LEED Core Concepts Guide 3rd Ed 2014 PDF

LEED® Core Concepts Guide An Introduction to LEED and Green Building THIRD EDITION  LEED® Core Concepts Guide: An Introduction to LEED and Green Building THIRD EDITION PURCHASE AGREEMENT AND LICENSE TO USE LEED® CORE CON...

LEED® Core Concepts Guide An Introduction to LEED and Green Building THIRD EDITION  LEED® Core Concepts Guide: An Introduction to LEED and Green Building THIRD EDITION PURCHASE AGREEMENT AND LICENSE TO USE LEED® CORE CONCEPTS GUIDE: AN INTRODUCTION TO LEED AND GREEN BUILDING, THIRD EDITION The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) devoted significant time and resources to create this Guide and all of its LEED™ publications. All LEED publications are protected by statutory copyright and trademark protection within the United States and abroad. Your possession of the LEED Core Concepts Guide: An Introduction to LEED and Green Building, Third Edition (the “Guide”), constitutes ownership of a material object and in no way constitutes a conveyance of ownership or entitlement to copyrighted materials contained herein. As a result, you are prohibited by law from engaging in conduct that would constitute infringement upon the exclusive rights retained by USGBC. 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The Guide is not associated with, nor endorsed by the Green Building Certification Institute (GBCI) and does not guarantee a successful outcome on any examination mentioned herein or associated with GBCI or USGBC. Although the information contained in the Guide is believed to be reliable and accurate, the Guide is provided as-is with no warranty of any kind, either expressed or implied including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability, warranties of accuracy or completeness of information, warranties of suitability or fitness for a particular purpose and/or warranties of title or non-infringement, except to the extent that such disclaimers are held to be invalid. Use of the concepts, examples and information contained in the Guide is at the user’s own risk. As a condition of use, the user covenants not to sue and agrees to waive and release the U.S. Green Building Council, Inc., its officers, directors and volunteers from any and all claims, demands, causes of action for any injuries, losses, or damages (including, without limitation, failure to pass any Green Building Certification Institute examination or equitable relief) that the user may now or hereafter have a right to assert against such parties as a result of the use of, or reliance on, the Guide. PUBLISHED BY: U.S. Green Building Council 2101 L Street NW Suite 500 Washington, DC 20037 TRADEMARK LEED® is a registered trademark of the U.S. Green Building Council. ISBN: 978-1-932444-34-6 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Thanks to all of the consultants that developed the content of this guide, based on their many years of experience in the green building industry: Karen Blust, CTG Energetics, Inc. Natalie Bodenhamer, CTG Energetics, Inc. John Boecker, 7group Clare Jones, CTG Energetics, Inc. Lani Kalemba, CTG Energetics, Inc. Joshua Joy Kamensky, CTG Energetics, Inc. Nick Rajkovich, University of Michigan Kathy Roper, Georgia Institute of Technology Heather Joy Rosenberg, CTG Energetics, Inc. Chris Shaffner, The Green Engineer, LLP Lynn Simon, Simon & Associates, Inc. Joel Todd, Environmental Consultant Thanks to U.S. Green Building Council staff who managed this project: Jacquelyn Erdman Julia Feder Karol Kaiser Jacob Monroe Jenny Poole Jen Schill Contents IMAGINE IT........................................... 1 A letter from the President, CEO and Founding Chair SECTION 1. INTRODUCTION TO GREEN BUILDINGS AND COMMUNITIES........ 2 The Environmental Impacts of Buildings What is Green Building? The Rise of the Green Building Industry Green Building and Climate Change Green Building Over Time Green Building and Location Green Building Costs and Savings Beyond Green Green Building Expertise SECTION 2. SUSTAINABLE THINKING........................... 18 Systems Thinking Life-cycle Approach Integrative Process SECTION 3. SUSTAINABLE THINKING AT WORK: NEW PROCESSES FOR BUILDING GREEN......................... 32 Getting Started Establishing an Iterative Process Team Selection Goal Setting Observation of the System Exploration and Selection of Technologies and Strategies Implementation On going Performance SECTION 4. GREEN BUILDING CORE CONCEPTS AND APPLICATION STRATEGIES................................. 50 Location and Transportation Sustainable Sites Water Efficiency Energy and Atmosphere Materials and Resources Indoor Environmental Quality Innovation SECTION 5. ABOUT USGBC AND LEED........................... 84 About USGBC About LEED CONCLUSION......................................... 94 APPENDICES......................................... 96 A: Resources B: Case Study Information  Imagine It A letter from the President, CEO and Founding Chair RICK FEDRIZZI President, CEO and Founding Chair U.S. Green Building Council CORE L EED CON L EED CORE GU ID E G—UIDE CON CEPTS CEPTS EDIR — TH T HIRD E DIT I ON I ON ITD H Imagine getting up on a warm spring morning and deciding it’s the perfect day to ride your bike to work. Invigorated by your morning ride and eager to start the day, you head into your office. As you pass through a common area, you see a group of coworkers deep in a collaborative work session. They’re seated around a gorgeous oak table hand-crafted by local artisans and made entirely of wood reclaimed from a tree that fell naturally in a nearby forest. Imagine getting to your desk and sitting down without flipping a light switch—the huge floor-to-ceiling windows nearby provide plenty of natural springtime light, and if it gets cloudy this afternoon, sensors in your work area will kick on overhead lighting to an appropriate level of brightness. Meanwhile, your personal control of the temperature in your work area allows you to stay warm even as your neighbor, who has a higher cold tolerance, works at a temperature that’s comfortable for him. Imagine being surrounded by decorative elements that invoke nature and keep you connected to the natural world even while you’re inside. Imagine an herb garden in the office cafeteria and an educational display in the office lobby—constant reminders for you and your company’s visitors of just what it is that makes your building so special. And imagine leaving the office to find that it has started raining. But not to worry, you just duck around the corner to one of the many bus stops nearby. You mount your bike to the rack on the front of the bus and climb aboard. You settle into your seat at the end of a full day of work, feeling the positive effects of having spent your day in an environment filled with clean indoor air, with plenty of exposure to natural light. Your mind is clear and your energy and spirits high, knowing that your workday cost substantially less in energy and water use than it would have in a more traditional building. This is what it feels like for me and my colleagues at the LEED Platinum U.S. Green Building Council headquarters in Washington, D.C. It is what it’s like for the thousands upon thousands of people worldwide who work in LEED-certified office space. And if you tweak the details, it is what it’s like for all the students nationwide who study in green schools and live in green dorms, and for the increasing number of families who live in green homes. Now, imagine that designing, building, operating, marketing, supporting, or celebrating green buildings was at the heart of your everyday work. Imagine being a green building professional. With the LEED Core Concepts Guide, you’re on your way to just such a career. We hope you enjoy the journey, and we look forward to the innovations you’ll bring as part of the green building community. I MAGIN E IT 1 2 L EED CORE CORE L EED CON CON CEPTS CEPTS GU ID E G—UIDE — TH T HIRD EDIR ITD E DIT I ON I ON and Communities Green Buildings Introduction to Section 1 Our built environment is all around us; it provides the setting for all our lives’ events, big and small. And whether we notice it or not, our built environment plays a huge role in our natural environment, our economic environment, and our cultural environment. The built environment provides a context for facing and addressing