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Cameron Diaz
Professor Connie Douglas
English 2116 008
2 November 2016

Benefits of LEED Certification

Introduction
Due to global warming, the planet is seeing global temperatures rise at
alarming rates. If the population continues to produce carbon dioxide at this
rate, temperatures are estimated to rise by 2 11.5 degrees Fahrenheit.
Considering this information, if the inhabitants of this planet dont work on
reducing the carbon foot print, the Earth will continue to rise in temperature.
With the rise in temperatures, our ocean levels will continue to rise thanks to
the icebergs that are gradually melting. To help slow down the process of
global warming, changes must be made. Changes include upgrading and
building new structures, so that they cut down on carbon dioxide production.
Thanks to the United States Green Building Council (USGBC), there is now a
rating system that allows companies and nations to improve their structures
and benefit from their earned ratings, financially.

About LEED Certification

The USGBC had put together Leadership in Energy and Environmental
Design (LEED) to help reevaluate the environmental performance of
buildings and lead others to become more sustainable. This third-party rating

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system serves as a method of standardization and oversight for
environmental performance designed for new and existing commercial,
institutional and residential buildings (Richards 1). To summarize, LEED
Certification is here as a grading rubric to help guide the country in a more
sustainable direction. There are five areas that LEED Certification focuses on:
water savings, energy efficiency, material selection and indoor
environmental quality. To obtain certification, one must submit an application
documenting compliance with the requirements of the given rating system.
After doing that, one must pay the registration and certification fees.
General LEED Certification contains four different ranks that you can reach
based on a point system:
1.
2.
3.
4.

Certified 40-49 Points

Silver 50-59 Points
Gold 60-79 Points
Platinum 80+ Points

To earn LEED Certification for a campus project, a university would

need to apply as one single identity. There are two different approaches to
earning campus credit; one can choose the Campus Credit Approach or the
Campus Group Project Approach. The Campus Credit approach enables you
to streamline the documentation process by earning campus credits
prerequisites and credits that can be applied to all LEED projects on the
master site. (Guide to LEED Certification: Commercial 1). With the Campus
Group Project Approach youll register the group of projects on the site as a

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single LEED project that will then receive a single LEED rating and
certification. (Guide to LEED Certification: Commercial 1).
The road to LEED Certification is one that is truly an investment with
several returns. Some of the benefits include: more cost-effective buildings,
better performance from employees and the buildings, lowering utility bills,
reducing impact on the environment, and increased recognition. Although
the upfront investment is higher than non-LEED Certified buildings due to the
higher cost for sustainable equipment such as; solar panels, low energy air
systems, etc., in the long run it has been proven to be worth the increase in
startup costs; green retrofit projects are generally expected to pay for itself
in just seven years (Benefits of Green Building 1). In the following section,
the financial benefits of LEED Certification will be discussed in full.

Financial Benefits of LEED Certification

One of the largest contributors to the many benefits of LEED
Certification would be the financial advantages. The financial advantages are
some of the most certain of all the positives when building green. The USGBC
reports that an upfront investment of less than two percent of construction
costs yields life cycle savings of over ten times the initial investment. For
example, an initial upfront investment of up to $100,000 to incorporate
green building features into a $5 million project would result in a savings of
at least $1 million over the life of the building, assumed conservatively to be
20 years. (Kats 5). Those are numbers that one cannot deny when

