What is Green Building?
The term “Green building” refers to a new way of designing
and constructing buildings to increase performance and enhance the
experience for the people who live, work and play in these places.
In other words, it is an opportunity to use our resources efficiently
while creating healthier buildings
A Green building is a structure that is designed, built, renovated,
operated, or reused in an ecological and resource-efficient manner.
Green buildings are designed to meet certain objectives such as
protecting occupant health; improving employee productivity; using
energy, water, and other resources more efficiently; and reducing
the overall impact to the environment.
The term “Green Building” is often used interchangeably
with the words like sustainable design, high-performance building,
energy-efficient and eco-friendly. The reality is they all embrace
certain elements of Green Building. The term more frequently used
by industry leaders is LEED. LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental
Design) was created to establish a voluntary, national standard
for Green building. It helps to measure things like energy savings,
waste reduction, water conservation, air quality, durability, etc.
It is fast becoming the industry standard. LEED ranks buildings
that are Green according to category. The categories are Platinum,
Gold, Silver and Certified, with Platinum ranking as the highest
green performance rating. To find out more about LEED visit www.usgbc.org.
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