humankind’s greatest contemporary challenges. Green building is fundamentally a process of continual improvement. It is a process by which today’s “best practices” become tomorrow’s standard practices, a rising foundation for ever-higher levels of performance. Green building can help us create more vital communities, more healthful indoor and outdoor spaces, and stronger connections to nature. The green building movement strives to effect a permanent shift in prevailing design, planning, construction, and operations practices, resulting in lower-impact, more sustainable, and ultimately regenerative built environments. For the purposes of this guide, “built environment” refers to any environment that is man-made and provides a structure for human activity. These environments range from shelters and individual buildings to neighborhoods and vast metropolitan areas. This guide explains the reasons we must change traditional building practices. It presents fundamental concepts of green building and provides a summary of the application strategies that will help you be a more effective participant in the green building process. The remainder of this section of the guide gives the rationale for green building and the related concept of sustainability. The core concepts of sustainable thinking are explored in Section 2. Section 3 looks at important components of the sustainable design and operations process. Section 4 reviews the application of green technologies and strategies. Section 5 offers more information on the programs of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), particularly the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification system. Additional resources are listed in the Appendix, and educational opportunities to support your growth and success as a green building professional are available from USGBC at usgbc.org/education. THE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS OF BUILDINGS Why is green building necessary? Buildings and communities, including the resources used to create them and the energy, water, and materials needed to operate them, have a significant effect on the environment and human health. In the United States, buildings account for: 14% of potable water consumption1 30% of waste output 40% of raw materials use2 38% of carbon dioxide emissions 24% to 50% of energy use 72% of electricity consumption3 S ECT IO N 1 1 J.F. Kenny, N.L. Barber, S.S. Hutson, K.S. Linsey, J.K. Lovelace, & M.A. Maupin. Estimated use of water in the United States in 2005: U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1344, (2009). 2 D.M. Roodman & N. Lenssen “A Building Revolution: How Ecology and Health Concerns Are Transforming Construction,” Worldwatch Paper 124 (Worldwatch Institute, 1995). 3 Energy Information Administration, EIA Annual Energy Outlook (EIA, 2008). 3  THE CUMULATIVE EFFECT OF CONVENTIONAL PRACTICES IN THE BUILDING INDUSTRY HAS PROFOUND IMPLICATIONS FOR HUMAN HEALTH, THE ENVIRONMENT, AND THE ECONOMY: Clearing of land for development often destroys wildlife habitat Extracting, manufacturing, and transporting materials may pollute water and air, release toxic chemicals, and emit greenhouse gases Building operations require large inputs of energy and water and generate substantial waste streams Transportation to and from buildings by commuters and service providers compounds the harmful environmental effects associated with vehicle use, such as increased energy consumption and pollution By building green, we can reduce that environmental damage. In many cases, green buildings can even enhance the health of the environment and the people who use them. A study by the New Buildings Institute found that in green buildings, average energy use intensities (energy consumed per unit of floor space) are 24% lower than in typical buildings.4 Additionally, the U.S. General Services Administration surveyed 12 green buildings in its portfolio and found these savings and improvements: 26% less energy usage 27% higher levels of occupant satisfaction 13% lower maintenance costs Cost and co2 = 13 and 33 Energy and occupant satisfaction = 26 and 33% lower emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2)5 27 120 100 80 60 Youngstown CH/FB L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON Omaha NPS FB Greeneville CH Fresno CH/FB Davenport CH 40 Lakewood FB Santa Ana FB Cleveland CH Knoxville FB Omaha DHS Denver CH Ogden FB 20 0 ENERGY USE INTENSITY (kBtu/sf/yr) Figure 1.1. Energy Use Intensities for Sustainably Designed U.S. Government Buildings (Source: GSA 2008) The dotted line indicates the national average energy use intensity. 4 Turner, C. & Frankel, Energy Performance of LEED® for New Construction Buildings (2008), newbuildings.org/sites/default/files/Energy_Performance_of_LEED-NC_Buildings-Final_3-4-08b.pdf. 5 Public Buildings Service, “Assessing Green Building Performance: A Post Occupancy Evaluation of 12 GSA Buildings” (General Services Administration, 2008), gsa.gov/graphics/pbs/GSA_Assessing_Green_Full_Report.pdf. 4 The study concluded that the federal government’s green buildings outperform national averages in all measured performance areas—energy, operating costs, water use, occupant satisfaction, and carbon emissions. The agency attributed this performance to a fully integrated approach to sustainable design that addressed environmental, financial, and occupant satisfaction issues. This higher performance will last throughout a building’s lifetime if the facility is also operated and maintained for sustainability. WHAT IS GREEN BUILDING? Sustainability is not a one-time treatment or product. Instead, green building is a process that applies to buildings, their sites, their interiors, their operations, and the communities in which they are situated. The process of green building flows throughout the entire life-cycle of a project, beginning at the inception of a project idea and continuing seamlessly until the project reaches the end of its life and its parts are recycled or reused. In this guide, the term green building encompasses planning, design, construction, operations, and ultimately end-of-life recycling or renewal of structures. Green building pursues solutions that represent a healthy and dynamic balance between environmental, social, and economic benefits. Sustainability and “green,” often used interchangeably, are about more than just reducing environmental impacts. Sustainability means creating places that are environmentally responsible, healthful, just, equitable, and profitable. Greening the built environment means looking holistically at natural, human, and economic systems and finding solutions that support quality of life for all. Triple bottom line is also often used to refer to the concept of sustainability. The term was coined by John Elkington, cofounder of the business consultancy SustainAbility, in his 1998 book Cannibals with Forks: the Triple Bottom Line of 21st Century Business. First applied to socially responsible business, the term can characterize all kinds of projects in the built environment. The triple bottom line concept incorporates a long-term view for assessing potential effects and best practices for three kinds of resources: PEOPLE (SOCIAL CAPITAL). All the costs and benefits to the people who design, construct, live in, work in, and constitute the local community and are influenced, directly or indirectly, by a project PLANET (NATURAL CAPITAL). All the costs and benefits of a project on the natural environment, locally and globally PROFIT (ECONOMIC CAPITAL). All the economic costs and benefits of a project for all the stakeholders (not just the project owner) The goal of the triple bottom line, in terms of the built environment, is to ensure that buildings and communities create value for all stakeholders, not just a restricted few. For example, an energy-efficient building that saves the owners money but makes the occupants sick is not sustainable, nor is a material that has a small carbon footprint but was made in a sweatshop, nor is an eco-resort that displaces threatened species or local people. S ECT IO N 1 5  Economic Prosperity THE TRIPLE Environmental BOTTOM Stewardship LINE Social Responsibility Figure 1.2. The Triple Bottom Line A commitment to the triple bottom line means a commitment to look beyond the status quo. It requires consideration of whole