James Residence - LEED certified

Having quite an absence from the LiveModern community I would like to dive back in with a conversation that discusses how one can obtain a LEED certified home. I feel that this is a very important topic given the energy crisis and economic issues that we currently face. We currently have a home in the production stages that we are trying to pursue LEED platinum on as well as keep relatively affordable. Our website will be up and coming soon with information and documentation on this project. "jamesresidence":http://www.jamesresidence.com

John, I am really interested to hear how your LEED experience goes. I think if it is a reasonably simple process and at the end of the day the certification does a pretty good job of measuring actual environmental impact (or lack thereof), then this will be a winning process in terms of getting homebuyers and homebuilders to figure out how to make environmental design the new status quo.

I have the feeling that energy costs might create a lot of unintended LEED compatible houses. With higher energy costs, more attention will be paid to design, SEER, effective R-values, thermal efficiency of windows, etc. and higher transportation costs will force more materials to be sourced locally. If we could get water rates to triple, the same would happen with water conservation.  But until that time, we have these types of certifications to help sort through this.

I am interesed in your thoughts on two issues. First, how much of the LEED incentives are what I would call silly in that they might give you points for bamboo flooring imported from China, but nothing for locally made oak flooring. Do you see many perverse incentives in the LEED methodology. Second, does LEED account for some measure of SF per unit of functionality (I just made up that term). Here is what I am getting at: A 1200 SF non-LEED glass box may use far less energy than a 6000 SF LEED certified mansion. If each house shelters 2 people, we want to encourage the glass box over the mansion. Again, how does LEED handle this perverse incentive issue?

 

Great topic, let's see what comes of it.

Yes, you are right that there are quite a few points that are attained unintentionally through smart design and construction. However there are certain prerequisites that must be met to achieve a certification. I'm not too sure about "silly incentives" but under the material and resource category there are prerequisites for using tropical woods in that they must be FSC certified. Additional credits can be achieved for using environmentally preferable products. There is a calculation for home size adjustment. Depending on the number of bedrooms and square footage of conditioned space there is a threshold adjustment to the minimum required points for each level of certification, whether it be silver, gold, or platinum. For instance, a larger home consumes more materials and energy than a small home over its lifecycle. So, the required points to achieve a certain level of certification for this larger home increases.

Yes, you are right that there are quite a few points that are attained unintentionally through smart design and construction. However there are certain prerequisites that must be met to achieve a certification. I'm not too sure about "silly incentives" but under the material and resource category there are prerequisites for using tropical woods in that they must be FSC certified. Additional credits can be achieved for using environmentally preferable products. There is a calculation for home size adjustment. Depending on the number of bedrooms and square footage of conditioned space there is a threshold adjustment to the minimum required points for each level of certification, whether it be silver, gold, or platinum. For instance, a larger home consumes more materials and energy than a small home over its lifecycle. So, the required points to achieve a certain level of certification for this larger home increases.