Schematic Design

If you decide to go after this credit, it is usually attainable, as it only requires a small percentage of your budget. Rapidly renewable finish materials may have a slightly higher cost than their conventional counterparts, however.

Using rapidly renewable finish materials is easily identified by occupants and can help with “telling the story” of your green building.

You won’t earn this credit by accident. You’ll have to make a concerted effort to use enough rapidly renewable materials to meet the credit thresholds. 

Avoid problems by early planning to allow sufficient space for recycling storage areas. 

Although recycling is required by law in some cities, this does not exempt your project from providing the appropriate documentation for LEED. 

If recycling haulers in your area don’t recycle all of the required materials, design a collection area that can accommodate all items. You’ll meet the prerequisite this way, and be prepared for more comprehensive recycling if and when the service becomes locally available. 

Generally, single-stream recycling will require less space for the storage of recycling because you will only need to provide one bin as opposed to five bins for sorted recycling. Also, if pickups are more frequent, you’ll need less space. Check with your hauler for recommendations.

Determine the required square footage of the storage space based on the LEED Reference Guide recommendations (see above), and estimated volume of waste generation and frequency of hauler pick-ups. 

Single-stream (or commingled) recycling is usually easiest from the occupants' perspective, but it is not available everywhere.