communities and whole systems, both at home and around the world. Research is needed to determine the impacts of a given project and find new solutions that are truly sustainable. New tools and processes are required to help projects arrive at integrative, synergistic, sustainable solutions. The triple bottom line requires a shift in perspective about both the costs and the benefits of our decisions. The term externalities is used by economists to describe costs or benefits incurred by parties who are not part of a transaction. For example, the purchase price of a car does not account for the wear and tear it will have on public roads or the pollution it will put into the environment. To shift the valuation process to account for such negative externalities, building professionals require new metrics. The green building process and rating systems have begun to encourage quantification of externalities. The focus has been first on environmental metrics, but the list is expanding to include indicators of social justice and public health. L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON Making buildings more healthful, more comfortable, and more conducive to productivity for their occupants has special significance in light of studies conducted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which found that people in the United States spend, on average, 90% of their time indoors.6 Occupants of green buildings are typically exposed to far lower levels of indoor pollutants and have significantly greater satisfaction with air quality and lighting than occupants of conventional buildings. Research conducted at Carnegie Mellon University shows that these benefits can translate into a 2% to 16% increase in workers’ and students’ productivity. Even small increases in productivity can dramatically increase the value of a building.7 6 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, The Inside Story: A Guide to Indoor Air Quality. U.S. EPA/Office of Air and Radiation. Office of Radiation and Indoor Air (6609J) Cosponsored with the Consumer Product Safety Commission, EPA 402-K-93-007. epa.gov/iaq/pubs/insidestory.html. 7 V. Loftness, V. Hartkopf, B. Gurtekin, and Y. Hua, “Building Investment Decision Support (BIDS™): Cost-Benefit Tool to Promote High Performance Components, Flexible Infrastructures and Systems Integration for Sustainable Commercial Buildings and Productive Organizations,” Report on university research (AIA, 2005). 6  THE RISE OF THE GREEN BUILDING INDUSTRY Many of the elements of green building are not new or even unique. Before the widespread availability of inexpensive fossil fuels for energy use and transportation, builders understood the principles of passive design, capturing sunlight and wind for natural lighting, heating, and cooling. In many ways, green building represents a return to simpler, low-tech solutions. At the same time, there are now many high-tech strategies available to improve the performance of the built environment. Green building is about finding the best combination of solutions to create built environments that seamlessly integrate the best of the old and the new in intelligent and creative ways. The USGBC was formed in 1992, a time when the field was beginning to define itself, to promote and encourage green building. A member-based organization, USGBC engages hundreds of thousands of individuals. The mission of USGBC is “to transform the way buildings and communities are designed, built and operated, enabling an environmentally and socially responsible, healthy, and prosperous environment that improves the quality of life.”8 USGBC supports achievement of this mission through education programs, advocacy, research, an extensive network of local chapters, and the LEED green building program. Soon after it was formed, USGBC began developing LEED for rating and certifying sustainability in the building industry. Experts identified characteristics and performance levels that contributed to a definition of a green building. The first LEED green building rating system was launched in 2000. In the decade that followed, LEED expanded to include systems to address the entire life-cycle of the built environment from land-use planning to operations. It now provides rating systems for a wide array of building types, such as offices, schools, retail establishments, homes, and neighborhoods. The trend toward green building practices in the United States has quickened in the past The Chesapeake Bay Foundation, an environmental advocacy, restoration, and education organization, is headquartered in decade, contributing to a transformation Annapolis, Maryland. Photo credit: Robb Williamson in the market of building products and services, as well as the demand for skilled professionals. As more green products and technologies become available, green building will become more mainstream. Federal, state, and local governments are among those adopting sustainable building practices and policies. For example, the largest federal property owners, the Department of Defense and General Services Administration have policies in place to pursue LEED certification in the new construction and major renovation rating system. Government agencies, utility companies, and manufacturers increasingly offer financial incentives for developers and owners to enhance the environmental performance of their buildings. The goal of LEED is market transformation—to fundamentally change how we design, build, and S ECT IO N 1 operate buildings and communities—through certification that honors levels of achievement in areas such 8 U.S Green Building Council, Strategic Plan 2013 - 2015 (USGBC, 2012). 7  as energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality, and stewardship of resources. More information on USGBC and LEED is provided in Section 5. GREEN BUILDING AND CLIMATE CHANGE Although many environmental impacts are associated with buildings and addressed by rating systems such as LEED, climate change deserves special consideration because buildings and land-use are responsible for a large proportion of greenhouse gas emissions. To be effective, the policies that are emerging at the local, state, and federal levels to regulate greenhouse gas emissions must reflect a clear understanding of the connection between climate change and the built environment. Unfortunately, it is not enough for green building to lessen the effects that humans have on our climate. It must also prepare us for the inevitable consequences of climate change on our homes, communities, and society as a whole. A lower-carbon future will not only have higher-performing buildings but also require higher-performing communities. The built environment, including buildings and transportation systems, accounts for more than two-thirds of all greenhouse gas emissions.9 Greenhouse gas emissions come from many components of the built environment, including building systems and energy use, transportation, water use and treatment, land- cover change, materials, and construction. By improving the efficiency of buildings and communities, we can significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, focusing on building design and construction alone will not achieve the emissions reduction that scientists believe is required to mitigate climate change. Building location is equally important. For example, a typical code-compliant 135,000-square-foot office building in a car-oriented suburban location will be responsible for approximately 8,375 tons (T) of carbon, or 11.8 T per person. Because this building is in the suburbs, emissions from transportation—people driving to and from work—make up half the total emissions associated with the project. L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON 9 Energy Information Administration, Annual Energy Outlook 2008 (EIA, 2008), eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/pdf/0383(2008).pdf. 8  Common Sources of Federal Greenhouse Gas Emissions CH4 N2O HFCs SF6 PFCs CO2 SCOPE SCOPE 2 SCOPE 1 Greenhouse gas emissions resulting from the generation 3 Greenhouse gas Greenhouse gas emissions from of electricity, heat, or emissions from sources sources that are owned steam purchased by a not owned or directly or controlled by a Federal agency. controlled by a Federal Federal agency. agency but related to agency activities. Purchased