Sustainability and the Green Site

FIGURE 2.3 A green roof, which reduces storm water runoff and rooftop albedo and increases
energy efciency. (Source: Image courtesy of Roofscapes, Inc. See also color insert.)

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) developed the Building
for Economic and Environmental Sustainability (BEES) model with support from the
EPA and HUD. This approach evaluates the life cycle costs and environmental impacts
of building materials in 10 areas of concern, which enables designers or builders to
determine the environmental loading of a material before they specify its use. The
American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) has also developed an approach
for evaluating the life cycle costs of building materials (Standard Guide for Environmental Life Cycle Assessment of Building Materials/Products, E 199198). This is a
broad-based approach that includes consideration of embodied energy, raw materials
acquisition, and environmental impacts.
The best-known approach is the U.S. Green Building Councils Leadership in Energy
and Environmental Design (LEED) program. This comprehensive approach is chief
among the reasons LEED-certified buildings have been shown to have significantly
lower operating costs and healthier and more productive occupants in addition to protecting the environment. Unlike BEES and the ASTM method, LEED does not certify
materials or processes, although these standards might be used by designers specifying
for a LEED project.
The U.S. Green Building Council (GBC) created and oversees the LEED program,
and in 2009 several notable changes were undertaken. First, the LEED certification
process was moved from the GBC to the Green Building Certification Institute, which
was created for this purpose and gives the certification process a degree of third-party
credibility. The second significant change was adoption of the LEED 2009 update in
November 2008, which provides for regional credits that reflect issues that may be of

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