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WalkerARCHITECTS
Joined: 25 Sep 2007
Posts: 312
Location: BRIER WASHINGTON
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 Posted: Thu Jul 22, 2010 1:21 pm Post subject: The Problem with LEED |
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Walker Architects advocates a National Code for Sustainability, based upon science, engineering and testing.
There exists little reason to assume that a LEED rating actually creates a reduction of the carbon footprint of built environment. We would be better off rating product in testing labs with established criteria. With very little of that nature, there is very little credibility to assign.
"Sustainable building design" was once all in the eye of the building team making the claim." LEED changed that, somewhat, creating a national standard for green buildings where none existed before, meeting pent-up demand for reliable information with a "rating system" and a "checklist" for going green. We question this accomplishment.
The USGBC has been enormously successful at publicizing the need for sustainable buildings. Interest in sustainable building is exploding. However the system is flawed, and with some municipalities, states, and corporations adopting LEED as a standard, we should be questioning it's actual capacity to deliver sustainable built environment.
Thanks to the USGBC and LEED, we now have momentum, media attention, motivated clients, and an expanded understanding of "green" building. Green building and sustainable design and construction are not on the same page.
LEED is a checklist driven design process. It is a paint by number system, where almost every color somehow meets the standards. That approach could, theoretically, produce buildings that conserve resources, reduce operating costs and pollution, help address global warming, improve marketability and durability, preserve the ozone layer, protect occupant health, and improve worker productivity, or not. When the program was launched, the hope was that it would transform the design and construction of commercial and residential buildings, usher in a new age and more sustainable way of building.
LEED's credibility is fading. Sustainable building has a robust future, but this certification system does not. LEED is broken. It simply does not work because it is not based upon certified scientific testing, that actually captures the embodied energy, in product, material and construction processes. There are insufficient standards and no unified testing lab system, ANSI, ASTM, ETC do not have or test for the energy embodied in product or the energy saved by using the product or material. LEED is not based upon hard fact established by rigorous testing. It is in fact a game, where claims have more weight than facts! Walker Architects has no desire for LEED certification. Someday we hope we will be able to embrace the program and drive a code for sustainability in the United States, that works.
The program's results are very disappointing. Since 2000, LEED has certified only 285 buildings. That is a complete failure. By contrast, over the same time period, the U.S. Department of Energy's Building America program helped builders design and erect more than 20,000 new homes, with a minimum 30 percent reduction in energy use for heating, cooling, and hot water at no net additional cost burden.
Walker Architects is concerned that LEED has become expensive, slow, confusing, and unwieldy, it is a death march for applicants administered by a soviet-style bureaucracy that makes green building more difficult than it needs to be. We need only accurately measured material and product performance, and application & installation requirements. Where is the index of material and product and the research and testing that backs up the LEED system. The result of a failure to provide a foundation of reliable testing:
mediocre misguided objective, "green" buildings where certification, not environmental responsibility, is the primary goal.
token response level only a few super-high-level eco-structures sustainable often expensive design driven built by motivated owners outside the normal market paradigm.
worthless credentials, an explosion of LEED-accredited architects and engineers designing a few "rated but untested" buildings once in a while.
discouraged professionals who want to design sustainable buildings, but can't afford to certify themselves or their buildings. LEED has a price big tag on everything!
Falsified reports on cost An avalanche of reports imply that green building -- and LEED certification in particular -- doesn't cost more than conventional building. These reports are wrong. The second you start a "green-building project", it costs more than conventional construction. In the real world, LEED certification typically adds 1 to 5 percent to the budget.
A myth that going green costs nothing is damaging to clients who discover the real cost of the process. Based upon fuzzy math to show that green building doesn't add costs, let's test and then establish the material and product that is more sustainable and and worth it.
LEED certification simply costs more and does not equate to a more sustainable built environment. The marketing of LEED is so huge that buyer pressure forces developers to pursue LEED -- and build a few certifiable buildings and thereafter be "GREEN" builders. Why not every building? Just upgrade the efficiencies, provide a photovoltaic system, work at daylighting during the design phase, design for passive solar and site the buildings with solar orientation then use tested assemblies with established thermal efficiencies.
