Every LEED Certification/Accreditation Fee In One Place

I had a few requests today at work for clarifications on LEED fees, presumably because they're a little hard to find or that they require 3-4 clicks to get to from the main website and my coworkers are lazy (just kidding... please don't fire me!)

Perhaps an unfair picture for this post, but then again...

As a result, I thought all you LEED power users might appreciate a post that will link directly to fees for every rating system. In each case, fees all versions of the rating system are indicated:

• LEED New Construction
• LEED for Schools
• LEED for Core and Shell (includes fees for LEED-CS Precertification)
• LEED for Commercial Interiors
• LEED for Existing Buildings, Operations and Maintenance (includes fees for recertification)
• LEED for Neighborhood Development (includes fees for all review stages)
• LEED for Homes (does not include fees for LEED Provider or Green Rater)
• LEED Green Associate Exam (includes Credentialing Maintenance costs)
• LEED Accredited Professional Exam (includes all specialties and Credentialing Maintenance costs)
• LEED for Homes Green Rater Exam

So that's that, and I hope it makes you're life slightly easier... If any of these links break please let me know by leaving a comment!

Learning from the LEED-Homes Platinum 100K House

A few years ago, Chad Ludeman and Nic Darling of Postgreen embarked on a journey "to build a LEED Platinum home for $100,000 in hard construction costs." Lucky for you, they not only succeeded but documented the entire process on their popular 100K House blog!

Image credit: Postgreen

While their blog covers topics beyond the original project and is definitely a recommended read as a whole, I wanted to highlight some of the posts I found most helpful for LEED APs embarking on a LEED-Homes project... or you could just go directly to the 20 posts under the LEED category:

• To LEED or Not To LEED
• LEED Design Charrette Today
• Results of the LEED Design Charrette
• LEED for Homes Basic Process and Fees
• LEED for Homes - Home Size Adjustment Calculations
• Innovation & Design Process - LEED for Homes Review
• Construction Waste Management Recap
• LEED Landscaping Requirements

New readers may not be aware of a similar that that I profiled a over a year and a half ago (has it been that long???), The Lambert LEED Home. Know of other great LEED Homes resources that deserve attention? Let us know by leaving a comment.

Residental LEED Projects Already Surpass Commercial Projects in Total Certifications

I noticed a while back from the USGBC updates that residential certifications were quickly catching up to their commercial counterparts. A USGBC Update from 03.11.10 there are now 5,000 'residential' certifications and 4,890 commercial projects in existence, though there are still slightly more commercial registered projects... amazing growth considering the first LEED-NC system was released over ten years ago while LEED-Homes was only launched in April of 2009...

USGBC Update from 03.11.10

I think this is great news... at this point everyone in the industry knows about LEED, so the only growth in awareness is going to have to come from the general public. As LEED Homes grows in popularity it only stands to reason that the other systems will gain wider recognition and demand as well. Wider demand means better benefits for certification (in higher lease rates and such), which will then spur increased demand for certification, which means more awareness still, and the glorious feedback loop continues on and on...

Details and More Details

When I first noticed this I shot off a quick email to the USGBC communications department to get some clarity on the distinction between 'residential' and 'commercial' projects. (Before you ask... I got a very timely reply... the fault for the delay in the post is all mine!) Residential projects are comprised of residential units, not necessarily project certifications (e.g. a multifamily building with 8 units earning a single LEED Homes rating counts not once but eight times) certified under traditional LEED for Homes or the LEED for Homes Mid-Rise Pilot systems. Commercial buildings are presumably everything else...

The next question I asked was whether the growth LEED Homes speciality accreditations were outpacing the other systems, but the response from the USGBC was that this is not the case yet...

LEED-Homes First Impressions... FREAKIN LOVE IT!

The firm I work at has been involved in an affordable housing project seeking LEED-Homes certification for a few months now, and until this morning I was largely uninvolved. Today though I was asked to run through the checklist and start to figure out who does what. Here's what I've learned so far:

• The LEED-Homes certification process is infinitely more user friendly than the other LEED systems. Instead of a mysterious review team located somewhere in communist Berlin, you can actually pick up a phone to work through documentation issues with your provider!
• LEED-Homes is remarkably straightforward. It's clear cut, prescriptive, and most anyone can understand the requirements without a PhD in LEEDology. I understand that homes have much more consistent issues than commercial projects that makes this possible, but that doesn't make it any less nice.
• There seems to be a great balance of design justification and in the field performance verification. I may find that as we enter into the construction phase that I may learn to hate LEED-Homes for the same reason, but we have a quality team and I don't expect that to be the case. Having a HERS rater evaluate the building as constructed in theory sounds like a much simpler way of determining relative energy performance over ASHRAE modeling.

Where would this blog be without marginally related photos?

ps... the bacon represents LEED-Homes, and I'm the cat.

Now, it's important to understand that our consultants and review team have already done a significant amount of work coordinating the design already, but from a pure documentation standpoint I can't get over how user-friendly this process is. Thanks for indulging my raves... I don't gush very often, but we need to figure out how to make the other LEED systems this simple to use while maintaining their rigor. I don't have an answer for that, but given the litany of issues I've faced recently surrounding project boundaries, I can say for sure a quick call to the review team would likely solve hours worth of headaches. Get on it guys!

Walking Through a Real Life LEED-Homes Project

Well folks, it looks like Real Life LEED finally has some competition, and I couldn't be more excited... Gretchen and Scott Lambert, two architects from Columbia, SC decided not only to pursue LEED-Homes certification as they remodeled their home, but also to blog about the process!

Hot remodeling action!

This blog is an excellent mix of practical info about the remodel and technical info about the LEED-Homes process. It's the kind of blog I would write if I knew anything about LEED-Homes, which I don't. There's even a running tally of Yes, No, and Maybe points that's updated regularly. The only bad thing is that they're somewhat far into the process already, so you have a lot of reading to do to catch up. Start now!