Proposed Leed Amendment Latest In Ongoing Feud between Greenists and The Chemical Industry

July 1, 2013- Environment & Energy Daily reports on the feud between the chemical industry and the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), an on-going issue that is heating up over pending legislation.

A common-sense, bipartisan energy efficiency bill, S. 761, introduced by Senators Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) and Rob Portman (R-Ohio), is currently waiting for its turn to come before the Senate.

Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) is authoring an amendment that opponents fear is intended to prohibit the Government Services Administration (GSA) from using the USGBC's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system to gauge the efficiency and sustainability of federal buildings.

For more than a year, chemical manufacturers and other groups have been actively fighting proposed LEED changes to discourage certain building materials and also creating their own alternative coalitions to the USGBC. Last year Sen. Landrieu joined other senators in signing a letter to the GSA urging abandonment of LEED unless the chemical provisions were removed.

Landrieu maintains we “can achieve a LEED standard without having specific materials dictated,” though the USGBC considers the proposed amendment a “Trojan horse.”

The USGBC and other pro-efficiency groups, motivated by this type of potential amendment, joined in signing a letter urging the Senate Committee leaders to resist “any effort or measure that would restrict the federal government from using proven, cost-effective green building programs, particularly the market-leading LEED green building rating system.”

After the chemical industry failed to get what it wanted via the USGBC internal standards development process, some green building advocates see this latest move as a legislative push to require the GSA to use only certification systems with an American National Standards Institute (ANSI) designation, which LEED lacks.

E&E Daily writes, “The issue essentially boils down to a split within the broader building industry over whether LEED should consider potential health and environmental ramifications related to chemical use or whether it should strictly focus on driving down the amount of energy required to light and heat a building.”

Read the full post here.

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