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Sydney Garceau

Professor Malcolm Campbell

UWRT 1103 H03

2 November 2019

LEED Architecture: Actually Green or Environmentally Mean?

As an architecture student, my professors and older students have homed in the concept

of recycling materials, looking in basically dumpsters for spare parts, and hoarding limited

supplies to me. Recycling materials that already exist allows me to not have to pay for anything

and lets me use the waste of others. Plenty of people throw out perfectly good materials that they

could still use if they scavenged them well. Another funny thing is the idea of people not cutting

to conserve the material by utilizing its edges but instead cutting out a piece from the middle of

it. This type of waste one can more easily see than a company belittling the environment because

the facts are right there. The only thing one can do when a student wastes supplies is to yell at

them. On Friday the 25th of October, our main instructor, Greg Snyder, pulled six-inch pieces of

a quarter by a quarter wood out of the trash. He was disappointed that we were not using these

pieces or saving it for someone else to use as our models are small. Instead, because the class did

not buy the wood or did not need the shorter piece; we simply it out. This is true in the actual

discipline as well, though it takes a slightly different form in energy waste. Energy waste is a

huge problem in the architectural industry today as well as a lack of energy-efficiency. A

growing trend of Green Architecture has inspired designers to think more creatively with a

greater concern for energy use. Through sustainability programs, companies that use recyclable

materials, or cut down on their waste and power use reap the rewards. Some of these programs or

certifications have more credibility than others because they are harder to get.
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The leading standard for sustainability that gains the most respect when buildings attain it

is called LEED. Architects and engineers that are LEED-accredited usually have more respect in

the field and get paid more because of the trend and need of Green Architecture. Also, getting

the accreditation is not an easy process. The buildings themselves also are usually much more

respected because of how hard it is to obtain the certification. At least it is hard obtaining it…

honestly. I plan to explore whether LEED-certified buildings are advantageous for our cities in

terms of sustainability, or if these supposed innovations harm the environment more than help.

According to the US Green Building Council, corporations use the “Leadership in Energy and

Environmental Design” program or LEED “to create healthy, highly efficient and cost-saving

Green buildings”. This is important because we as an Earth are dying and we need to heal the

world and give back to it instead of just taking. If we as a whole start building smartly and

responsibly, we can help negate the effects of pollution and waste that would have happened if

we continue to build and design in a harmful way.

In a modern growing world, we need better ways to provide new infrastructure, conserve

resources, and keep the environment in mind. LEED began in 1993, when a National Resources

Defense Council senior scientist, Robert Watson, wanted to bring civil engineers and architects

together to work with industry leaders to make buildings more cost-efficient and eco-friendly

(“Robert K. Watson”). The program LEED is the international standard for determining a

building’s efficiency and it uses a point system in which buildings earn points based on their

efficiency. To expand further, LEED ranks buildings in categories such as if it is on a sustainable

site, its water efficiency, its energy and atmosphere, its choice in materials in construction and

resources used (Gou). Each point earns different levels of certification. For example, reusing

water or using LED bulbs for lighting awards different points to build the LEED score to obtain
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the certificate. Also, the installation of solar panels or other innovative sources to use clean

energy gain points as well. The different levels are as follows in ascending order: Certified or 40-

49 points, Silver or 50-59 points, Gold or 60-79 points, and then Platinum, 80 points or higher.

Different environmentally protective measures earn different points; the more challenging ideas

such as rerunning all the water to use rainwater for greywater (water not for drinking) earn more

than just installing bamboo flooring. The better the certificate, the more cost-efficient, eco-

friendly, and better for the environment the building is, or so it may seem.

The whole point of LEED is to create healthier buildings/spaces to create a better

tomorrow. The main incentive for honest companies to build this way includes protecting the

environment, achieving exclusive LEED status, and becoming key players in the latest trend of

Green Architecture. A company that obtains LEED certification creates a great reputation for

themselves because this shows it cares for the environment and this catches consumer attention,

as well as tenants. All in all, people that want “instant recognition for your building, faster lease-

up rates, higher resale value, healthier indoor space, [a] lower use of energy, water and other

resources, [a] better [environment] for building occupants, the community and the environment”

should use LEED (USGBC). LEED-certified buildings can also charge more to tenants because

of their exclusivity. The government is trying to incentivize building this way too. According to

the article “Some Buildings Not Living Up to Green Label” in The New York Times, these

buildings get tax credits (Navarro). I, like many other 18-year-olds have little to no idea what a

tax credit is. Thus, TurboTax says that tax credits reduce the amount of income tax owed to the

federal and state government. On the negative side, this shows that some buildings could obtain

the certification just to get tax cuts and there are no ramifications for this. LEED does not take

away certification after they award it to a building for up to five years before the building must
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reapply. Some companies falsely obtain LEED certification and steal money from the

government by doing so through tax credits. So, this puts the problem only on the companies,

right? No! LEED does nothing to reprimand these companies or suspend their certificates. The

concept of the tax credits and the exclusivity of LEED with the public’s hype behind it sheds

new light as to why these companies falsely obtain accreditation, to save money and charge

higher. We need to protect and keep the environment in mind when we build in order to plan for

the future. We as a people need to preserve the Earth and its resources for future generations and

can achieve this through actually upholding the values that LEED preaches.

While the USGBC argues for more widespread use of the LEED program, other research

suggests the program does not actually uphold any type of energy-saving principles. Both sides

of the argument mostly agree that the environment needs to come first. We know that the rise in

population depletes the resources and the space Earth has, especially in today’s world. Michael

Mehaffy, an urbanist and Ph.D. in Architecture, and Nikos Salingaros, a mathematician and

Ph.D. holder in Physics, have published various works explaining how Green Architecture with

LEED is worse for the environment. Mehaffy and Salingaros published a book called Design for

a Living Planet: Settlement, Science and the Human Future, which exposes a 2010 lawsuit

against the US Green Building Council. Henry Gifford, the owner of the heating retrofit

company Gifford Fuel Saving in New York and energy consultant accuses the “USGBC [of

engaging] in ‘deceptive trade practices, false advertising and anti-trust’ [when] promoting the

LEED system” (Mehaffy and Salingaros). The source continues with “because the LEED system

does not live up to predicted and advertised energy savings, the USGBC actually defrauded

municipalities and private entities” (Mehaffy and Salingaros). This shows that one of the

problems with LEED is that there is no clear follow up after the certification. As I mentioned
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briefly earlier; the certification expires in five years, and it lasts the five regardless of whether or

not the building continues to meet requirements after it gets certified. Henry Gifford explains,

“the plaque should be installed with removable screws… once the plaque is glued on, there’s no

incentive to do better” (qtd. in Navarro). Thus, this source first introduces the idea of LEED

needing to have some form of further evaluation of its spaces after people use the space to

determine whether or not it still meets specifications. Gou builds on this idea, saying that “post-

occupancy evaluation is required to complement the rating systems.” In other words, “although

these rating systems [LEED] were robustly appropriate to national standards or regulations, they

lacked… ongoing maintenance” (Gou). This just further references the need for some type of

ongoing test or study to maintain the building’s level of supreme status. This is comparable to a

gold medalist in the Olympics. If you win once, you are a star and a champion which people

should celebrate, but the real skill is the ability to of course achieve this in the first place, but to

also be able to continue getting this achievement. One and done is not nearly as impressive as the

ability to show that again and again, you are the best. In the sustainability world, this becomes

more complicated as the current time frame is five years. However, LEED should compress the

time frame either to every year or instead give out the certification after the building has been

open and in use for at least a year.

Compared to other buildings, LEED-certified ones do not always prove they are the most

sustainable out of non-LEED buildings. In their book, Mehaffy and Salingaros say “when

actually measured in post-occupancy assessments, they’ve (some LEED Certified Buildings)

proven far less sustainable… [and] they’ve actually performed worse than much older buildings”

(Mehaffy and Salingaros). To further this point, in The New York Times article “Some Buildings

not Living up to Green Label,” journalist Miyera Navarro explains that the Youngstown Ohio
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Federal Building “has LEED certification… [but] it did not score high enough to qualify for the

Energy Star label granted by the Environmental Protection Agency, which ranks buildings after

looking at a year’s worth of utility bills”. This supports how LEED has no follow-up after the

certification. Even though these are two different sustainability programs, LEED is more

exclusive so a true LEED-certified building should have been able to qualify with ease. Even

though this building in Ohio is at the lowest certificate, this still should not have been a problem.

This issue of falsely accredited buildings is happening right in our city as well. Bruce Henderson

with the Charlotte Observer decided to look further at the LEED-certified ImaginOn building.

During the LEED-certification process, it was estimated that the building would use about one-

third less energy than others in the city. However, ImaginOn used twice as much energy as they

originally predicted (Hincha-Ownby). Navarro says of LEED: “the certification relies on energy

models to predict how much energy a planned building will use, but council officials and many

experts agree that such models are inexact. Once a building opens, it may use more energy than

was predicted… [and] how many occupants it has, for example — affects its energy

consumption.” This explains how LEED may not be as corrupt as it seems but just does not have

the best ranking system or conditions to base sustainability. This also shows the idea that the

predictions made simply do not account for the actual use of the building and that LEED needs

to wait until the building is in use for a while before giving the accreditation.

