Here at Mead & Hunt, sustainability and resilience are at the forefront of what we do. They are pillars of our strategic and business plans, including the goal to integrate “sustainability and resilience elements into every solution that we develop and deliver to our clients and communities.” As we celebrate 125 years in business, we know what it means to be sustainable!
What You Need to Know About LEED v5
After more than a decade since LEED v4 was released, the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) will publish LEED v5 this spring. Every new version of LEED incorporates the latest knowledge of how the built environment affects people, the planet, and the economy. LEED v5 will help us continue to improve our buildings and their impact on the world around them.
What’s exciting about LEED v5 is a laser focus on three impact areas:
- Decarbonization
- Quality of Life
- Ecosystem Conservation & Restoration
The new rating system better targets improvements and even net-positive outcomes resulting from our work. It includes new prerequisites focused on assessment and planning, providing a comprehensive roadmap toward net-zero.
In-House LEED Expertise
Mechanical Engineer Shana Scheiber is the co-chair of the Technical Advisory Group (TAG) for Indoor Environmental Quality for LEED. She provided technical guidance and industry insights for this latest version. Our firm was also active in two public comment periods, having submitted over 2% of all comments USGBC received worldwide!
LEED aligns with our participation in the AIA 2030 Commitment and SE 2050. Currently, we have over 30 LEED projects in design or construction, and our staff has been involved with hundreds more throughout the past decade. This vast experience and valuable insight help us better guide clients through the critical areas of impact within this latest version of the LEED rating system.
Keeping You Informed
Over the next several weeks, we will post a series of blogs providing insight into what LEED v5 means for all of us. We’ll include recommendations for integrating supportive strategies into your current design process, provide real-world examples, and break the criteria down into digestible bites.
Our next blog will discuss decarbonization, then we’ll go into quality of life, ecosystems, and wrap it up with key information and advice concerning the LEED v5 launch. Each version of LEED is intended to move the goalposts and challenge our profession to do better. LEED v5 will continue this tradition of ongoing improvement.
