Breaking News: Ballot postponed to August 15

Hopefully they will bring in some serious technical expertise and green building practitioners with some solid experience to pull this v4 LEED package together to refine and coordinate the Credits. We all want it to be successful, and we all want the market to be nudged forward as much as possible. Fingers crossed!

"serious technical expertise and green building practitioners with some solid experience" have been working on this for the last 3+ years.

And the cumulative field experience with mandatory features such as ASHRAE 90.1-2010 is exactly zero.

I beg to differ. Here in Massachusetts, 118 cities and towns including Boston and Cambridge have adopted the Massachusetts Stretch Energy Code. The Stretch Code requires large projects to be 20% better than ASHRAE 90,1-2007. According to estimates, ASHRAE 90.1-2010 is about 19% better than 90.1-2007. So in Massachusetts we have several years worth of field experience with these types of requirements. And guess what? - even the developers can meet this code. The sky isn't falling. In fact, we're having a building boom - cranes are all over the downtown skyline. Disagree with the requirements if you like. Make you comments heard. But to say that the problem with LEED 2012 is that we haven't involved "green building practitioners with some solid experience" is absurd.

Chris, if some of the other credits were as thoroughly tested as that one, I would totally agree with you, and I suspect others would too. Also, if I'm reading Peggy's original post correctly, I don't think she's saying that there weren't solid practitioners involved over the last three years, but rather that she'd like to see that involvement continue and possibly grow as 2012 comes to market.

Yes Mara - that is an accurate interpretation of my comment. It's not personal, although unfortunately Chris seems to have taken it that way. It's business. We can, and should do better with v4 before it goes live, or we risk LEEDs reputation and future (IMO).

My turn to differ...1/2 of 1% of the US market does not "tested" make--I'll even throw in Maryland and make it an even 2%. In today's LEED, "solid experience" requires overseas practice where a soon-to-be majority of our projects will be originating. Right now, I promise you that only a tiny fraction of them even know that 90.1-2010 even exists. In addition, LEED as a totality should be at least theoretically accessible to the top quartile of the domestic market. Right now, just to play, let alone get any points, in LEED V4 you're talking the 6-7 point range under 2009, which by itself will eliminate close to 35% of the projects certifying under V3. When you add that to the raft of un-tested water and materials prerequisites and credits, I believe you are talking about eliminating a minimum of another 15-25% of the market that's gone after LEED to date. This is just over 20% of new construction but a low single-digit percentage of the eligible EB stock. Oh, and have the reviewers been trained on this? Practitioners with solid experience doubtless understand that the certification chain breaks at its weakest link. Which brings me to my final point: the Massachusetts example is irrelevant: if the 118 cities mentioned have adopted the stretch standard as code, that means that if developers (even them!) want to build in that jurisdiction, they don't have a choice but to comply if they want to build there. Since the "estimates" are that the MA stretch code is equivalent to 2010 (BCAP seems to think not) it would be interested to see how far beyond the code these complying buildings go. As I'm sure we've all learned the hard way, a couple of percent one way or another makes a BIG difference in LEED, particularly with prerequisites. LEED is a voluntary standard and there's nothing forcing people from not using it if they want to build. The job of USGBC (including its staff and dedicated volunteer and kibitzing pissant members) is to keep LEED close enough to the market train so that the standard can continue acting as an engine for transformation. Easiest thing to do would be to decouple the engine from the train and make it go faster. And then what would you have?