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considering going more sustainable; only a small investment in construction
can lead to huge return over the long run.
LEED Certified buildings have been shown to have a significant
percentage lower operation costs, and this can lead to big savings. In 2014,
it was reported that the University of Hawaii had saved $3.4 million in just
2014 by reducing energy usage in their LEED Certified buildings (The
Business Case for Green Building 1), this is where the big savings come from!
LEED-certified buildings have been proven to use 25% less energy and a
19% reduction in aggregate operational costs in comparison to non-certified
buildings. (The Business Case for Green Building 1). When reducing energy
usage by this much, it allows for a much lower operating cost due to lower
electricity and water bills. Bank of America had reported that since 2014,
their LEED Certified buildings had saved $227 million in energy costs since
2004 (Marcacci 1). If youre renting out homes, or apartments, by becoming
certified you can increase your new buildings value by around 10% and even
renovate projects for around a 7% increase (The Business Case for Green
Building 1).
Building green can also have some more direct financial incentives;
these incentives include tax credits, fee reduction, grants, revolving loan
funds, and also rebates. These grants are awarded to developers to help pay
for the buildings certification and other fees required for green building;
although, it will require a financial investment by the city. Revolving loan
funds come from programs that allow, those who are taking loans, to save

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money by lowering the interest rates when building green. When it comes to
tax credits, USGBC.org states that: Many municipalities already offer tax
credits as a means of advancing specific policy agendas. These same
principles can be applied to homes or developments that achieve certain
green building goals. (The Business Case for Green Building 1). The tax
credits may be carried forward up to 20 years.

Health Benefits of LEED Certification

When building green, it is not just about saving money on operation
costs or tax breaks, but the health and happiness of the occupants of those
building. Whether you are certifying a home, campus, or apartment complex,
the satisfaction of those occupying the space is crucial. LEED Certified
buildings tend to have cleaner air, better controlled temperature, and an
increased amount of natural sunlight inside. One meta-analysis complied
the results from dozens of individual studies and found that while results
varied widely, the benefits from improved ventilation ranged as high as an
11 percent gain in productivity, and improved lighting led to productivity
gains up to 23 percent. (Brodwin 1). Formaldehyde is a chemical that is
often used produce household products and materials; this chemical is
colorless and flammable. When building LEED certified buildings, a lot of the
complied materials are required to be formaldehyde free. High exposure to
this chemical can lead to: water eyes, burning sensations, nausea, and
others. With healthier air and higher quality working/living space, LEED
certified buildings have been proving to be beneficial for productivity;

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Employees working in the LEED-certified branches of the same financial
institution were found to be "more productive and engaged in their work.
(The Business Case for Green Building 1).

Marketing Benefits of LEED Certification

There are plenty direct benefits to going with become LEED Certified,
but one of the more subtle, harder to measure, benefits of going green is the
marketing aspect. When one becomes certified, that structure becomes
critically acclaimed on an international level; this brings in good public
relation help and community benefits. People from around the world come to
see the pioneers and innovators in todays battle with becoming a more
sustainable planet. Whether the building is commercial, a college campus, or
a personal home, becoming LEED Certified brings ton of positive attention.
An increase in positive attention means more recognition and a chance for
an increase in business; 73% of corporate leaders expect to attract and
retain customers as a direct result of their sustainability efforts; for example,
Adobe Systems, Inc., a major software maker, announced in 2006 that it had
received three LEED Platinum awards for its headquarters towers; not only
did it reap great publicity, but the firm showed that it had garnered a net
present value return of almost 20 to one on its initial investment. (The
Business Case for Green Building 1). Become LEED Certified puts also you to
an advantage over competitors who are not, which is another way to bring in
new business. With the increase acceptance of global warming, there is a

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growing market for sustainable businesses and homes; there is no time
better than now to get involved.

Environmental Benefits of LEED Certification

While all the financial and business advantages of LEED Certification
are great incentives, the reason this certification was created was to improve
our environmental condition. LEED Certifications has contributed to some
astronomical numbers when it comes to waste and gas emissions. Per
USGBCs website, certified buildings help reduce around one third of gases
emitted by the average commercial building. Not only are these green
buildings good with gas emissions, but they also allow for a large reduction
in the waste sent to landfills; LEED projects are responsible for diverting
more than 80 million tons of waste from landfills, and by 2030 that number is
expected to grow to 540 million tons. (Benefits of Green Building 1). The
LEED Certification requirements also target water usage, the higher percent
reduction in water use can lead a project to score greater points on the
assessment. For commercial buildings, they must be at an average of twenty
percent lower than the baseline building. LEED Certification is helping the
world reduce its carbon footprint and securing the planet a brighter future.

