From the Editor
Last week, the U.S. District Court in New York City dismissed in its entirety the lawsuit Henry Gifford and other plaintiffs brought against the U.S. Green Building Council. As reported in this post at the Green Law Update, the lawsuit had been amended from its original $100 damages figure. But the crux of the suit was that LEED certified buildings don’t operate as energy efficiently as they were designed.

The dismissal of the lawsuit doesn’t mean the court found that LEED buildings actually are energy efficient, of course. The post at Green Law Update does a good job of explaining the legalese for why the court dismissed the lawsuit.

That means the question still remains — are LEED certified buildings more efficient, in general, than their non-certified counterparts? And further, do LEED certified buildings always perform as efficiently as they were intended in design?

Several studies over the last few years have looked into how LEED buildings perform, including the oft-cited New Buildings Institute report that found a wide range of energy performance among LEED certified buildings.

To many facility managers working in LEED certified buildings, the question of critical importance isn’t whether LEED works. It’s if a LEED building isn’t performing, how should they fix it?

We’re very interested in that question as well, so we are starting a project of our own to tell the stories of LEED certified buildings that didn’t perform as well as expected. The heart of the story, though, is why the building didn’t perform as expected and what facility managers did to fix the poor performance.

Do you work in a facility that has gone through a similar process? Would you be willing to tell us about it? Please give me a shout! 

Cheers,

Greg Zimmerman, editor  

Green Strategies
Judgment Day? 

In the News
Court Dismisses USGBC Lawsuit
Henry Gifford’s lawsuit against USGBC has been dismissed in its entirety. 

Green Multimedia
What is the Value of LEED Certification?
Michael Arny, president of Leonardo Academy, talks about why he believes LEED certification (as opposed to using LEED as a guide) will continue to gain popularity and importance.

GreenTech Conference & Exposition

Interoperability Takes the LEED
This presentation from the 2011 GreenTech Conference & Exposition by Steve Tom of Automated Logic shows how one LEED certified building — The Banner Bank Building in Boise, Id. — went from a LEED dud to a high-performing green building.