Rob, not going to argue with your numbers. Certainly any new version of LEED is going to be a numbers game somewhere or other, but in the past we have had good take up with LEED basically because there are plenty of people out there who REALLY want it to work….and that includes you. LEED has gained traction not just because of what (or in some cases not) the USGBC has done…it’s worked because ‘we all’ have made it work….HOK, Gensler, Lynn Simon, Chris, you, me. (and many, many others) Many of us work abroad where we have had to ‘manipulate LEED to make it work’, and the bottom line has been education. Leaving aside the fact that USGBC are ‘changing faculty’ and the USGBC educational piece is going to change…in reality the majority of the great education has come from the practitioners in the industry, we have sold it into the marketplace, our companies have put the program on the line and made it work in each building…building by building. Those fighting to understand outside of the core practitioners have made use of LEED User and their great team to understand the information to help the uptake. LEED is not a mandatory/must do program as ASHRAE can be in some circumstances…even you said it’s a ‘voluntary standard’…we ALL know that, including the clients…each job is a sell and an opportunity to educate. Is V4 perfect..no..IT NEVER WILL BE….just as V3 wasn’t…nor the reviewers, nor LEED on Line…nor…well whatever, we can all find fault somewhere, but at some point we have to take V4…and use it. Now would be a really sensible time to do so.

Well, Barry. There's one lesson I hope we never learn from the market: 'You shouldn't have gone so far so fast'.

Given that several states, cities and the District of Columbia all have mandatory LEED building policies in place, we can't say that LEED is purely voluntary anymore. While LEED was not initially set up to be a de facto code, it has effectively become that in many localities with the USGBC celebrating every adoption. As for the definition of 'solid experience', I have to reject the notion that it must include 'overseas practice'. I think you can have a lot of great knowledge without ever stepping a professional foot outside of the US. Not every building professional using LEED has the opportunity to work in a different country outside of their country of origin. This does not diminish their capacity to think critically, apply knowledge and push LEED forward. Most professionals with solid experience would be able to grasp that a US standard applied outside of the US will have problems and will require that professional to understand the US standard, the other country's standard and interpolate the difference while working actively with the GBCI to get the job done correctly. However, I do agree that every job is a sell and opportunity to educate.

Chris I have to completely disagree - my take on who has been "working" on this is lots of special interests, narrowly focused practitioners, and a whole bunch of environmental extremists, with some industry folks who want "their" standards to be just as important as those referenced in LEED already. Definitely not folks who have to deliver projects either as LEED experts, architects or engineers. And definitely not those realistically interested in the long term sustainability of the LEED systems.

Karen - I have been working on LEED development since 1997 and have been one of those folks working on this like Chris. In my experience your "take" is completely inaccurate relative to reality. The vast majority of those folks are and have been working directly on LEED project delivery including innumerable contractors, architects, engineers and consultants like yourself. Very few represent special interests beyond a strong desire to improve building performance relative to the environment and human health. Very few representing any environmental groups serve on the LEED development committees (actually Rob used to represent any environmental group, NRDC, that some may consider extreme!). Almost no folks promoting particular standards serve on the LEED committees due to an inherent conflict of interest. In my experience everyone working as a volunteer on LEED development is keenly interested in the long term sustainability of the green building movement. LEED is just a means to perpetual improvement in this field. The issue at hand is how far and how fast to change LEED to continue a steady pace of market transformation. That is obviously subject to debate and is a very difficult balancing act. The market is full of status quo extremists opposed to the pace of change or even any change on particular issues. This is counter to the fundamental reason for being of LEED to transform the market regarding the issues LEED addresses. I can tell you from personal experience that finding the right balance between two extremes is hard work which has been undertaken by thousands of well-informed, practical-minded, and mission dedicated professionals who volunteer their time to enable LEED to deliver market transformation. Too far, too fast - maybe, maybe not. However, I would personally vouch for the dedication and integrity of the professionals involved in LEED development. In my experience those folks are the reason that LEED has risen to the point where the status quo cares enough to even have these discussions.

I think Marcus' points are correct. My experience is that the three biggest 'sins' committed by committee members is 1) their belief that their experience is much more representative than it in fact is, 2) a willingness to forgive flaws large and small in the mechanics of the system due to their incontestable devotion to the cause of greening the built environment and 3) not appreciating that the market will turn on a dime and devour anything--including LEED--that is not sufficiently alert to its fickle nature. There is all of the extremism and bare-knuckle politics Karen rightly abhors, but they occur less at the committee level and more in various state and national political and media forums. The question "too far, too fast?" is not an academic one. It is a 'you-bet-your-certification-program' proposition. Unfortunately, the market is 'slippery down/sticky up', meaning that once customers jump ship, it will be versions/cycles before they come back, not a matter of months or years.

Marcus, your position is very well stated. Having been on and off of LEED committees and serving as an advisor to LEED committees over the years, I agree that everyone is on the same team, so to speak, and that there are relatively few special interests. (The latter does influence LEED in other ways, however.) The challenge that I have experienced, both from being inside the fold and from the outside looking in, is that the process can feel fragmented, and we don’t always have enough opportunity to step back and take stock of the impact of the cumulative level of change across the entire rating system. The overarching committees, e.g. Market Advisory, are intended for this, but my sense in speaking with members is that they are more reactive than proactive. Also, despite the thousands of person-hours by practitioners, this version of LEED is also more staff-driven than past versions have been. Does this ring true to you too? (My experience is that this has been the case with USGBC committees across the board before vs. after the big change-up in 2007 or 2008 when they disbanded and reformed most/all committees. I’m not complaining – it’s been nice to have more staff support! – but I wonder about unintended consequences.) I wouldn’t be concerned if we had only a handful of major changes – the individual items (e.g. 90.1 2010) on their own are not a big deal, but the holistic set of changes is a different story. There’s been *tons* of work put into this version of LEED – probably more than any other – but so much is new that it will be hard for both USGBC and the industry to keep pace. I’m excited to dive in and use it, but the glitches in past releases of LEED that Karen points out are unfortunately quite real. There are sectors of the market – possibly very large sectors – that will become very frustrated and drop out completely. My hope is that the beta period will be extensive and effective enough to prevent this. We’ll see.

I admit I'm not a member of any LEED committees at present, so I can only guess at what goes on, on them. My engagement here is just as somebody who has worked on more than a few LEED certified projects over the years. What I wanted to note here is that developing and writing standards is difficult work under the best of circumstances. By their nature, standards must be universal, whilst their applications are, by definition, project and situationally specific. Precisely as Rob noted above, the dedicated people who work on creating standards can only represent their own experience with complete effectiveness, experience that is, by definition, project and situationally specific. They are tasked with the difficult task of generalizing the specific, and that task inevitably requires a long, iterative process of review, feedback, testing and adjustment, since nobody can conceivably anticipate every possible project and situation. I care about greenbuilding, and so I'm greatful that so many dedicated and talented people are working on creating standards for them, whether LEED or otherwise. In the future, I even hope to help. What is needed here is some type of trial or beta period to get the inevitable kinks out of a good system, while hopefully, in the interim (in, what will hopefully be an extended interim), allowing projects to continue to move forward under 2009.

Rob as it is written - "let he who is without sin cast the first stone". I think this leaves you out brother. :-) Mara - It has been my experience (as chair of the EA TAG during the first part of 2012 development and as a current member of the Market Advisory Committee during the latter parts) that the volunteer committees were leading the development up until last fall and after that the staff took over. I do not necessarily disagree with many of the concerns expressed here (beside the obvious compulsion to defend my fellow LEED committee members). LEED development is full of examples of unintended consequences related to untested requirements. The market sends a clear message when that happens and so far LEED has been nimble enough to adjust. I do agree that a reactionary approach is inferior to a precautionary one so testing new requirements is a no brainer. The latest version of 2012 has removed virtually all of these untested requirements from the prerequisites in an effort to lower the entry point for projects while raising the bar on many of the optional credits. The whole point behind the pilot credit library is to test these new requirements before including them in the system. So no need to test drive the full LEED 2012 beta, you can test it in small pieces without risking your client's certification desires. I do understand that this is not the same as testing the whole. My personal proclivity is to set my goals very high and fall short as opposed to setting them low and exceeding them, as you usually end up in a better place in the long run. To a significant degree the market has caught up with LEED BD+C 2009. Around 50% of BD+C projects obtain LEED Gold certification and the vast majority of credits have not fundamentally changed since 2005. So how far and how fast is enough to sufficiently and continually transform the market? I would suggest that that is impossible to answer (at least not with my feeble brain) with any significant degree of accuracy. LEED 2012 development has been reigned in considerably to date and will likely be reigned in some more before ballot. Rob I look forward to seeing your analysis, perhaps it can answer my impossible question.

Marcus, that staff/committee assessment is relatively in line with what I've been hearing/experiencing. The main issue is that we've gotten more or less a whole new MR approach since last fall. Other than construction waste, the credits in the current draft are pretty untested.

Yep MR is very new and I think staff felt the need to take over LEED development in the interest of getting it done faster so they could deliver the necessary support materials (LEED Online, Reference Guides, exams, education, etc.). The Market Advisory Committee has been almost completely out of the loop since last fall with the vast majority of our calls cancelled by staff. Taking its place have been some of those special interest market forces you alluded to in your previous post. At least that is what it appears like to me.

My sense is that at least the MR section has been overly rushed, which would lead to all sorts of unintended market and technical consequences if not vetted more thoroughly.

Not sure about rushed (we have been working on v3 since about 2003 or 2004) but certainly untested to a significant degree. Of course the EA section is perfect! :-)

I'll definitely agree that the EA section feels more refined and in many cases better tested than some of the others.

Actually, much of what's in V4 reminds me of what we discussed at Wingspread in 2001. It just shows that the 1 percentile is pretty far ahead of the 20-25th percentile. Indeed, a simple 'administrative' change would significantly raise the bar without changing a comma in LEED. This would be going back to the original point distributions for the different certification levels: 50-59% for Certified (or Bronze, as it was known back then in the Bronze age...), 60-69% for Silver, 70-79% for Gold and 80%+ for Platinum, which is still getting way less than 10% of the certifications, which indicates to me that the market is not as far along as everyone would like to think.

Great point about the points and certification levels. All things being equal that would help even it out. I have worked on a couple of projects lately that received Platinum certification without even pushing the envelop. Built at or below market rates, no renewables, no beyond code strategies to address rainwater or on-site treatment, nothing particularly innovative about them but all in urban locations. In my opinion neither of them deserved Platinum certification but were able to earn it pretty easily. Just my anecdotal experience.

From Marcus: "Yep MR is very new and I think staff felt the need to take over LEED development in the interest of getting it done faster so they could deliver the necessary support materials (LEED Online, Reference Guides, exams, education, etc.)." Faster? Methinks there may have been other reasons. Removing the general membership from the development of the new MR Credits and disbanding the MR committee, and then leaving MR development to 'staff' has resulted in something less than desirable, Credits that appear to serve industry rather than sustainability. Curious conundrum we're in now.

Truly unfortunate that my serious and detailed reply yesterday was not posted - feeling a little censored right about now!

Karen, I don't know if this is your issue, but a few times my responses don't make it up when I inadvertently try to post something at the same time that someone else does. I've learned to copy/paste my longer responses before hitting submit for this reason. If this is an ongoing problem you should contact the site admin.

Karen, there has been absolutely no censorship on this forum. I apologize for what was apparently a technical issue that lost your post. Our IT team is now looking at how to prevent this kind of thing in the future. Again, I'm sorry and I hope you'll repost!

Peggy, I've spent a lot of time discussing MR with staff and the TAG over the last few months. One of the interesting revelations was that the motivations behind some of the major changes weren't at all what I had assumed just by reading the rating system. After learning the logic behind some of the credits they made much more sense (though I didn't always agree) - I don't think staff has done a good job in communicating this publicly, but we should see improvements in coming months. Also the MR TAG wasn't disbanded, it was just less involved than it had been. Their process for credit development was more inclusive but to Marcus's point also more time consuming. At that time they were still trying for a June 1 ballot.

Karen--I've lost posts before. Definitely a PITA but don't think there's anything nefarious.

It happened to me yesterday too Karen regarding my second long rant. Unfortunately I had to try and remember what I said and repost.

Mara raises another excellent point. Just reading the outcome without being privy to the hundreds of hours of discussions that led up to it is like reading the last page of a book. I agree that USGBC could do a better job of communicating the rational behind the outcome but that would be a massive undertaking. For example, on this page the issue of Title 24 equivalency was raised. Amy Boyce from staff very thoroughly explained the rational behind the outcome. Imagine the time it would take to address every issue in LEED so i understand why USGBC has not been written the book just yet!

