Page 108 - Green Building Through Integrated Design

FEWER HIGHER-LEVEL CERTIFICATIONS 85

© 2006 Assassi.

Fewer Higher-Level Certifications

Another indicator of system difficulty is that the percentage of projects receiving basic
Gold and Platinum ratings actually decreased from LEED-NC version 2.0 to version 2.1.
(There are still too few data on LEED version 2.2 certifications to see if this trend is
reversing.) This may mean two things: one is that more teams are completing their first
project and haven’t built the skill level to get to the higher levels of certification; however,
it may also be that the costs of certification at higher levels are not coming down, leading
teams on limited budgets to settle for lower levels of certification. Another reason may lie
in the very success of the LEED system in selling its label to the marketplace. If any level
of LEED certification is seen as a “green” building, equal to all others in the minds of
the media and various stakeholders; then the actual certification level doesn’t matter as
much as the LEED label itself. In that case, project teams and owners may well think:
Why spend more money than I need to get beyond basic certification?
That attitude may not be a bad thing. Even basic Certified projects are better proj-
ects than the vast majority of those that don’t bother to certify at all. One study of 125
certified projects found that even the Certified projects were projecting energy and
water savings of 30 percent versus a standard building. (See Table 5.2) Interestingly,
the average water savings didn’t increase much, even at higher levels of certification,
whereas average energy savings increased from 25 percent to about 45 percent,