Only measure results have value.
Milwaukee's new Urban Ecology Center is one of the greenest buildings in the upper Midwest. It is a truly sustainable architectural work. It is not certified. "Because it could have added as much as $75,000 to the cost, just for the paperwork," said Ken Leinbach, the center's executive director.
In LEED, you need 26 of 69 possible points to get certified. It is a numbers game. All points, for some reason, are weighted equally, even though some have far greater environmental benefits than others.
Point-mongering is what happens when a design team becomes obsessively focused on getting credits, regardless of whether they add environmental value. In the office here we coined the term "LEED brain", this term describes what happens when the potential PR benefits of certification drive the design process. If you know how to scam LEED points, not difficult to do, you can get the PR benefits without doing much at all. We see simply too much of that.
Walker Architects has been designing passive solar buildings since the early 1980's and we know it takes more than mountains of paperwork to produce sustainable energy efficient project with low carbon and toxicity impact on the environment. We do it the old fashioned way, by established principles, by the numbers with tested reliable assemblies.
The LEED rating system does not make sense in terms of dollars spent or performance achieved. Walker Architects is calling for a national code for sustainable built environment based upon a testing program managed by the DOE.
LEED credit reviews are not based upon building performance. The goal is to fail as many applicants as possible. Sustainable built environment requires design intelligence which should count for something, "Green building" is costly but not effective because design intelligence and building performance does not count, where the USGBC should be aiding and empowering sustainability they are crushing with a faceless technocracy based upon misguided criteria and measurement systems.
I have been told by fellow Architects that "The review process is heavy-handed, it's as if the review contractors are trying to impress the USGBC with their thoroughness and nitpicking. ... the review comments are brief and impersonal, without the slightest hint of support, actual building performance is irrelevant."
There is no physical examination of the actual building, LEED evaluators do not come out and spend a few days looking at a project themselves? They do not personally verify the dual-flush toilets, examine the HVAC controls, meet the design team, discuss the design strategy, experience the effect of thermal mass in the building or the phenomenal impact of movable insulation. If there are questions, based on physical reality they could be resolved on the spot.
The review process needs to be dramatically improved and streamlined. t needs to be injected with a serious dose of science and engineering, valid testing and considerable humility and humanity. That said USGBC consulting engineers are well-trained and should be given more discretion and latitude for subjective decision making. Only building performance has actual contribution to the mission. It has to be solid science based and verifiable, to accomplish a reduction of the carbon footprint of built environment.
The idea behind LEED is laudable. The execution, so far, has been disappointing. In the final analysis, the world needs more sustainable buildings, we need better physical performance from our buildings and more "green buildings" that work, need LEED certification. If LEED continues to cost too much in dollars, time, and effort, the industry is not going to stop building green projects, we'll just stop certifying them. LEED certification is not a process in an awards program, there should be a qualified certification agent in every city.
We need sustainable building to triumph, to take over our culture like computers did. We need LEED -- or something better to accelerate that transition. See our post on Passive Solar Retrofit. Let's roll up our sleeves, get to work, and re -design LEED around design intelligence and established passive solar principles-- for our children, and for the future of our planet.
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WalkerARCHITECTS
Joined: 25 Sep 2007
Posts: 312
Location: BRIER WASHINGTON
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| Posted: Thu Jul 22, 2010 1:24 pm Post subject: Achieve Carbon Reduction Performance |
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It is the mission of Walker Architects that the building design sector move forward with designing buildings that use substantially less energy, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and create spaces that are healthy and comfortable. While focused on designing net zero energy buildings, the ultimate goal of the company and the AIA is carbon-neutral buildings by 2030. Carbon neutral buildings use no energy from external power grids and can be built and operated at fair market values.
We support the AIA, Architecture 2030. We support the USGBC but must point out it is flawed and the material supplier & manufacturer's reports needs to be based instead upon metrics that have been established by testing, that includes an accounting of the embodied energy of same.
