The LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Green Building Rating System is a voluntary, consensus-based national standard for developing high-performance, sustainable buildings. USGBC's members, representing every sector of the building industry, developed and continue to refine LEED.

The U.S. Green Building Council's core purpose is to transform the way buildings and communities are designed, built and operated, enabling an environmentally and socially responsible, healthy, and prosperous environment that improves the quality of life.

Who is the U.S. Green Building Council?

The  U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) is a 501(c)3 nonprofit working to promote buildings that are environmentally  responsible, profitable and healthy places to live and work. Our more than 6,000 member organizations representing every sector of the building industry work together to develop a variety of programs and services, and forge strategic alliances with key industry and research organizations and federal, state and local government agencies. Our collective power is leading the transformation of the building industry and market to sustainability. Council programs are Committee-Based, Member-Driven, and Consensus-Focused.

USGBC GUIDING PRINCIPLES

With regard to the importance of these essential values, be it resolved that the 

U.S. Green Building Council adopts the following guiding principles: 

1. PROMOTE THE TRIPLE BOTTOM LINE: USGBC will pursue robust triple bottom line solutions that

clarify and strengthen a healthy and dynamic balance between environmental, social and

economic prosperity. 

2. ESTABLISH LEADERSHIP: USGBC will take responsibility for both revolutionary and evolutionary

leadership by championing societal models that achieve a more robust triple bottom line.

3. RECONCILE HUMANITY WITH NATURE: USGBC will endeavor to create and restore harmony

between human activities and natural systems. 

4. MAINTAIN INTEGRITY: USGBC will be guided by the precautionary principle in utilizing technical

and scientific data to protect, preserve, and restore the health of the global environment,

ecosystems and species. 

5. ENSURE INCLUSIVENESS: USGBC will ensure inclusive, interdisciplinary, democratic decision-

making with the objective of building understanding and shared commitments toward a greater

common good. 

6. EXHIBIT TRANSPARENCY: USGBC shall strive for honesty, openness and transparency.

Example of Green Building:

Solaire Apartments, Battery Park Wastewater Treatment System

Application

Urban water reuse system

Capacity

25,000 gpd (95 m3/d)

Commissioned

December 2003

Location

New York City, New York, United States

Introduction

As municipal water supply and wastewater treatment costs continue to rise, and environmental efficiency becomes a more important focus, water reuse has proved to be a beneficial and economical tool in green building design. Treating collected stormwater and wastewater on-site creates the ability to reuse treated water for flushing toilets, irrigation and cooling towers; greatly reducing the amount of fresh water that is taken from a municipal water supply and eliminating the need to pump wastewater to a municipal plant.

Plant Overview

The 250 unit, Solaire Apartments in Battery Park continues the city's trend to reusable, sustainable, and efficient residential development. This specific development was a private- public partnership and is the first "green" residential high-rise building that incorporates advanced materials, energy conservation and water reuse in an urban setting. The development has adopted features that will become a must in the future as populations grow and water resources become limited.

The Solaire Apartments selected ZENON's proprietary ZeeWeed® MBR (membrane bioreactor) process to treat, store and reuse the wastewater for toilet flushing, irrigation and cooling towers. This approach reduces the freshwater taken from the city's water supply by over 75%, and significantly decreases energy costs as less drinking water is pumped from the city's treatment plant and wastewater is not transferred to the city's wastewater treatment system. The system is the first onsite water recycling system in the U.S. built inside a multi-family, residential building. It is unique for such a system to be located in an urban setting as they are more commonly found in rural or suburban environments where access to public systems are lacking.

Process Overview

The 25,000 gpd (95 m3/d) onsite wastewater treatment, storage and reuse system is located in the building's basement, and includes a series of common-walled, cast-in-place, concrete tanks. The first step in the process is a collection and settling tank where large solids are removed. The wastewater then flows to a bioreactor which contains active bacteria used to consume or digest the biodegradable waste.

ZeeWeed® ultrafiltration membranes are immersed directly into the bioreactor, which eliminates the need to settle solids, and significantly decreases the necessary size of the treatment tanks. Permeate pumps are used to gently pull the wastewater through thousands of membrane fibers. Each fiber is filled with billions of microscopic pores that physically block suspended solids, bacteria and viruses from passing through—guaranteeing an exceptional water quality and clarity on a continuous basis.

The treated water is then further disinfected by ultraviolet lights. Any remaining color and odor is removed using an ozone generator that also provides a residual disinfection during water storage. The storage tanks serve as reservoirs for the treated water, which is used as flush water, make-up water for the cooling towers and for irrigation.

Example:

Colorado Court is a multi-award winning LEED Gold certified (the major certification program for green building in the United States) residential housing complex which helped to pave the way for future green, large-scale commercial construction projects. Through both innovative design, and by using cutting-edge sustainable building techniques, the structure breaks one’s perception of what affordable housing looks like.

The construction process was filmed in order to give an inside view as to the advantages of green building—both to the occupants and to the community. The production crew worked closely with the architects to gain access to both the construction site and to the hurdles that had to be overcome in order to move the building from concept to reality. By watching the process, the viewer will learn what is needed to make sustainable structures mainstream.

Electricity is generated through a combination of solar panels and a natural-gas-fired microturbine. These two on-site electricity-generating systems, have the capacity to meet over 90% of the building’s electrical needs. During daylight hours, power generated from the photovoltaic panels is fed into the grid. The utility grid serves as a storage battery to supply electricity at night and on cloudy days. A natural-gas-fired micro turbin on the roof generates additional electricity. Waste heat from the micro turbine is used to create hot water for domestic use and for space heating via a hydronic radiator heating system. This building generates over 90% of it own energy for electricity, hot tap water, and interior heating. The building was able to eliminate the need for air conditioners by taking advantage of prevailing winds and the use of operable insulative windows.

Interesting stories unfold during the construction process of Colorado Court. The code officials insisted on a certain wiring schematic for the photovoltaic system that converts sunlight into electricity. The code officials were told by the builders that the code's mandatory requirements would severely damage the inverters. The code officials still insisted on their wiring, and it destroyed thousands of dollars of inverters. The builders bought replacement equipment and were then permitted to wire the inverters properly. This was just one of the hurdles that had to be overcome when building a structure with new technology.

In the end, through the architects own words, we hear why it was worth the extra effort to to create a structure that moves way beyond what code requires.

Some of the topics that are covered:

Solar Cooling Load Reduction

Colorado Court uses light-colored exterior walls and roofs. The number of east and west windows were reduced to prevent overheating. South windows with exterior louvers, awnings, or trellises also help to prevent unwanted heat gain in the summer.

Non-Solar Cooling Loads

The building uses operable windows to capture summer breezes to reduce internal heat gain.

Photovoltaics and Energy Efficiency

Colorado Court incorporates building-integrated photovoltaics (PV) to generate electricity on-site In the future, it is hoped that excess electricity can be sold into the grid. Ooccupancy sensors are used to turn the lights off when not needed.

Building Awards

AIA/COTE Top Ten Green Projects in 2003

AIA California Chapter in 2003;

Design/Honor AIA Honor Awards for Architecture in 2003

Rudy Bruner Prize in 2003

AIA Housing PIA Award in 2003

Multi-Family/Design Building Social Housing Foundation in 2003

World Habitat Award/Finalist