electricity Purchased heating/cooling Transmission and distribution Vehicles and equipment losses from purchased electricity Purchased steam Stationary sources Business travel On-site landfills & Employee commuting wastewater treatment Contracted solid waste disposal Fugitive emissions Contracted wastewater treatment Figure 1.3. Common Sources of Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Federal Facilities as Called Out by Executive Order 13514. When that same building is moved to a location that is accessible via public transportation, bicycling, or walking, its total emissions decrease. The emissions from transportation are much less, and the relative amount from the building systems increases. When the building is designed and maintained as a green building with improved energy and water performance, the total emissions fall to 3,233 T, or 4.6 T per person. This example demonstrates the important link between buildings and land use and the need to address both to achieve meaningful reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. S ECT IO N 1 9  Figure 1.4. Building Location without Supporting Figure 1.5. Building Location with Infrastructure Infrastructure and Services and Services Carbon emissions provide a useful metric for many aspects of green buildings and communities, including energy, water, solid waste, materials, and transportation, but green building involves more than reducing greenhouse gas emissions. It is important to set goals for other issues as well, such as indoor air quality, human health, and habitat protection. This comprehensive goal-setting process encourages programs and policies that will lead to sustainable communities. The goal-setting process will be discussed in Section 3. ENERGY CONSUMPTION: BUILDING-ASSOCIATED TRANSPORTATION VERSUS OPERATIONS For an average office building in the United States, 30 percent more energy is expended by office workers commuting to and from the building than is consumed by the building itself for heating, cooling, lighting, and other energy uses. Even for an office building built to modern energy codes (ASHRAE 90.1–2010), more than twice as much energy is used by commuters than by the building.10 Flexibility and adaptability are increasingly important attributes of green projects. Although the long- term effects of climate change are uncertain, we know that sea levels will be higher, temperatures higher, droughts longer and more widespread, and flooding more intense. How different regions will experience L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON these changes will vary considerably, and building professionals will have to assess the likely threats to their communities and respond accordingly. GREEN BUILDING OVER TIME Green projects must be prepared to adapt to future change and be designed and operated to stand the test of time. Continuous monitoring is required to identify needed improvements and users’ changing needs. Project teams must look far ahead to determine what stressors a project is likely to encounter and then build resilience into the system. 10 H. Levin. Driving to Green Buildings: The Transportation Energy Intensity of Buildings. Environmental Building News, 16:9 (2007). buildinggreen.com 10 For example, where water supply depends on local snowpack, planning and design efforts might focus on water conservation, water storage, and alternative sources of water in anticipation that the snowpack will shrink. Where summer heat is already high, green builders will have to consider what will happen with even hotter temperatures and ensure that the cooling strategies of buildings can handle higher degree-days and still maintain air quality, which will be exacerbated at higher temperatures. These strategies and others will be discussed in Section 4. The performance of most systems degrades with time, and thus a building’s total emissions footprint incrementally increases over time unless care is taken to maintain the systems properly. Figure 1.6 illustrates building performance by looking at the total amount of carbon emissions over a building’s life-cycle. Building commissioning helps project teams ensure that systems are designed efficiently, are installed appropriately, and operate as intended. Commissioning is the process of verifying and documenting that a building and all its systems and assemblies are planned, designed, installed, tested, operated, and maintained to meet the owner’s project requirements. However, even if initial performance is optimal, emissions will rise as performance falls over time. This trend can be periodically reversed through retrocommissioning, a tune-up that identifies inefficiencies and restores high levels of performance. Commissioning and retrocommissioning will be reviewed in further detail in Section 4. Today’s typical building GHG emissions Today’s efficient building Green, high-performance building Years Figure 1.6. Carbon Emissions Related to Building Performance Over Time Green building professionals strive to follow a path of continuous improvement. Because projects must be designed for the future, their operators need to participate in the design process and obtain the information they will need to monitor and maintain the building’s performance. Operators also benefit from monitoring and verification systems, which enable facilities personnel to identify and resolve issues that arise over time and even enhance a building’s performance throughout the life of the project. S ECT IO N 1 11  A chief goal of green building practitioners is to find new uses for existing structures. Adaptive reuse is the practice of redesigning and using a structure for a use that is significantly different from the building’s original use. Buildings can also be designed to prevent future obsolescence; for example, a flexible floor plan can accommodate offices today and apartments tomorrow. This avoids the environmental consequences of extracting materials for a new building and disposing of demolition waste. The adapted building reuses a site that is already served by infrastructure and avoids the conversion of farmland or forest to development. Designing a project to meet both current and evolving needs is one key to sustainability. Adaptability is also critical for land use and municipal infrastructure, such as roads. Once road networks are established, they can remain fixed for centuries. In Rome, for example, the roadways that existed in ancient times have become today’s automobile roads. This issue is particularly important as we move toward a lower-carbon future. Alternative transportation, including availability of public transportation, is essential for reducing carbon emissions. However, options for alternative and public transit, including bicycling and walking, depend on the proximity of destinations, connectivity of the community, and design of surroundings. Roads that are designed for only motor vehicles do not provide the flexibility or adaptability of a transportation network designed for diverse travel modes. Buildings that protect the history and character of a place also promote sustainability. A project team can take advantage of the community’s past by reusing materials with historic value. Linking the present with the past reinforces a sense of place and helps create attractive communities with viable commercial centers. Sustainable design ensures that buildings and communities will survive and thrive for generations, no matter what the future holds. GREEN BUILDING AND LOCATION A place for everything, everything in its place. Benjamin Franklin L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON Location is a critical element of green building: it can define appropriate strategies, yet it can also limit how green a project can actually be. Depending on the environmental issues that are most critical in a particular area, location can influence a project team’s priorities. Location includes these factors: NATURAL CONTEXT. Climate, sun, wind, orientation, soils, precipitation, local flora and fauna. INFRASTRUCTURAL CONTEXT. Available resources, materials, skills, and connections to utilities, roads and transit. SOCIAL CONTEXT. Connections to the community and other destinations, local priorities, cultural history and traditions, local regulations and incentives. 