Does LEED Really Work?
What good is a LEED-certified building? Lots of people — including architects, engineers, building contractors and real estate developers — are asking the same question. Since it was developed by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) over 10 years ago, LEED has come under constant criticism. Why are people complaining about a program that creates more green buildings? Because it actually doesn’t create more green buildings, skeptics argue. What it does, they claim, is create a multimillion-dollar source of revenue for the non-profit USGBC while providing a great marketing tool for developers. But in reality, many LEED-certified buildings are not all that green — some, in fact, are downright brown and use huge amounts of energy. How can a LEED-certified building be an energy hog? LEED has gone through severa