Conclusion
With global warming on the rise and the supply of energy commodities
dwindling, the journey to a more sustainable planet starts with LEED
Certification. Buildings are liable for large amounts of resource consumption,

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gas emissions, and energy use, so there is no better place to start the
investment for a higher quality future; In the United States alone, buildings
account for almost forty percent of national CO2 emissions and out-consume
both the industrial and transportation sectors (Benefits of Green Building 1).
Health, reducing environmental damage, lower operation costs, smaller
carbon footprints, and wide recognition are only some of the benefits
stemming from green buildings. LEED Certification is the pioneer, forging the
path to greater sustainability and innovation, helping drive the greatest
minds to rethink and produce a better world to live in.

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Work Cited
"Operating Expenses and the Rent Premium of Energy Star and Leed Certified
Buildings in the Central and Eastern U.s."Reichardt, Alexander. "Operating Expenses
and the Rent Premium of Energy Star and Leed Certified Buildings in the Central and
Eastern U.s." The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics. 49.3 (2014): 413433. Print.
Altomonte, Sergio, and Stefano Schiavon. "Occupant Satisfaction in Leed and
Non-Leed Certified Buildings." Building and Environment. 68 (2013): 66-76. Print.
Azhar, Salman, Wade A. Carlton, Darren Olsen, and Irtishad Ahmad. "Building
Information Modeling for Sustainable Design and Leed Rating Analysis."
Automation in Construction. 20.2 (2011): 217-224. Print.
El-Rayes, Khaled, Moatassem Abdallah, and Liang Liu. "Minimizing Upgrade
Cost to Achieve Leed Certification for Existing Buildings." Journal of Construction
Engineering and Management. 142.2 (2016). Print.
Glazer, Breeze,L.E.E.D.A.P.B.D.+C., Guenther, Robin, FAIA,L.E.E.D.A.P.B.D.+C.,
and Gail Vittori L.E.E.D. "What's it Worth?" Health facilities management, vol. 27, no.
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Kats, Greg. "The Costs and Benefits of Green Architecture." SciVee (n.d.): n.
pag. 03 Oct. 2003. Web. 15 Nov. 2016.
"Leed-certified Projects: Green or Sustainable?" Karakhan, Ali A. "Leedcertified Projects: Green or Sustainable?" Journal of Management in Engineering.
32.5 (2016). Print.
Lee, Young, and Denise Guerin. "Indoor Environmental Quality Related to
Occupant Satisfaction and Performance in LEED-Certified Buildings." Indoor and
Built Environment. 18.4 (2009): 293-300. Print.
Matisoff, DC, DS Noonan, and AM Mazzolini. "Performance or Marketing
Benefits? the Case of Leed Certification." Environmental Science & Technology. 48.3
(2014): 2001-7. Print.
National Cancer Institute. "Formaldehyde and Cancer Risk." National Cancer
Institute. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Nov. 2016.
LEED-Certified Lighting Pays Off in Other WaysLane, Keith. "How to - LeedCertified Lighting." Consulting-specifying Engineer. 37.5 (2005): 55. Print.
Richards, Jennie. "GREEN BUILDING: A Retrospective on the History of LEED
Certification." (n.d.): n. pag. Institute for Environmental Entrepreneurship. Web. 10
Oct. 2016.
"Guide to LEED Certification: Commercial." U.S. Green Building Counsel. N.p.,
n.d. Web. 5 Oct. 2016.
"Benefits of Green Building | U.S. Green Building Council." U.S. Green Building
Council. N.p., 01 Apr. 2016. Web. 21 Nov. 2016.

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"The Business Case for Green Building | U.S. Green Building Council." U.S.
Green Building Council. N.p., 10 Feb. 2015. Web. 21 Nov. 2016.