12 PROJECT CASE STUDY NORTHWEST GARDENS LEED GOLD Northwest Gardens (NWG) is a transit-rich affordable housing development adjacent to downtown Fort Lauderdale, FL. The location of the NWG neighborhood on an urban infill site is ideal for the LEED for Neighborhood Development (LEED ND) program. The community boasts sufficient density to support nearby mass transit, accessible via a gridded street network of compact blocks. The project contains 394 dwelling units located in 44 multi-family buildings in addition to several retail and office buildings. The Housing Authority for the City of Fort Lauderdale (HACFL) welcomed the idea of using LEED ND and engaged their development partner Carlisle Development Group to further improve the community. Together, they expanded programs to install energy efficient street lighting and added pocket parks, community gardens, fruit trees, bioswales and additional walking paths throughout the community. Each of the homes is pursuing LEED for Homes Certification for improvements in energy use, water consumption and indoor air quality. To learn more about Northwest Gardens visit usgbc.org/projects/northwest-gardens S ECT IO N Courtesy of The Housing Authority of the City of Fort Lauderdale 13  Selecting a location is one of the earliest decisions made in a project, and this decision defines many of the opportunities and constraints that the project team will encounter. It can determine whether a project can take advantage of sunlight, have access to public transportation and other services, and protect habitats. As discussed earlier in this section, a building whose occupants must drive long distances may contribute to greenhouse gas emissions, as well as destruction of natural habitat for infrastructure development. To design sustainably for place, a team can start with a project site and determine what uses are most appropriate there. Alternatively, the team can start with a function and find the best place to put it. In either case, the goals of the project must be clear and the needs and resources must be clearly identified so that the building can be carefully integrated into its context and support a thriving and sustainable local community. Project teams with a goal of sustainability develop a deep understanding of the place and context in which their projects are built. They go beyond a cursory site assessment and study the land and its history. They look for ways to make connections to the immediate site, the surrounding watershed, or ecological features and promote their healthy evolution. They also engage the community’s traditions, strengths, and needs in order to ascertain how the project can contribute to social and economic well-being and growth. GREEN BUILDING COSTS AND SAVINGS At first glance, the additional work and alternative materials needed to build green may seem like a burdensome cost, but closer attention reveals this perception to be misleading. If sustainability is viewed as an expensive add-on to a building, we would mistake efforts to reduce energy costs or improve indoor environmental quality as comparable to specifying a better grade of countertop or a more impressive front door. Under this approach, any improvement beyond a minimally code-compliant baseline looks like an added cost. If, however, we consider energy improvements part of an overall process, we often find that the added costs are balanced by long-term savings. The initial expenditures continue to pay back over time, like a good investment. The best returns on these investments are realized when green building is integrated into the process at the earliest stages rather than as a last-minute effort. For instance, specification of more costly, high-performance windows may allow for the use of a smaller, lower-cost heating, ventilation, L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON and air-conditioning (HVAC) system. More fundamentally, if we view sustainable design as part of the necessary functional requirements for building an energy-efficient structure and providing a safe, healthful environment, we can compare the cost of the green building with that of other buildings in the same class, rather than against an artificially low baseline. A landmark study by the firm Davis Langdon found no significant difference between the average cost of a LEED-certified building and other new construction in the same category: there are expensive green buildings, and there are expensive conventional buildings. Certification as a green building was not a significant indicator of construction cost.11 11 L.F. Matthiessen and P. Morris, “Cost of Green Revisited: Reexamining the Feasibility and Cost Impact of Sustainable Design in the Light of Increased Market Adoption” (Davis Langdon, 2007), davislangdon.com. 14 Interestingly, the public dramatically overestimates the marginal cost of green building. A 2007 public opinion survey conducted by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development found that respondents believed, on average, that green features added 17% to the cost of a building, whereas a study of 146 green buildings found an actual average marginal cost of less than 2%.12 Green building is, however, a significant predictor of tangible improvements in building performance, and those improvements have considerable value. Studies have shown that certified green buildings command significantly higher rents. A University of California–Berkeley study analyzed 694 certified green buildings and compared them with 7,489 other office buildings, each located within a quarter-mile of a green building in the sample. The researchers found that, on average, certified green office buildings rented for 2% more than comparable nearby buildings. After adjusting for occupancy levels, they identified a 6% premium for certified buildings. The researchers calculated that at prevailing capitalization rates, this adds more than $5 million to the market value of each property.13 BEYOND GREEN Initially, green buildings were intended to reduce damage to the environment and human health caused by creating and maintaining buildings and neighborhoods. As the concept of sustainability was applied to the built environment, it has become clear that doing less damage is not enough. Leaders in the field now speak about buildings and communities that are regenerative, meaning that these sustainable environments evolve with living systems and contribute to the long-term renewal of resources and life. Some practitioners have begun to explore what it would mean to move beyond “sustainable” and participate as a positive developmental force in our ecosystems and communities. The focus is on building a comprehensive understanding of the place in which the project is located, recognizing the site’s patterns and flow of life. Accordingly, such projects contribute to the healthy coevolution of humans and all life in that place. They thrive on diversity, for example, and clean the air rather than pollute it. Regenerative projects and communities involve stakeholders and require interactivity. Figure 1.7. Regenerative Design S ECT IO N 1 12 G. Kats et al., Green Buildings and Communities: Costs and Benefits (Good Energies, 2008). 