In its first three years on the market, LEEDv4 registered less than 5% of all new LEED projects, with the balance going to the cheaper and easier-to-understand LEED 2009. This does not bode well for the future of new project registrations, now that LEEDv4 is the only LEED system available for project registrations.

LEED project certifications in commercial interiors increased in 2016 after falling in 2014 and 2015. Retail project certifications also increased. Still, both totals are very small compared to the huge size of both 86 billion sq.ft. of nonresidential floor space and 1.1 million retail buildings.

In 2016, nonresidential new construction and core and shell LEED certifications fell 21% below 2015 levels, to only about 1,500 projects, down about one-third from the peak in 2013. 

LEED, Trump, Alternative Facts, and the Resistance: The truth behind LEED's propaganda piece from last week is something quite different than what the US Green Building Council says, in these very expensive ads running in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post. Of course, in the new political climate anyone can claim anything with very little in the way of response. But I do think some of the claims are so preposterous that they warrant a little response. Take a look!

While the trend in US certifications of existing nonresidential buildings is up quite modestly the past three years, the numbers are still shockingly low: less than 700 projects certified annually since 2010. This number represents each year only slightly more than one in 10,000 (0.01%) of the 5.8 million US nonresidential buildings.

In 2016 LEED use in US higher education projects fell precipitously, declining more than 50% from 2015 levels. Talking to one higher education facility manager last month, he indicated that while the campus was going to continue to build to green building standards embodied in LEED, he saw no benefit to further certifications on future construction projects. He also said it had become a "hard sell" to campus administrators. So in one sense, LEED has succeeded in having its standards used; in another sense, it has failed to communicate enough value for the cost to get campus officials to use it.

For this week's blog, I wanted to look more into the "weeds," the details of how one goes about designing platforms for managing smart buildings and smart portfolios, with a focus on an outstanding user experience, the first step to getting something actually used in the marketplace. I asked my colleagues at Switch Automation for some insight as to how they do it. 

Everyone's talking about zero net energy buildings as the next frontier in green building. But what does "zero" really mean? What about retrofits - is it even possible to renovate existing buildings to be "Zero Net" energy? For example, Alphabet/Google reports that in 2017 they will be a zero net energy/100% renewable energy company, for all of their buildings and data centers, using purchased green power. But shouldn't we hold them to a more stringent definition.

Part 2 of my discussion of 10 green building megatrends for 2017 to 2020. Green building megatrends are firmly in place for the next 5 years. Read this week and last week about my specific predictions for the leading trends of 2017. Then prepare your business to succeed by taking advantage of these trends to restructure your consulting, marketing and product offerings to follow these trends.

Green building megatrends are firmly in place for the next 5 years. Read this week and next about my specific predictions for the leading trends of 2017. Then prepare your business to succeed by taking advantage of these trends to restructure your consulting, marketing and product offerings to follow these trends.