Green Building Legal Issues

Checking In with the Green Real Estate Law Journal

Wed

Feb

I apologize for the interruption, but if you haven't yet checked out the Green Real Estate Law Journal , I'd like to encourage you to do so. Again, the idea behind GRELJ is that it will allow us to delve into some of the thornier legal issues associated with green building in much greater detail than here at gbNYC, where our focus will continue to be projects, deals, and other news items of interest to the New York City green building community. Although we won't be posting with the same degree of frequency at GRELJ, much of the utility of the site will come from the discussion in the comments, where we've already seen some really terrific discourse. Nevertheless, it's been a little over a month since GRELJ launched and already we've had some great content, ranging from a dissection of the green building components of the October bailout and the legal aspects of green real estate finance to the first post in a series about green leasing and a critique of the recent CoStar article reviewing exaggerated owner claims of LEED certification.

An Open Letter to USGBC Requesting Data on Certified Wood

Thu

Sep

by Stephen Del Percio

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As you may know, the USGBC recently accepted public comments on proposed amendments to its certified wood credit. The purpose of the effort is to establish “a clear set of metrics, proposed as the USGBC Forest Certification System Benchmark, that any forest certification system must meet in order to be recognized within LEED.” In its current form, only Forest Stewardship Council-certified wood products are eligible for LEED points.

Earlier this year, Toronto-based construction consultant and gbNYC reader Leslie Marshall was asked by the Canadian Wood Council and the Canadian Forest Service division of Natural Resources Canada (similar to the U.S. Department of the Interior) to lead a research team and evaluate various green building rating systems. His team produced a report called Certified Wood and the Impact of LEED, which looked closely at the Canadian market and attempted to quantify most aspects of stakeholder experiences with specific rating systems, including LEED.