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NewAnahitaRezaallah FullPaperBSA LEEDandBREEAM
NewAnahitaRezaallah FullPaperBSA LEEDandBREEAM
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R. A. Khoraskani
Department of BEST, Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy
ABSTRACT: BREEAM and LEED are the two most widely recognized environmental assess-
ment methods used globally in the construction industry today. Each has different strengths and
weaknesses, with differing philosophies and business strategies. Generally it is not straightfor-
ward to compare the two. This article gives an overview about the BREEAM and LEED – NC
through their history, facts and characteristics. It provides an indication on the differences be-
tween their policies, practices and their approaches towards the global market. It looks at the
BREEAM Offices 2008 and LEED – NC (New Constructions and Major Renovations) 2009
main categories and factors they consider through their assessment process, and compares in
detail their distinctions involving the priority and importance of these factors, among their dif-
ferent calculation methods and the process of certifying a building.
1 INTRODUCTION
With so much attention being drawn towards the perils of our planet and the environmental im-
pact that a global population is causing on natural resources, forward-thinking companies and
individuals are developing new ways to solve human needs for new buildings and minimize the
impact of these activities on environment. Among the different approaches and tactics that are
being applied in order to describe, quantify and control these impacts, the most influential ones
are BSA tools and methods accompanied by the new regulation worldwide for the building in-
dustry.
There are some main categories that are being considered in designing a sustainable and
green building; energy efficiency, CO2 emission, material selection, water management and in-
door environment quality and waste reduction are among them. The main aim of green design
and refurbishment of a building is to have less impact on the environment, less use of natural
resources and improve the health and overall quality of life of human beings. (Rezaallah 2012)
1.1 Regulations; Environment and Building Industry
Initiatives to address the problem of energy consumption are not new. They have been devel-
oped in 1970s with the oil shock and energy crises that hit the capitalist economies hard. It was
almost two decades after in 1990s with the growing sense of emergency and problem of climate
change that global agreements focused on the problem of environment.
The building sector has a considerable potential for cost effective energy savings, it means
that by exploiting this potential the EU will have the possibility of consuming 30 percent less
energy in 2020.
Knowing all these facts, in addition to the problems that CO2 emission causes on environ-
ment, and continuously rising prices of energy, the European countries are putting to act many
regulations on regional, state and European levels for residential buildings. There are also inter-
national protocols and milestones like Kyoto protocol or “20-20-20” that needs to be fulfilled by
European nations.
The Kyoto Protocol is a protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change (UNFCCC or FCCC), aimed at fighting global warming. The Protocol was initially
adopted on 11 December 1997 in Kyoto, Japan, and entered in to force on 16 February 2005.
Under the Protocol, 37 countries commit themselves to a reduction of four greenhouse
gases and two groups of gases produced by them, and all member countries give general com-
mitments. At conference, countries (including the USA) collectively agreed to reduce their
greenhouse gas emissions by 5.2% on average for the period 2008-2012. This reduction is rela-
tive to their annual emissions in a base year, usually 1990.
In 2007, the EU established what it described as the 20-20-20 objectives: a 20 percent de-
crease in CO2 emissions; a 20 percent increase in energy efficiency; and increasing the percent-
age of energy generated from renewable sources to 20 percent.
Green design and green refurbishment of the buildings will makes it much easier to reach
these goals and meet the targets set for the future.
In UK, BREEAM have different certification schemes for different building types.
For non-residential buildings:
− BREEAM Offices
− BREEAM Retail
− BREEAM Industrial (factories and ware-houses)
− BREEAM Educational (schools)
− BREEAM Healthcare (medical facilities)
− BREEAM Courts
− BREEAM Prisons
− BREEAM Other Buildings (any building that is outside the standard categories for example
laboratories, hotels, leisure complexes etc.)
The scheme ‘BREEAM International’ has been developed for buildings outside the UK and cur-
rently includes the following versions:
− BREEAM Gulf (all building types within the Persian Gulf region)
− BREEAM Europe (selected European countries; office and retail buildings)
− BREEAM Communities (urban planning / development)
− BREEAM International Bespoke (any building type)
− BREEAM In-Use (different existing buildings)
Currently LEED has ten different rating systems for different types of buildings, which are:
− LEED – NC (New Construction and Major Renovations)
− LEED – EB: O&M (Existing Buildings: Operational and Maintenance)
− LEED – CI (Commercial Interiors)
− LEED – CS (Core and Shell)
− LEED – H (Homes)
− LEED for Schools
− LEED – ND (Neighborhood Development)
− LEED Volume Certification
− LEED – Retail: NC and CI (Retail: New Construction and Commercial Interiors)
− LEED for Healthcare
Several countries around the world have adopted the LEED certification system and adjusted it
to their specific conditions and requirements. Some of these countries are:
− India (LEED India)
− Italy (LEED Italy)
− Canada (LEED Canada)
4 COMPARISON
The two building sustainability assessment tools have their differences as well as similarities.
Table 3 shows a detailed comparison between the main characteristics of these two systems,
which are BREEAM Offices 2008 and LEED - NC (New Constructions and Major Renova-
tions) 2009.
Table 3. Comparison of the two BSA system characteristics (Ebert 2011)
BREEAM LEED
Assessment Method BRE Environmental Method Leadership in Energy
And Environmental De-
sign
Certification Body BRE USGBC
Launch 1990 1998
Number of categories 10 6
Main categories Energy Energy and Atmosphere
Materials Water Efficiency
Innovation Sustainable Sites
Waste Materials and Resources
Pollution Indoor Environment Quality
Health & well-being Innovation &Design
Water
Transport
Land Use and Ecology
Management
Number of Criteria 76 43
Number of Mandatory Criteria 27 28
Weightings For each individual category No Weightings
Calculation style In % With Points
Result Unclassified Certified
Pass Silver
Good Gold
Very good Platinum
Excellent
Outstanding
There is a large overlap between the two systems assessment criteria. The table 4 (Elgendy
2010) demonstrates the general emphasis of the major categories of BREEAM and LEED and
their relative weights in each rating system. It also shows that there is a considerable overlap
between the two systems with each system having its on particularities (Facilities Management
in the Case of BREEAM, and Regional Priority in the case of LEED). The table is for general
comparison purposes only as it does not take into account point-less prerequisites. The names of
some categories have been adjusted and some credits have been moved across categories to
simplify the comparison.
