings running effectively in real time by 2030. Is it realistic to think that all buildings will be? Not even. It is projected that 75% of all the buildings we are going to have in 2050 are already standing! Therefore the chances of starting over from scratch with a LEED-like scenario are even more limited.
….. that is the real sustainability question
LEED -Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design
by Matthew D. Todd, P.E., Sales & Engineering Manager / Partner, Entek Corporation
Issue #467 / June 2011
| Matthew Todd has 30 years practical experience in numerous areas of Heating Ventilating and Air
Conditioning design, installation and maintenance. This time period includes activities such as system
analysis, system applications, equipment selection, life cycle costing, energy study and analysis, basic and
advanced system design training, and preventative maintenance coverage evaluation and implementation. His
project experience ranges from large tonnage centrifugal chilled water plants and central station air handling
systems to smaller, finite control applications such as laboratories, and smaller hi-tech clean rooms and low
tolerance PLC and DDC applications. Mr. Todd has also participated in all local utilities authorized contractor programs including the new Energy Smart Rx Office BPA program. He has become an advocate of practical energy efficiency programming. Entek was the first Design/Build/Maintain contracting firm in the Pacific Northwest to be approved for participation in EPA’s Energy Star program. Entek Corporation is a trade Ally of the Energy Trust of Oregon. |
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| Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) |
| US Green Building Council (USGBC) |
American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers |
