Standards keep getting tighter: a lighting design that was considered very efficient a decade ago won’t earn you any points under this credit today. Even today’s standard practice is not likely to earn you points, so don’t fall in the trap of waiting until the lighting design is complete to calculate the project’s lighting power density. Instead, incorporate lighting power optimization strategies early in design to optimize lighting power density for your project and earn up to five points here. 

This credit offers talented, motivated project teams a chance to demonstrate leadership in the green building industry by presenting new and creative solutions to sustainable operations and maintenance. 

Three paths to four possible points

Teams can earn up to four points under this credit. There are three standard paths to earning an IO point: 

This credit is fairly straightforward and easy to achieve through prescriptive design measures such as using a light-colored roofing material or vegetation on a majority of the roof area. 

The heat island effect is more of a problem in urban environments with long stretches of hot weather. If your project is in such a location, this credit might be a higher priority from a comfort and energy perspective. Incorporating a reflective roof or green roof will help to reduce cooling loads, thereby lowing energy consumption and making for a more comfortable space.

This credit is fairly straightforward and easy to achieve if you are newly creating all the hardscapes. You may comply by applying prescriptive design measures outlined by LEED to 50% of your site’s hardscape, or by covering 50% of your project's parking spaces. If, however, your project includes a planned or existing surface parking lot, replacing the existing asphalt or finding a cost-effective alternative to new asphalt may be challenging and can make this credit difficult to achieve.

If your cleaning staff already keeps your building relatively clean, this credit—and the associated exemplary performance point—should be easy to achieve. If performed professionally and objectively, the audit can help you evaluate the quality of your cleaning services and highlight areas of the building that present particular cleaning challenges.

To encourage projects to pursue credits with regional environmental significance, LEED offers up to four bonus Regional Priority (RP) points for each project.

RP credits are identified by USGBC Regional Councils for each zipcode within their region, with input from USGBC Chapters. These bonus points are granted for meeting requirements that have been designated as particularly important for your project's specific geographical area. 

This credit can be one of the more challenging to achieve if your project is not currently using compliant cleaning equipment—and many projects are not, particularly those that are paying attention to green cleaning for the first time.

The credit requirements are actually fairly straightforward. You must use at least one piece of cleaning equipment in order to be eligible, 20% of all your cleaning equipment must comply with the equipment-specific criteria, and 100% of equipment purchased during the performance period must comply with the criteria.

To encourage projects to pursue credits with regional environmental significance, LEED offers up to four bonus Regional Priority (RP) points for each project.

RP credits are identified by USGBC Regional Councils for each zipcode within their region, with input from USGBC Chapters. These bonus points are granted for meeting requirements that have been designated as particularly important for your project's specific geographical area. 

This credit can be fairly difficult to understand at a glance. So let’s start by getting some common misconceptions out of the way.

One common misconception is that this credit specifies or prohibits a certain refrigerant type. That was true in early versions of LEED (and is still the case in the prerequisite, EAp3).