hundreds of builders and improved <strong>the</strong> energy performanceof 15,000 homes, very few of which wouldhave participated in <strong>the</strong> much more rigorous LEEDsystem.Critics complain that Built Green requires little in<strong>the</strong> way of site selection, water savings or materialselection. <strong>The</strong>y fur<strong>the</strong>r note <strong>the</strong> EnerGuide R-2000standard -- which forms <strong>the</strong> basis for both <strong>the</strong> trainingof Built Green builders and <strong>the</strong> bar above which BuiltGreen platinum homes must rise -- was drafted 30years ago by <strong>the</strong> federal government, and represents anarrow and outdated definition of green building.BOMA BESt (aka Go Green, aka Green Globes,aka BREEAM-Canada)Just to spice <strong>up</strong> this alphabet so<strong>up</strong> of acronyms, <strong>the</strong>o<strong>the</strong>r major Canadian green building certification systemhas operated under several different names.More than 800 commercial buildings have been certifiedunder <strong>the</strong> system now known as BOMA BESt.BOMA BESt shares a common ancestry with LEED.Both evolved <strong>from</strong> <strong>the</strong> United Kingdom’s BRE EnvironmentalAssessment Method (BREEAM), whichin 1990 was first to offer an environmental label forbuildings.<strong>The</strong> Canadian Standards Association publishedBREEAM-Canada as a guideline (but not a ratingsystem) for existing buildings in 1996. <strong>The</strong> Americanauthors of <strong>the</strong> first LEED standard have acknowledgedborrowing ideas <strong>from</strong> BREEAM and BREE-AM-Canada.A program called Green Globes was created in 2000as an assessment and rating tool based on <strong>the</strong> BREE-AM-Canada guidelines. And in 2004, <strong>the</strong> BuildingOwners and Manufacturers Association of Canada(BOMA) adopted a version of <strong>the</strong> BREEAM-Canada/Green Globe standard for existing buildings, andrebranded it Go Green.BOMA subsequently renamed its program BOMABESt (for Existing Buildings). BOMA BESt featuresfour levels of certification and a simplified onlineapplication procedure. Participants assess <strong>the</strong>ir ownfacilities, <strong>the</strong>n hire a third-party verifier to achievecertification.Major commercial real estate firms such as CadillacFairview, Bentall Real Estate, SNC Lavalin Profacand GWL Realty Advisors use BOMA BESt, whichclaims its certified buildings use 11 per cent lessenergy and 18 per cent less water than <strong>the</strong> industrystandard.Complicating <strong>the</strong> brand a bit fur<strong>the</strong>r, an Americangro<strong>up</strong> called <strong>the</strong> Green Building Initiative was createdin 2004 to launch an industry-led version ofGreen Globes in <strong>the</strong> states. That system is based ona 1,000-point scale divided into categories similar toLEED: site, energy, water, resources and materials,emissions and effluents and project management. Asis <strong>the</strong> case with LEED, roughly a third of <strong>the</strong> totalpoints are allotted in <strong>the</strong> energy category.A University of Minnesota team published a detailedcomparison of <strong>the</strong> American LEED and Green Globesystems. <strong>The</strong> 2006 study found “<strong>the</strong> Green Globessystem appears to be doing a fairly good job in improving<strong>up</strong>on <strong>the</strong> delivery mechanisms employedby LEED which are so often criticized. <strong>The</strong> onlineapproach to assessment not only improves efficiencyand reduces costs, but also provides opportunities toinfluence <strong>the</strong> design and planning processes of <strong>the</strong>project through immediate feedback not available<strong>from</strong> a primarily paper-based system.”Next-generation rating systemsWhile Built Green and Green Globes serve <strong>the</strong> greenbuilding industry by providing less complicated alternativesto LEED, a new pair of labels have challengedLEED’s dominance by offering even more stringentstandards.Passivhaus is a European standard focused solely onenergy use. Passivhaus certified buildings must consumeno more than 15 kilowatt hours of energy persquare metre per year. In order to achieve this rigid requirement,Passivhause structures are s<strong>up</strong>er-insulatedand astonishingly airtight. Many are built withoutfurnaces, even in nor<strong>the</strong>rn countries.30
<strong>The</strong>re are an estimated 25,000 Passivhaus buildingsin Europe, but only a handful in North America. Oneis in Whistler. (Click back for more about passivhausnext week in this series.)Living Buildings, on <strong>the</strong> o<strong>the</strong>r hand, produce <strong>the</strong>irown energy, capture and process <strong>the</strong>ir own water andrelease minimal toxins. <strong>The</strong> Living Building Challengedescribes itself as “a philosophy, advocacyplatform and certification program” that aims to be<strong>the</strong> most stringent in <strong>the</strong> world. (More about LivingBuildings later in this series.)A project of <strong>the</strong> Cascadia Region Green BuildingCouncil -- <strong>the</strong> only multinational chapter of <strong>the</strong> U.S.and Canada green building councils -- <strong>the</strong> InternationalLiving Building Institute will convene its fifthannual unconference in Vancouver this April.31
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