LEED, SCHMEED. Just turn the lights off when you leave the room!

It's official. San Francisco now has it's first 'green' residential high rise. Arterra in Mission Bay was awarded a LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) Silver certification last week which means that the building achieved the required points on the scale that measures environmentally friendly practices and design. From their website:

Green Building Council members, representing every sector of the building industry, developed and continue to refine LEED. The rating system addresses six major areas:

Sustainable sites
Water efficiency
Energy and atmosphere
Materials and resources
Indoor environmental quality

LEED was created to accomplish the following:

Define "green building" by establishing a common standard of measurement
Promote integrated, whole-building design practices
Recognize environmental leadership in the building industry
Stimulate green competition
Raise consumer awareness of green building benefits
Transform the building market

That's a pretty wide-ranging mission they have there. Granted, environmentally sound building practices and materials were around long before LEED came up with their criteria and scorecard.  We do have to start somewhere, though and there are now hundreds of LEED certified buildings across the country. The irony is that almost all of them are in cities. Urban environments are inherently "greener" than the suburbs because they use less space, energy and resources to support higher human density.

When I think about the relative efficiencies that a LEED certified building provides versus a non-LEED building compared to acres and acres of McMansions bleeding the grid dry, I wonder if the LEED emphasis on urban construction is misplaced. 

In future, we will see more efficient building practices become the rule and not the exception and LEED certification is an important and viable first stage in this cycle. Just like hybrid vehicles are not the ultimate solution to our dependence on oil, but an important "bridge technology" that will get the auto industry to the next platform for efficient 4-wheel transport. Regardless, it's important to support new methods and technologies as they develop and LEED certification is one step in the right direction. 

Turning the tap off while you brush your teeth is another !