LEED seems logical at a glance. Walker Architects can take a spec home built in the mid 1980's and convert that house net zero carbon for an investment of about $50,000.00. If we did that or built a house of such quality from scratch would that net zero carbon house, qualify for a LEED platinum rating?
LEED certified buildings are supposed to use resources more efficiently when compared to conventional buildings which are simply built to code or designed by a non LEED certified professional. Individuals recognized for their knowledge of the LEED rating system are permitted to use the LEED Accredited Professional (AP) acronym after their name, indicating they have passed the accreditation exam given by the Green Building Certification Institute. (This is a third-party organization that handles accreditation for the USGBC,).
The assumption of credibility from the somewhat self refferencing accreditation by the public arises in part from the image created by advertising. Like the good housekeeping seal of approval, a LEED certification means that some people examined plans of the building or product and blessed them, so certified buildings do sometimes provide healthier work and living environments, which contributes to higher productivity and improved employee health and comfort, and the point is so do many non LEED certidied buildings.
The USGBC has compiled a long list of benefits of implementing a LEED strategy which ranges from improving air and water quality to reducing solid waste, benefiting owners, occupiers, and society as a whole. The track record thus far is actually poor. The industry standard has improved, LEED just has not measured that.
Often when a LEED rating is pursued, this will increase the cost of initial design and construction. One reason for the higher cost is that sustainable construction information is not based upon solid labratory testing that is generally available & backed up by trusted sources. The principles are generally well understood by the design professionals undertaking the project, but the rating is achieved by accrual of points not building performance.
The lack of documented testing directly creates time spent on product and material research. This information should be compiled not by the manufacturer but by testing labs. I have experienced this frustration personally, the data from the manufacturer of product never says "we are not green". There is mysteriously no lack of manufactured building components which meet LEED standards. On top of the hype we have to wade through, pursuing LEED certification for a project is an added cost in itself as well. Like many others, Walker Architects would love to do a LEED certified project because it is good for the business image, instead we do buildings with exceptional performance that are not certified.
LEED focuses on the end product. For example, because leather does not emit VOCs they are deemed healthy for environments, disregarding the use of extremely harmful chemicals in the process of tanning leather.
LEED is a measurement tool and not a design tool. It is a paint by number system. It is for the most part not yet climate design driven. We hope this flaw will be addressed someday. Because of this, designers may make materials or design choices, just to get a LEED point, even though they may not be the best design intelligence or climate-appropriate choice available.
LEED has been innovative in reuse of reclaimed building materials. Walker Architects like many others practices reclamation of materials. Re-use by Re-casting used copper pipes into copper fittings is estimated to have saved close to 5000KW/h's in the United States alone.
LEED is a measurement tool for green building in the United States and it is developed and continuously modified by workers in the green building industry, especially in the ten largest metro areas in the U.S.
LEED certified buildings have been slower to penetrate small and mid-major markets.[11] Also, some criticism suggests that the LEED rating system is not sensitive and does not vary enough with regard to local environmental conditions. For instance, a building in Maine would receive the same credit as a building in Arizona for water conservation, though the principle is more important in the latter case.
LEED is BIG BUSINESS oriented. Many critics have noted that compliance and certification costs have grown faster than staff support from the USGBC.
There are three key problems with LEED; buildings that earn more LEED credits than other buildings do not necessarily provide more environmental benefits; that some design techniques encouraged by the LEED program are not the most effective ways to reduce environmental impact; and that the costs and benefits that come with LEED certification remain undocumented and uncertain.
Buildings and Climate Change – Quick Stats:
Buildings Account for 38% of CO2 emissions in the United States —more than either the transportation or industrial sectors
Over the next 25 years, CO2 emissions from buildings are projected to grow faster than any other sector, with emissions from commercial buildings projected to grow the fastest—1.8% a year through 2030
Buildings consume 70% of the electricity load in the U.S.
Buildings have a lifespan of 50-100 years during which they continually consume energy and produce CO2 emissions. If half of new commercial buildings were built to use 50% less energy, it would save over 6 million metric tons of CO2 annually for the life of the buildings—the equivalent of taking more than 1 million cars off the road every year
The U.S. population and economy are projected to grow significantly over the coming decades, increasing the need for new buildings - to meet this demand, approximately 15 million new buildings are projected to be constructed by 2015
Building green is one of the best strategies for meeting the challenge of climate change because the technology to make substantial reductions in energy and CO2 emissions already exists.
