Leed Green Certification
Anyone can become involved and influence this consensus based approach to building more sustainably.
Leed green certification. With four possible levels of certification certified silver gold and platinum leed is flexible enough to accommodate a wide range of green building strategies that best fit the constraints and goals of particular projects. Leed leadership in energy and environmental design is simply a sustainablity scorecard for green buildings. Certification guides outline the process and necessary details for projects attempting leed certification. While participation in leed is voluntary the program owes some of its growth to municipal and state ordinances that have mandated it for public buildings and have offered incentives for private buildings.
Each rating system has four 4 levels of certification that attest to a building or neighborhoods quantity of robust high performance green features. Leed was developed by the us green building council usgbc. The leed standards are maintained by the us. Green building council usgbc a nonprofit non governmental membership based organization.
The usgbc is a non profit member driven organization. Leed is the most internationally recognized roadmap to building sustainability. The usgbc developed the leed certification process to enhance environmental awareness among architects and building contractors and to encourage the design and construction of energy efficient water conserving buildings that use sustainable or green resources and materials. Founded 1993 to encourage sustainable practices design and development by means of tools and criteria for performance measurement.
Leed certification is granted by the green building certification institute gbci which handles the third party verification of a projects compliance with the leed requirements. The leed green associate is the only professional designation to show employers and clients you have certified knowledge in the field. The certification process for design teams is made up of two consecutive applications. Leed standards a certification program devised in 1994 by the us.
One including design credits and one including construction credits. Leed is the most popular worldwide green building certification program. The four leed certification level designations are platinum gold silver and certified. Leed leadership in energy and environmental design is an internationally recognized green building certification system providing third party verification that a building or community was designed and built using strategies aimed at improving performance across all the metrics that matter most.