13 P. Eichholtz, N. Kok, and J.M. Quigley, “Doing Well by Doing Good? Green Office Buildings” (Institute of Business and Economic Research, University of California–Berkeley, 2008), mistra.org/download/18.39aa239f11a8dd8de6b800026477/IBER+Green+Office+Buil dings+NKok+et+al.pdf. 15  Regenerative projects support the health of the local community and regional ecosystems, generate electricity and send the excess to the grid, return water to the hydrologic system cleaner than it was before use, serve as locations for food production and community networking, regenerate biodiversity, and promote many other relationships that link the projects to the whole system of life around them. Regenerative projects strive toward “net-zero”—using no more resources than they can produce. For example, net-zero energy projects use no more energy from the grid than they generate on site. These projects may be connected to the grid, drawing electricity from it at night and contributing energy from on- site renewable energy systems during the day, such that their total energy cost is zero. Other projects strive for carbon neutrality, emitting no more carbon emissions than they can either sequester or offset. Still other projects are designed to achieve a more even water balance: they use no more water than that which falls on site as precipitation, or they produce zero waste by recycling, reusing, or composting all materials. Not all projects can achieve those levels of performance. Nevertheless, on average, green buildings save energy, use less water, generate less waste, and provide more healthful, more comfortable indoor environments. Specific strategies will be discussed in Section 4 of this guide. Getting to green and beyond requires more than learning about new technologies and strategies. It requires more than learning to apply LEED checklists. Achieving true sustainability requires a new approach to creating and caring for the built environment. GREEN BUILDING EXPERTISE Green building requires new skills and new knowledge, as well as new attitudes and new mindsets. In a linear and hierarchical practice, each participant does his or her part and passes the job on to the next in line. There is little interaction, and people are compartmentalized by discipline or profession. By contrast, the green building process is interdisciplinary, iterative, and collaborative. Teamwork and critical thinking are valued. Everyone needs to learn to ask the right questions and to participate in developing the solutions. Feedback loops are built into the entire process. The new skills required for a green building practice are not just knowledge of new strategies, materials, or L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON equipment, although these are necessary. Green building practitioners need to learn how teams work, how to facilitate or participate in a productive discussion, how to work with people with different backgrounds and skills, and how to think outside their normal comfort zones when developing ideas. They need to be able to understand an ecologist’s report on the proposed site, or better still, participate in walking the site and contributing to the assessment. They need to be able to question one another—Why should something be done the way it always has been done it in the past?—and then consider, what if…? These are not skills and knowledge that most practitioners traditionally receive during their professional education and training. Most architects, engineers, landscape architects, planners, and business managers learn skills on the job and through trial and error, such as by facilitating meetings with team members and stakeholders. These opportunities will be explored in greater depth in Section 3. Additionally, training programs can help build these skills by combining experience with more formal classes, workshops, and online education. University curricula are beginning to incorporate these skills, but it may be several years before green expertise becomes the norm. 16 This guide is intended to set the foundation needed to develop green building expertise. A fresh perspective will change the way you look at the buildings we all live and work in, the ones we walk past, and the ones we revere as beacons of innovation in our communities. It will challenge you to imagine the next green building project to which you’ll contribute.  CORE CON CEPTS — TH E DIT I ON 18 L EED CORE L EED CON CEPTS GU ID E G—UIDE T HIRD EDIR ITD I ON Thinking Sustainable Section 2 Green building will change the way you think. Buildings that seem to be individual, static objects will reveal themselves as fluid parts of an environmental system that changes over time. Professionals who appeared only distantly related will become partners in a dynamic process that incoporates perspectives from different fields. No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it. Albert Einstein This section reviews three major concepts that are integral to green building and sustainability: systems thinking, life-cycle thinking, and integrative processes. In systems thinking, the built environment is understood as a series of relationships in which each part affects many other parts. Systems include materials, resources, energy, people, and information, as well as the complex interactions and flows between these elements across space and through time. Green building also requires taking a life-cycle approach, looking at all stages of a project, product, or service. It requires asking, where do building materials and resources come from? Where will they go once their useful life ends? What effects do they have on the world along the way? Questions such as these encourage practitioners to ensure that buildings are adaptable and resilient and perform as expected while minimizing harmful consequences. Finally, to achieve results that are based on whole systems across their entire life-cycle, building professionals must adopt an integrative process. This approach emphasizes connections and communication among professionals and stakeholders throughout the life of a project. It breaks down disciplinary boundaries and rejects linear planning and design processes that can lead to inefficient solutions. Although the term “integrative design” is most often applied to new construction or renovations, an integrative process is applicable to any phase in the life-cycle of a building. In green building, solutions are examined through different perspectives, scales, and levels of detail, and then refined. The lens of each discipline involved in a project contributes to an overall view that leads to more effective designs. For example, sustainable neighborhood design strategies might be analyzed by land-use planners, traffic engineers, civil engineers, infrastructure designers, public health experts, and developers. The more each team member understands the perspectives and strategies of the others, the more integrated the design. The iterative pattern of an integrative process can be used throughout the project as details come into focus. Far from being time consuming, the process can actually save time by encouraging communication up front and bringing people together for highly productive collaborative work sessions. S ECT IO N 2 19  INTEGRATIVE DESIGN MEETS THE REAL WORLD In the article “Integrated Design Meets the Real World,” the authors note that users of an integrated approach “… got better at the process over time, especially when they were able to work with the same team members more than once. Once they’d gone through the process, they found it valuable, and many couldn’t imagine doing design any other way.”14 This section addresses problem-solving approaches that can be applied throughout the green building process. Subsequent sections will explore how green building professionals can begin to incorporate these ideas into projects and professional pursuits. SYSTEMS THINKING Sustainability involves designing and operating systems to survive and thrive over time. To understand sustainable systems, we must further understand what we mean by systems. A system is an assemblage of elements or parts that interact in a series of relationships to form a complex whole that serves particular functions or purposes. The theory behind systems thinking has had a profound effect on many fields of study, such as computer science, business, psychology, and ecology. Donella Meadows, Jørgen Randers, and Dennis Meadows, pioneers in the study of systems and sustainability, describe this discipline in their book The Limits to Growth. A system can be physically small (an ant hill) or large (the entire universe), simple and self-contained (bacteria in a Petri dish) or complex and interacting with other systems (the global trading system or a forest ecosystem). Systems rarely exist in isolation; even the bacteria in the Petri dish are affected by the light and temperature of the laboratory. The boundaries of a system depend on what we are looking at, and most systems are actually systems within systems. For example, the human body is made up of many interlinking internal systems, such as the musculoskeletal system, which interact with external systems, such as the natural environment. L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON Our training taught us to see the world as a set of unfolding behavior patterns, such as growth, decline, oscillation, overshoot. It has taught us to focus not so much on single pieces of a system, as on connections. We see the elements of demography, economy, and the environment as one planetary system, with innumerable interconnections. We see stocks and flows and feedbacks and interconnections, all of which influence the way the system will behave in the future and influence the actions we might take to change its behavior.15 14 A. Wendt and N. Malin, Integrated Design Meets the Real World, Environmental Building News 19(5) (2010), buildinggreen.com/articles/IssueTOC.cfm?Volume=19&Issue=5. 