Another issue with LEED is how fickle the point system is. According to a 2008 study by

the General Services Administration, the Federal Building in Ohio used native landscaping rather

than structural energy-saving features to get points for LEED solely for the purpose of obtaining

LEED certification rather than trying to help the earth (Navarro). I mentioned this earlier that the

more complex solutions gain more points, but it is easier to gain several small amounts of points
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than a few large amounts. This is a weakness in the LEED program as simply installing bamboo

flooring and LED lights to obtain points can lead to accreditation even if the building is horrible

for the environment. I think these are good things to have in an energy efficient building, but

there should be some stipulation to also have more complex solutions that impact the

environment more. In LEED’s defense to these accusations, the CEO of the United States Green

Building Council Rick Fedrizzi says, “over time, there will be buildings that are not performing,

from which we get no revenue” (qtd. in Hincha-Ownby). This means that these ‘easy-route’

buildings will simply vanish because they will not make enough money because they are not as

energy efficient. He also says that governments need to enforce their own Green Building codes.

Opposition to this is that he could instead have LEED enforce the Green Building codes instead

of having to rely on government regulation.

One other concern is that some of these buildings favor the environment too much at the

cost of the people in these buildings. Gou says, “the Green Building Movement is an attempt to

address IEQ and occupant health concerns by providing healthier building environments.” More

simply, this means that the more cost-efficient, eco-friendly, and better for the environment the

building is, the better it is for the people within these environments. IEQ stands for Indoor

Environmental Quality, reflecting ideas such as work performance and better health conditions.

More simply, people want to work in conditions healthy for them and the environment.

However, with LEED buildings, there may be certain sacrifices to standard living/working

conditions in favor of the environment. This could mean that the lighting is dim, which makes

working harder or that the temperature is not as comfortable. The benefits for the environment

are the lower energy used to power the lights and the reduction in wasted energy.
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Overall, there are strengths and weaknesses in the LEED process. Most of the problems

stem from a lack of regulation, both during and after the building process. Another problem is

the idea that the LEED certification lasts for up to five years, regardless of buildings upholding

sustainable practices or the initially measured values of energy efficiency determined in the

planning of the building. Lastly, the idea of gaining points to obtain the certificate through the

means of only recyclable materials or energy-saving appliances but still polluting the

environment heavily or otherwise wasting power simply makes no sense. These buildings need

to follow Green Architecture practices, which would be through making the world a healthier

place and bridging the gap between humanity and the Earth. How can we then ensure that

companies that preach they build Green Architecture uphold these policies? One idea could be

follow-up testing a year after the building gets LEED-certified and having some type of

punishment or revoking involved. Another idea could include LEED working with other energy-

saving companies that directly work with energy use after the building is completed and how

occupancy affects a building’s projected energy use. After all, something in theory may not work

as well on paper.

Comments: Good exploration of the topic, I felt like I learned a lot about LEED while reading.

Some of the sentences in the opening paragraph are hard to understand, and it seems to jump

around a lot. I think it reads too much like a spoken story in that regard. Nevertheless, the story

itself is the best way to start. It gives you some sort of connection to the topic that I would have

otherwise assumed you didn’t have. For the rest of the draft, there seem to be a lot of repeated

points. In particular, the idea of a 5 years certification period could probably be mentioned less
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until it’s elaborated on. I don’t have much else other than try to read aloud some of the more

word-filled sentences. A few of them could be simplified to make it read a bit easier.

Works Cited

Gou, Zhonghua, et al. “Indoor Environmental Satisfaction in Two LEED Offices and Its

Implications in Green Interior Design.” Indoor and Built Environment, vol. 21, no. 4, 29

Aug. 2011, pp. 503–514. Sage Publishing, DOI:10.1177/1420326x11418700.

journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1420326X11418700. Accessed 1 Oct. 2019.

Hincha-Ownby, Melissa. “Energy-Hogging LEED-Certified Buildings Cause Concern.” Forbes,

Forbes Magazine, 11 Aug. 2011, www.forbes.com/sites/eco-nomics/2011/01/12/energy-

hogging-leed-certified-buildings-cause-concern/#6c92eaa21fe9. Accessed 29 Oct. 2019.

“Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design.” Green Building Leadership Is LEED, U.S.

Green Building Council, 2019, www.new.usgbc.org/leed. Accessed 29 Oct. 2019.

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Mehaffy, Michael, and Nikos Salingaros. “Why Green Architecture Hardly Ever Deserves the

Name.” Articles, ArchDaily, 3 July 2013, www.archdaily.com/396263/why-green-

architecture-hardly-ever-deserves-the-name. Accessed 2 Sep. 2019.

Navarro, Miyera. “Some Buildings Not Living Up to Green Label.” The New York Times, The

New York Times, 30 Aug. 2009,

www.nytimes.com/2009/08/31/science/earth/31leed.html. Accessed 2 Sep. 2019.

“Robert K. Watson.” Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 28 Sept. 2019,

www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_K._Watson. Accessed 29 Oct. 2019.

“What Are Tax Credits?” TurboTax Tax Tips & Videos, Intuit, Inc, 2019,

www.turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tips/tax-deductions-and-credits/what-are-tax-

credits/L1C2IkvRt. Accessed 29 Oct. 2019.