Mara - the MR Committee was disbanded, not the MR TAG. Last fall myself and several others met with the staff working on the MR Credits and the chair of the MR TAG at GreenBuild. My question was "who's writing this stuff?" and the reply was that staff was writing the MR Credits with "some input" from the TAG, and then the Credits were reviewed by other staff folks at USGBC. Staff also mentioned that they had met with some folks from the wood industry and they then expressed some sympathy for the non-FSC position. My concerns are: 1. The exclusion of the general membership from the conversation during development. 2. The lack of experience and expertise of staff, however well intentioned and smart they may be. 3. The cumulative effect of the influence of 2 members of the MR Committee who were on the Board of Green Globes (SFI) and members of the MR Committee simultaneously for YEARS without ever declaring a conflict of interest during discussions of wood issues. 4. One of these Green Globes Board members is also the developer of an LCA database. So here we are with LEED 2012, with non-FSC wood being backdoored into LEED via the definition of biobased including wood, and the foisting of LCA on us before it is ready for prime time.

Peggy - I must differ with your earlier comment regarding MR development resulting in: "Credits that appear to serve industry rather than sustainability." As a member of industry, I have to say that the new MR section will not be easy for a majority of industry. The credits are making strides toward a more holistic analysis of our building materials, and should be viewed as a stepping stone to future versions of LEED that will be able to evaluate products based on their overall environmental impact. I feel fortunate that at Interface, we are one of a handful of manufacturers that has a product specific EPD. Meeting the new Material Disclosure and Optimization credit will be a long road for many others as Product Category Rules need to be created and that process takes time on time of the time to complete the EPD. We are fortunate to have in-house LCA expertise and have been tracking internal metrics for 15+ years. Others will have to pay and outsource creation of an LCA and the 3rd party verification required. We are lucky to have chemists on staff that can navigate the new Material Ingredient Reporting credit and assess our products against Green Screen. Others are likely not to have the expertise. Maximum credit is only offered for 3rd party verified information. Avoidance of Chemicals of Concern, and the new requirements of meeting REACH, may be brand new to manufacturers that don't export to the EU. 3rd party verification again is required. Responsible Extraction of Raw Materials - we must get our raw material suppliers for mined and quarried materials to agree to the Framework for Responsible Mining. While they may agree in spirit, there is a 155 page doument describing the Framework. The lawyers are going to go crazy over every line item. Product manufacturers must make publicly available a 3rd party verified corporate sustainability report that includes a long list of commitments and practices. While many manufacturers do publish sustainabilty report, there will be an additional cost for the 3rd party verification. Overall, the 4th draft of the MR section is a drastic change from LEED 2009's MR credits with simple, single attribute contributions, none of which required 3rd party verification. We are excited to see USGBC pushing towards greater transparency, as access to the data is required in order to make performance based decisions, and therefore work towards holistic reductions in environmental impacts. The new credits are going to be incredibly challenging and costly for industry, except for the few of us leaders. Those in the verification industry should staff up for a significant increase in business.

Great points, Melissa, regarding the EPDs and chemicals of concern. My preliminary sense of the raw materials credit, though, is that it can be easily gamed by manufacturers who are a bit less committed (and perhaps less honest) than Interface - you all are true leaders. Can I expect the same commitment from suppliers in Asia? I'm not convinced. Also, the notion that a product can get credit if it's extracted within 100 miles of the site but meets no environmental criteria is a bit bothersome. Most aggregate, for example, would comply... not exactly an industry known for its environmental stewardship. Peggy, FSC is well supported in the current draft but there are definitely loopholes and other issues that could make FSC a less appealing option. One big concern with the MR section for BD+C is that most of the credits would initially be perceived as either too hard, too much work or (in some cases) simply not possible to implement and/or document - so projects will just revert to standard practice. This is one reason why the beta and long overlap with 2009 are so important.