To categorize the level of sustainability of the buildings, LEED applies a scale of platinum,
gold and silver, while BREEAM adopts a scale from pass to excellent. The different type of
naming the certification levels can make the comparison between the two systems a bit compli-
cated. A study by BRE (BRE, 2008) concluded that there are high levels of variation between
the systems for the same ‘grade’ or ‘rating’ than might be expected. For example, BREEAM
Excellent and LEED Platinum office building are not equivalent in terms of sustainability fea-
tures or environmental impact (BRE, 2008). LEED, when applied to UK buildings, rated those
buildings higher than the UK BREEAM assessment method. Overall, BRE stated that none of
the systems they examined (BREEAM, LEED and etc) traveled well in terms of comparison.
One aspect that is very important to address in both of the certification systems is the opera-
tional performance. Both LEED and BREEAM need to clarify whether a high rating actually
means an improvement in the building's efficiency and operational performance. They simply
rate the 'asset' and do not consider how the building will operate in reality in future.
LEED is ahead considering this matter, the owners of the buildings are mandate to provide
them with the utility consumption data after five years and in case the owners don’t provide the
USGBC with such a data, they have to sign a waiver so that the USGBC will get the data from
the utility providers.
BREEAM 2011 has started to consider the post occupancy issue by emphasizing the commis-
sioning the first year of occupation. It contains credits for 'seasonal commissioning', collecting
and analyzing energy performance and consumption data for the first year; and providing ex-
tended aftercare. All the excellent and out- standing rated buildings have to complete the
BREEAM In – USE assessment in three years.
There are some other significant differences between the two BSA tools. In general, LEED is
slightly simpler and easier to use but this can also be considered a weakness if owners are push-
ing to improve environmental performance of the buildings. BREEAM is arguably stricter as it
sets more absolute targets. LEED sets relative percentage reduction targets. For instance, in case
of materials, LEED looks at the usage of local sources of the material and also percentage of
recycled content, while BREEAM is more precise and considers the wider environmental im-
pacts of building different elements by awarding the credits using the Green Guide to Specifica-
tion and a 'responsible-sourcing' index. In case of water, BREEAM credits are based on cubic
meters per person per year; LEED points are base on the water use reduction percentage. A 40%
reduction in water use achieves maximum points under LEED, but only gets one or two credits
under BREEAM.
The main concern of the both BREEAM and LEED rating systems is to move towards inter-
nationalization. For being more easily accepted and adopted to the global market both systems
have to work on their disadvantages. They are constantly trying to improve their weaknesses to
optimize building performance and minimize environmental impact; provide a measure of a
building’s effect on the environment; and set credible standards’ by which buildings can be
judged objectively. They are learning from each other’s strength points.
Both LEED and BREEAM building sustainability assessment tools have their own advantages
as well as disadvantages.
One of the aspects that makes the LEED more simple is the easy calculation method, which is
done through a checklist that makes it very easy and transparent to calculate the points and
evaluate the final score by sum of the points without any weighting. BREEAM is more compli-
cated, more strict and accurate. The calculation of the points is through different calculators and
is followed by various weighting scores for each category considered in the evaluation. This
complex process makes the calculation less transparent, which is a disadvantage of BREEAM.
For the international market the transparency is essential and BREEAM should try to make the
calculation of the points more transparent for the market, developers and operators of the build-
ings.
At the international scale the advantages and disadvantages of these two systems is very
much dependent on the regional standards, lows and legislations. LEED is more dominated by
ASHREA standards while BREEAM uses European and UK codes. Higher similarities between
the regional standards and the code mentioned above will further assist the adaptation of the
assessment tool for the regional purposes in the international market. Generally in this scene,
BREEAM has more attention to the regional standards, laws and legislations. It tries to consider
the specific characteristic of different countries in accordance with their climatic situation. As
an example BREEAM Gulf has been adapted for the local market. The weightings are changed
so that water is the key issue, rather than energy as in the standard UK schemes.
BREEAM also has long been able to adapt to local contexts. With BREEAM Bespoke, for
example, the assessor can work with BRE to develop assessment criteria specially tailored to a
building where it doesn't fit neatly into one of the existing schemes. (Parker 2009)
Never the less LEED has also provided adaptability by using regional bonus for weighting
different environmentally important factors for different regions in the USA. There are six re-
gional priority credits available only for the USA. Also some individual national green building
councils in other countries have developed some domesticated versions of LEED such as Can-
ada and India. There are other countries such as Italy who are in the developing process.
6 CONCLUSION
The main aim of these two methods is to encourage the mass of building stock towards higher
levels of environmental performance. The two methods have their similarities as well as differ-
ences; they are improving and updating their judging criteria with legislative developments and
current best practices. Since the main differences between the two systems arise from their poli-
cies and the bureaucratic environment of their origins, it is somehow unreasonable to praise one
over the other and the decision to choose one over the other highly depends on the background
and regional conditions of the projects. All of the comparisons and studies of different assess-
ment tools proves that building certification in each country idealistically should be done by the
country’s specific certification system. These building sustainability assessment tools are sup-
posed to adapt the local political, regional standards and laws, social and climatic conditions of
each country.
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