SPECIAL REPORT
LEEDuser expert
Marcus Sheffer
7group / Energy Opportunities
LEED Fellow
SPECIAL REPORT
LEEDuser’s viewpoint
Explore this LEED credit
Post your questions on this credit in the forum, and click on the credit language tab to review to the LEED requirements.
Credit language
© Copyright U.S. Green Building Council, Inc. All rights reserved.
Intent
To reduce the environmental and economic harms associated with fossil fuel energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by increasing self-supply of renewable energy and the use of grid-source, renewable energy technologies and carbon mitigation projects.
Requirements
Use on-site renewable energy systems, procure renewable energy offsite, or purchase Energy Attribute Certificates (EACs) or carbon offsets to meet or offset annual building greenhouse gas emissions.
Projects may choose one or more strategies for renewables procurement from the categories below. Points achieved in each category may be added for up to a total of 5 points.
Environmental benefits of all procurement must be retained by the project.
All off-site qualifying resources must be contracted, owned, or leased for at least 10 years or the remainder of the tenant lease term, whichever is greater.
Existing off-site renewables, EACs and carbon offsets must be procured from projects that have come online or been built within the last 15 years.
Table 1. Points for Renewables Procurement
| Points | On-Site Renewables |
New Off-Site Renewables |
Existing Off-Site Renewables |
Green-e Certified: EACs & Carbon Offsets | EACs & Carbon Offsets |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2% | 20% | 60% | 100% | 150% |
| 2 | 6% | 40% | 80% | 200% | |
| 3 | 15% | 60% | 100% | 300% | |
| 4 | 35% | 80% | |||
| 5 | 60% | 100% | |||
| 6 | 70% | ||||
| EP | 100% |
New Off-site Renewables: built within the last year or contracted prior to renewable energy project development.
Existing Off-site Renewables: contracted from an existing renewable energy provider.
See all forum discussions about this credit »What does it cost?
Cost estimates for this credit
On each BD+C v4 credit, LEEDuser offers the wisdom of a team of architects, engineers, cost estimators, and LEED experts with hundreds of LEED projects between then. They analyzed the sustainable design strategies associated with each LEED credit, but also to assign actual costs to those strategies.
Our tab contains overall cost guidance, notes on what “soft costs” to expect, and a strategy-by-strategy breakdown of what to consider and what it might cost, in percentage premiums, actual costs, or both.
This information is also available in a full PDF download in The Cost of LEED v4 report.
Learn more about The Cost of LEED v4 »Frequently asked questions
See all forum discussions about this credit »Documentation toolkit
The motherlode of cheat sheets
LEEDuser’s Documentation Toolkit is loaded with calculators to help assess credit compliance, tracking spreadsheets for materials, sample templates to help guide your narratives and LEED Online submissions, and examples of actual submissions from certified LEED projects for you to check your work against. To get your plaque, start with the right toolkit.
© Copyright U.S. Green Building Council, Inc. All rights reserved.
Intent
To reduce the environmental and economic harms associated with fossil fuel energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by increasing self-supply of renewable energy and the use of grid-source, renewable energy technologies and carbon mitigation projects.
Requirements
Use on-site renewable energy systems, procure renewable energy offsite, or purchase Energy Attribute Certificates (EACs) or carbon offsets to meet or offset annual building greenhouse gas emissions.
Projects may choose one or more strategies for renewables procurement from the categories below. Points achieved in each category may be added for up to a total of 5 points.
Environmental benefits of all procurement must be retained by the project.
All off-site qualifying resources must be contracted, owned, or leased for at least 10 years or the remainder of the tenant lease term, whichever is greater.
Existing off-site renewables, EACs and carbon offsets must be procured from projects that have come online or been built within the last 15 years.
Table 1. Points for Renewables Procurement
| Points | On-Site Renewables |
New Off-Site Renewables |
Existing Off-Site Renewables |
Green-e Certified: EACs & Carbon Offsets | EACs & Carbon Offsets |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2% | 20% | 60% | 100% | 150% |
| 2 | 6% | 40% | 80% | 200% | |
| 3 | 15% | 60% | 100% | 300% | |
| 4 | 35% | 80% | |||
| 5 | 60% | 100% | |||
| 6 | 70% | ||||
| EP | 100% |
New Off-site Renewables: built within the last year or contracted prior to renewable energy project development.
Existing Off-site Renewables: contracted from an existing renewable energy provider.
LEEDuser expert
Marcus Sheffer
7group / Energy Opportunities
LEED Fellow