When I read about the AIGRMGreen Reputation Coverage, which covers bad press for green building projects, I immediately thought of allegations of greenwashing. From wikipedia: Greenwash (a portmanteau of green and whitewash) is a term used to describe the practice of companies disingenuously spinning their products and policies as environmentally friendly, such as by presenting … Continue Reading
How did we all miss this? While AIG may have had its problems recently, it certainly has created an innovative green building insurance product: The company says the casualty coverage for property owners and managers of green buildings consists of two coverages, AIGRMGreen Reputation Coverage and AIGRMGreen Indoor Environment Coverage. The reputation coverage provides up … Continue Reading
If you are a contractor lucky enough to have won a stimulus project, one of the pesky requirements attached to the project is reporting the number of new jobs created by the project. Many builders and contractors have been wondering how exactly to do that. Finally, at long last, the White House has provided clarity: … Continue Reading
I have previously speculated that stimulus green building projects will be at risk of underbidding. Now we have real evidence. Remember the $5.5 billion that the General Services Administration received from the stimulus to fund green building construction and retrofits? "Bids came in far lower than we expected, but the upside is that because of … Continue Reading
You may be relieved to learn that I am temporarily done discussing LEED de-certification. The USGBC will be releasing an addenda to the Minimum Project Requirements, at which time we will discuss this issue anew. Until then, lets move on…to another LEED legal discussion. One green building legal development that I, and others, have been … Continue Reading
A few weeks ago, Toronto announced a mandatory green roof requirement, which my fellow bloggers dutifully covered. When I read about the green roof mandate, I thought of another Canadian city with a similar program. You remember the Vancouver Catch-22, right? Many British Columbia jurisdictions, including Vancouver, began mandating green roofs. Simultaneously, the Homeowner Protection … Continue Reading
[Sometimes I get great emails from readers and we discuss a green building topic or blog post. Then I sit on the topic for a while, waiting for the right time to share with the Green Building Law Update readers. Now seems like the right time to share an email I received from a reader. … Continue Reading
[Today, I am bringing you a guest post from Mark Rabkin. I have been on Mark for awhile to write a guest post. He is doing a tremendous job looking at the insurance and surety concerns related to green building. Back when I was looking at alternatives for the D.C. Green Building Act bond requirement, … Continue Reading
With the recent announcement that LEED certified projects will have to report energy performance data, the USGBC has signaled its intent to take on under performing green buildings. LEED 2009 requires the reporting of energy performance data, but does not include actual energy performance requirements. I have no doubt that the USGBC will require some … Continue Reading
Love might be too strong of a word but you get the point. The idea of LEED de-certification has touched off a firestorm of comments, some in support and others in objection. I think a follow up post is warranted. First, I want to clarify one important piece of information as I noticed some were … Continue Reading
Disclaimer: If you are sensitive to or frightened by new risks and liabilities in the green building industry, please skip this post. On Monday, I highlighted the USGBC’s decision to create requirements to ensure a building’s performance matches modeled energy savings. I finished the post by asking, what happens to projects that do not comply? … Continue Reading
I’m impressed. In one fell swoop, the USGBC has stepped up to the plate to address the primary criticisms of the LEED rating system. Kudos to Scot Horst and the USGBC for acknowledging an issue that has bothered many users of the LEED rating system: “Today there is all too often a disconnect, or performance … Continue Reading
I wanted to take a moment and thank all of the Green Building Law Update readers. You all have been blowing my minds the last few weeks. There has been a surge in comments and discussions that take place after my original post. Many times, these comments and discussions are much more important than the … Continue Reading
As I mentioned in my June 24 post, starting June 26, the USGBC eliminated public CIRs in order to improve the functionality of the LEED rating system. The USGBC’s Peter Templeton provided the following explanation for eliminating the public CIRs: Under the new LEED certification model, standards development and project certification responsibilities are divided between … Continue Reading