15 Donella H. Meadows, Dennis L. Meadows, Jorgen Randers, and William W. Behrens III. (1972). The Limits to Growth. New York: Universe Books. 20 Many systems in the modern world are designed as open systems, into which materials and resources are constantly brought in from the outside, used in some way, and then released outside the system in some form of waste. For example, in most urban American communities, water, food, energy, and materials are imported into the city from sources outside the municipal boundaries. In fact, many of our materials and resources are imported from around the world. After they have been used inside the city, they are released as waste in the form of sewage, solid waste, and pollution. In nature, there are no open systems; dead and decaying matter become food for something else, and everything goes somewhere. There is no “away.” By slowing the passing of materials and resources through the system and linking elements to form new relationships and functions, we can begin to mimic nature and design closed systems, which are more sustainable. When designing buildings and communities, we must understand both the individual elements of the system and their relationships to each other as a whole. One decision may have a ripple effect. For example, improvements in the building envelope, the boundary between the exterior and interior elements of a building, can change the requirements for the mechanical system. Using better insulation or more efficient windows might allow for a smaller heating system. At the same time, reducing air infiltration can raise concerns about the indoor air quality. Envelope design can also be used to increase daylight into the space, affecting lighting design, heating, and air-conditioning as well as improving the quality of the indoor space. But envelopes designed for increased daylighting without consideration of glare and heat gain can create uncomfortable and less productive spaces. Even the interior finishes and furnishings can change the effectiveness of natural daylighting and ventilation strategies. Optimizing components in isolation tends to pessimize the whole system— and hence the bottom line. You can actually make a system less efficient, simply by not properly linking up those components … If they’re not designed to work with one another, they’ll tend to work against one another. Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins, and L. Hunter Lovins Natural Capitalism The concept of feedback loops helps explain how systems work. Feedback loops are the information flows within a system that allow that system to organize itself. For example, when a thermostat indicates that the temperature in a room is too warm, it sends a signal to turn on the air-conditioning. When the room is sufficiently cooled, the thermostat sends a signal for the air-conditioning to stop. This type of feedback loop is called a negative feedback loop because embedded in the system’s response to a change is a signal for the system to stop changing when that response is no longer needed. Negative S ECT IO N 2 feedback loops enable a system to self-correct and stay within a particular range of function or performance. Thus, they keep systems stable. 21  Sensor Which raises the temperature and melts more snow Fewer surfaces remain covered with snow As the earth When snow melts, gets warmer the darker surfaces Stimulus Counteraction absorb more heat Figure 2.1. Negative Feedback Loop Figure 2.2. Positive Feedback Loop POSITIVE FEEDBACK LOOPS, on the other hand, are self-reinforcing: the stimulus causes an effect, and the effect produces even more of that same effect. Population growth is a positive feedback loop. The more babies who are born, the more people there will be in the population to have more babies. Therefore, the population can be expected to rise until acted upon by another force, such as an epidemic or shortage of resources. In the built environment, roads and infrastructure built out to the urban fringe often result in a positive feedback loop of increased development. This suburban growth can sprawl far from the urban core, requiring more roads and encouraging additional growth, as well as using more resources (energy, water, sewage systems, materials) to support that growth. Climate change is another positive feedback loop. As the earth gets warmer, fewer surfaces remain covered with snow, a reflective surface that bounces incoming heat from the sun back into space. When snow melts, the darker surfaces absorb more heat, which raises the temperature and melts more snow. Similarly, in the built environment, the dark surfaces of roofs, roads, and parking lots absorb more heat from the sun. This heat island effect raises temperatures in urban areas several degrees above the temperature of surrounding L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON areas, increasing the demand for cooling and the amount of energy that buildings use. The additional energy use can increase carbon emissions, which contribute to global warming, further raising urban temperatures and energy use, and the cycle continues. 22  Figure 2.3. Induced Growth Over Time Unchecked, positive feedback loops can create chaos in a system. For example, if urban temperatures rise too high, local populations may suffer or abandon the area. In nature, positive feedback loops are typically checked by stabilizing negative feedback loops, processes that shut down uncontrolled growth or other destabilizing forces. Stability and resilience in the system return as the feedback loops begin to control the change. To design sustainable systems, we must understand the positive and negative feedback loops already in existence or those we set in motion, to ensure systems remain stable and habitable over time. Feedback loops—positive or negative—depend on flows of information. When information about the performance of the system is missing or blocked, the system cannot respond. For example, buildings without appropriate sensors and control systems cannot adjust to changing temperatures and maintain a comfortable indoor environment. The information must be both collected and directed. Most buildings have thermostats to provide information and control temperature. However, there are many other parameters, measurable or quantifiable characteristics of a system, that are relevant to sustainability but do not get measured or reported in effective ways. For example, the amount of energy used by tenant-occupied buildings may be collected by an electricity or gas meter and reported to the utility company but not to the occupants, who therefore have no information about their energy consumption and no incentive to reduce it. If real-time information on energy use is delivered to them in a convenient way, they can use energy more efficiently. Some have called this the Prius effect, after the hybrid car that gives drivers information about fuel consumption so that they can drive in a fuel-efficient way.16 Installing real-time energy meters where operators can act on the information is an example of connecting elements of a system so that they can interact and respond to each other more appropriately in the feedback loop. S ECT IO N 2 16 Brand Neutral, The Prius Effect: Learning from Toyota (2007), brandneutral.com/documents/Prius_Effect.pdf. 23  THE PRIUS EFFECT Delivering real-time energy information in a convenient way by installing meters where operators can act on the information and make changes to use energy more efficiently. In addition to elements, their relationships, and the feedback loops among them, systems theory explores the emergent properties of a system—patterns that emerge from the system as a whole and are more than the sum of the parts. For example, the pattern of waves crashing along the beach is an emergent property: the pattern is more than the water molecules that make up the ocean, more than the surface of the shore, more than the gravitational pull of