How LEED-ND works, step-by-step - evaluating a low-carbon development

Today's post is a bit more for the hard-core planning junkies in the audience.  My friend Eliot Allen, who has been involved with LEED for Neighborhood Development for as long as I have and who is also an education provider for the Green Building Council, which now administers the system, has put together a 10-minute, step-by-step video on how review and certification works, particularly for a well-located and well-designed low-carbon neighborhood.

In particular, Eliot has adapted Metro Square, a Sacramento development by Mogavero Notestine Architects that he and I studied some years back.  Metro Square is not in the LEED-ND system but, if it were, this is how an evaluation under LEED-ND might occur, particularly with respect to credits in the system that are designed to reward carbon reduction.  Our hypothetical version of Metro Square would qualify for a gold rating under the system, even if the credits we apply are limited to those related to energy and carbon emissions.

Here’s the video: 

Next, we’ll look at a companion video that shows how LEED-ND’s location criteria can be used to assist a jurisdiction’s planning and zoning.