Modest investments in energy-saving and other climate-friendly technologies can yield buildings and communities that are environmentally responsible, profitable and healthier places to live and work, and that contribute to reducing CO2 emissions.
These objectives require cogent metrics that have been confirmed by scientific method, not a point allocation system with a door prize to the winner.
These are the opinions of Walker Architects based upon our knowledge of sustainable architecture and renewable energy.
The LEED® (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Green Building Rating System™ is a voluntary building certification program that defines high-performance green buildings, which claim to be more environmentally responsible, healthier, and more profitable structures. LEED was created to establish a common standard of measurement for what constitutes a green building and offer third party validation of a building’s green features. LEED addresses a variety of buildings and building project types through individualized systems, including: new construction, existing buildings, commercial interiors, core & shell, homes and neighborhood development.
Thanks
TLW
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RickBalkins
Joined: 20 Oct 2009
Posts: 259
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| Posted: Sat Jul 31, 2010 9:19 pm Post subject: |
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Embodied energy is something that is WAY beyond possible to absolutely determine. It is a theory but can not be tested to absolute level for each project. The very testing itself ADDs embodied energy. Embodied energy includes EVERYONEs physical energy use from the time the raw material was extracted (or a seed) to the point in which it is a product installed in a building to the point of all the energy used to operate the building, repair, maintain and finally demolished and site cleaned up.
The very testing and research will involve as much physical embodied energy as the entire life cycle and the number of sun rises left in our species future.
This becomes a problem in my opinion and really can only be subjectively "guessed". There will always be a level of subjective reasoning then pure absolute empirical scientific analysis on each and every project. This would caused the cost of a project to go through the roof and well beyond the stars. That would be akin to the proverbial - second guessing yourself. It wastes too much time, money, energy then it would have been to stop worrying and just get the job done.
On the other note, I believe that we should use the science we already have done. Such as the knowledge of calorie use by making this information from medical science available in a reliable area for us without having to hire doctors as consultants, then associate that with the energy we use to build buildings and the average labor embodied labor hours. I do believe that we mus include all the known fossil fuel energy used. We can determine past to present by scaled example of like or similar scale of work. We need a central public information database that is user friendly. We need to base on science NOT bought 'credits'. Credits be earned - if there is such a system for monetary support. reduced embedded fossil fuel energy, carbon footprint and reduced average fossil fuel energy use required and possibly some sort of monetary benefit for keeping to a sustainable life style and innovative reduction of energy use.
So, in essence, a system that rewards for actually doing good not just bought credits. A person can buy a million credits and be 10 times worse offender then the worse offender we know. Yet, get Platinum LEED rating. In theory, that can happen. LEED system certainly has good potential and it does one thing good. Get the public attention and demand for sustainable living. More real science is necessary but only much. We need to be careful and reasonable to this regard.
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WalkerARCHITECTS
Joined: 25 Sep 2007
Posts: 312
Location: BRIER WASHINGTON
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| Posted: Sat Jul 31, 2010 10:19 pm Post subject: |
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Actually the embodied energy could be reasonably determined in most cases.
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RickBalkins
Joined: 20 Oct 2009
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| Posted: Sat Jul 31, 2010 10:33 pm Post subject: |
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| WalkerARCHITECTS wrote: | | Actually the embodied energy could be reasonably determined in most cases. |
Reasonably guessed. But how do we know about how manufacturing plant? How much fuel used and all that. I certainly love to see a nice list that will clearly tell me but it is really guessing. How do I know the embodied energy between a plywood sheet made by one company from another. How do I know the embodied energy for each production batch from each plant. For absolute numbers.... that is a bit beyond realistic for us to ascertain. Not to mention, the companies just won't give that information to us or is going to even bother wasting their time to do the research.
It is still a guessing game. If you know some good listing of averages and such information that is publically available that is clear and coherent, I like to know where that is.
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