the moon or the influence of the wind. The waves emerge as a result of the interactions and relationships among the elements. Similarly, the culture of a company emerges from the people who work there, the buildings in which they work, the services or products they provide, the way they receive and process information, the management and power structure, and the financial structure. These elements and flows combine in both predictable and unpredictable ways to form a unique and individual organization. The elements of the system (people, buildings), the flows within the system (of materials, money, and information), the rules that govern those flows (management and structures), and the functions of the system (providing goods or services, generating a profit) determine whether the company is a good place to work and will be sustainable over time. To influence the behavior of a system, it is important to find the leverage points—places where a small intervention can yield large changes. Providing building occupants with real-time energy information is an example of using a leverage point to alter behavior. Rather than changing the elements of the system—the envelope of the structure, the mechanical system, the building occupants, the electricity grid—the change focuses merely on delivering available data to a point where it can be acted on appropriately. This minor tweak can dramatically raise the efficiency of the system. Donella Meadows’s essay “Leverage Points: Places to Intervene in a System” provides an excellent summary of how to find and use leverage points to make meaningful change.17 L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON In Natural Capitalism, Hawkens, Lovins, and Lovins explore how capital markets can be used for—rather than against—sustainability, not by eliminating them or adding intensive regulation, but by using leverage points within the system. One leverage point they examine is the goals that govern the system. By valuing not only financial capital but also natural capital and human capital, existing systems and structures can lead to sustainability. 17 D. Meadows, Leverage Points: Places to Intervene in a System (1999), sustainer.org/pubs/Leverage_Points.pdf. 24 PROJECT CASE STUDY CANNON DESIGN CHICAGO OFFICE RELOCATION LEED PLATINUM Cannon Design’s Chicago office, certified under LEED for Commercial Interiors, relocated to Michigan Plaza, two adjacent mixed-use office towers in Chicago’s central business district. The company’s former longtime home spread employees and operations across four different floors, so this move marked a watershed: for the first time Chicago office employees are now able to occupy a single, contiguous 60,000 square foot floor that spans two buildings. Ultimately, this is a workplace designed to benefit the people that work in it. Prior to relocating to this space, the project team conducted an online survey open to all employees to estimate the percentage of time employees dedicated to formal and informal collaboration, learning, personal head-down work time and socialization. The space plan for the project responded to needs identified in this survey. In all, the design incorporates twenty different workplace setting types to encourage all employees to work in the manner that best suits each individual’s style and the task at hand. Canon Design also valued an energy-efficient space, and used the site selection process to achieve their goals—the chosen building is certified under ENERGY STAR and achieved Gold under the LEED O+M rating system. An interactive sustainability reporting dashboard occupies a prominent space in the heart of the office, immediately adjacent to the library and central gathering space. This dashboard tracks real-time energy consumption within the office and also displays other key annual environmental measures for the office, including waste management, water consumption and vehicle miles traveled. To learn more about the Cannon S ECT IO N Design Chicago office visit usgbc.org/projects/cannon-design-chicago-office-relocation Photo by Christopher Barrett 25  LEVERAGE POINTS Places to Intervene in a System (in increasing order of effectiveness): 12. Constant, parameters, numbers (such as subsidies, taxes, standards) 11. The sizes of buffers and other stabilizing stocks, relative to their flows 10. The structure of material stocks and flows (such as transport networks, population age structures) 9. The lengths of delays, relative to the rate of system change 8. The strength of negative feedback loops, relative to the impacts they are trying to correct against 7. The gain around driving positive feedback loops 6. The structure of information flows (who does and does not have access to what kinds of information) 5. The rules of the system (such as incentives, punishments, constraints) 4. The power to add, change, evolve, or self-organize system structure 3. The goals of the system 2. The mindset or paradigm out of which the system—its goals, structure, rules, delays, parameters—arises 1. The power to transcend paradigms For instance, when carpet manufacturer Interface Flooring switched from being a producer of carpet to a provider of the service of floor coverings, it created a shift in the company’s mission. Instead of buying carpet, customers could buy the service of the carpet, which would be owned by Interface. The company would be responsible for maintaining the carpet over time, replacing worn areas, and disposing of any “waste.” This shift served as a leverage point to enable the company system to change radically toward sustainability, reducing waste, and improving performance of the product while maintaining profit. In other words, Interface Flooring moved Building Envelope System from an open system to a closed system. The new mental model resulted not just in more efficient processes, but also in a Dehumidification L EED CORE CON CEPTS G UIDE — TH IR D E DIT I ON System radical restructuring of the company and all its operations. HVAC System Buildings are part of a world of nested systems that affect and are affected by one another. Once the project team understands the Electrical network of systems that affect a given project, System the energy and matter that flow through the systems, and the relationships and interdependencies that exist, the deeper Figure 2.4. Nested Systems and more effectively integration can occur. 26 When designing aspects of the built environment, consider the systems in which the project will be located and the systems the project will create. Learn about the relationships between the elements, the flows of resources and information, and the leverage points that can lead to dramatic changes. Before starting any project, the team can explore these systems by asking questions. Whether working in the planning, design, construction, or operations phase, these questions may provide insight into the systems context and ways to move more fully toward sustainability in an integrated way. QUESTIONS A PROJECT TEAM NEEDS TO EXPLORE AS MEMBERS BEGIN WORKING TOGETHER, INCLUDE: Where is the project located, and who are its neighbors—locally, regionally, and beyond? What is the local watershed? The bioregion? What are the characteristics of these systems? How do resources, such as energy, water, and materials, flow into the project? Where do they come from, and from how far away? What other purposes or projects do those flows serve? What natural processes are at work on the site? How do resources, such as rainwater, wastewater, and solid waste, flow out of the system? Where do they go? Are there places on site where these flows can be captured, stored, or reused? What are the goals of the owner? What is the function or purpose of the project? How will the project meet those goals? What is the community within the project? Who are the people who come here, and where do they come from? Where do they go? What brings them together, and what might keep them apart? How will the project change their interactions? How does the project community interact with other, overlapping communities? What are the interrelationships? Are there sources of conflicts? What is the economic system within the project? How does it fit into larger or overlapping economic systems? What are the leverage points within the system? Are there places where small changes can produce big results? In