The LEED platinum WPUDA headquarters in Olympia, photo by Matt Todd Photography

Photo by Matt Todd Photography

According to the October edition of the Green Builder, the monthly digital newsletter published by the Cascadia Chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council, there are 113 LEED certified projects in Washington and 657 that are registered. But where in the state are they?

If you missed the post about whether green building is an urban thing (click on tag ’suburban cities’ if you did), maybe the statistics below will help answer the question. 

This information is based solely on the USGBC’s LEED project registry, and does not take into account other green buildings, such as those that are Built Green. It also does not consider those buildings that are complete and awaiting certification from the USGBC, of which there are many.

According to the registry:

There are three LEED platinum buildings in the city. One in Seattle, another in Shoreline, the third in Olympia.

There are 32 LEED gold buildings in Washington. Of that, 15 are in Seattle, two are in Bellingham and two are in Vancouver. But the other 13 are spread across the diverse jurisdictions of Issaquah, Spokane Valley, Redmond, Cheney, Lacey, Spokane, Monroe, Tumwater, Retsil, Olympia, Burien, Tacoma and Bainbridge Island.

Go down to LEED silver and out of 38, it’s 15 to Seattle, four to Tacoma, three to Issaquah, two for Tumwater and one each for Monroe, Vancouver, Redmond, Olympia, Port Townsend, Walla Walla, Sammamish, Spokane, Bellevue, Auburn, Kent, Fort Lewis, Bremerton and Liberty Lake.

Obviously there are more LEED projects in Seattle, and at least more LEED silver in Tacoma. But the rest of it is a mixed bag. If we look at projects that are registered to meet LEED - but have not yet achieved it (and in today’s market where certain projects are being held indefinitely, might never make it) it’s a very different story.

In the registered list there is currently 18 pages of projects. Of those, 7 pages are in Seattle, one page in in Tacoma, almost one page is in Bellevue, a little more than a page is in Vancouver, while Spokane, Bellingham and Olympia each have about a half a page. But there are planned projects spread everywhere from Friday Harbor to Bonney Lake to Woodinville to East Wenatchee to Hoquiam. Since LEED is planned in all of these areas, does that mean that green building is not an urban thing, though there might be more of it going on in urban areas?

If you want to explore the registry, visit http://www.usgbc.org/LEED/Project/CertifiedProjectList.aspx

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Green building has many elephants in the room and thanks to the current state of the economy, this is a big one: will green building suffer because of the current state of the economy?

The problem with trying to answer this question is that it all comes down to

The road to market-wide green buildings?

definitions: what do you consider to be a green building? Does it need to be certified by a third party operation? Are you talking about all markets - commercial, homes, mixed use etc.?

Assuming you can answer the definition question, another one immediately presents itself: how do we measure how green buildings are doing? Is there any way to realistically measure the buildings that are putting off plans, and then how green building is a factor in that?

I cannot answer these questions without doing a lot of research with time I frankly don’t have. But in the end, it seems like there are two groups out there:

1. The group that thinks yes, green buildings will take a hit because they’re more expensive.

and

2. The group that thinks green buildings are actually more valuable because they cut down on energy use and electricity bills, and will hold their value better in future markets.

Which group do you belong to? Comment on my new poll at right, or tell me more below, to let me know!

P.S. For great coverage about how the market is affecting the Puget Sound region, check out the DJC. On Oct. 13, we ran a story from local contractor’s perspectives. On Oct. 14, we run a story on local architecture and engineering firm’s perspectives. Don’t miss them!

Readers, I’m sorry I haven’t posted in a couple days here, but like I mentioned in an earlier post, September is CRAZY. Tuesday, that craziness was exemplified by my calendar, which had me rushing from the Urban Land Institute’s launch of the Quality

Busy, busy times!

Growth Alliance in downtown Seattle, to a panel discussion (that I moderated) in Bellevue, and back to our offices in Pioneer Square to write up the story. Whew.

In case you missed both those events (and the recommendations put out by the Western Climate Initiative to boot) here is a rundown for your viewing pleasure:

The Quality Growth Alliance. Anyone remember Reality Check in April? The huge event that got 250 big-wigs playing with Legos? At that event (DJC story on it here), I spoke with Jim Potter of Kauri Investments who told me it was a great planning exercise as long as the results didn’t fade away into the sunset. Well the alliance is the attempt of prominent groups - from the UW’s College of Architecture and Urban Planning to NAIOP - to make sure the results stick around and influence future planning policy. More info in my story in today’s DJC or at their Web site.

The Panel Discussion. In case you missed this one, it was a lot of fun. Hosted by SMPS, panelists represented various fields of the AEC community (architecture, engineering, construction) and were Eric Anderson of MulvannyG2, Jeffrey Cox of Triad Associates, Rae Anne Rushing of Rushing and Yancy Wright of Sellen Construction Co. Among some of the interesting tidbits:

• Collectively, panelists said sustainable or green design is changing so quickly, that as soon as you read about it, it’s old. If you want to know what’s going on you need to work to educate yourself. This is true for everyone, and especially for marketers.
• Marketing and public relations professionals, they said, need to be really careful about sounding really stupid. Oftentimes they (and I incidentally) get press releases that virtually make no sense. If you’re going to write about green systems or projects, understand it, otherwise you run the risk of major embarrassments (I can’t tell you how often I get press releases that tell me a product will get me 10 “Leeds” points).
• Green building doesn’t have to be more expensive if you start from the beginning and have the right leaders on board. If you start thinking about integrative design and green systems midway through a project, there’s a good chance it’s going to be more expensive.
• Everyone needs to be on board with green building, even those who have been in the industry for many years and are hesitant to change the way they work. Panelists said they need all disciplines at an eco-charette and that bringing and open mind really, really helps.
• Definitions aren’t clear and because everyone has different definitions…. it’s hard to understand what a word, be it ‘eco-charette,’ ’sustainability’ or ‘integrative design,’ means to a specific person. Define those definitions for your project, or your company.

Western Climate Initiative. And don’t forget yesterday’s announced recomendations by the Western Climate Initiative for a regional cap and trade system. If you want to learn more about this one, read the Seattle Times or the PI.

Also, if you’re looking for an interesting way to fill your Thursday evening, Patrick Bellew of Atelier Ten will speak at the downtown Seattle Library at 5:30.

That’s all for today folks. If I don’t thank you enough, thanks for reading!

Legos have been played with. Leaders have created their plans for people and transit. Gov. Chris Gregoire has extrolled the benefits of compact communities, and Washington’s role as an international leader. In short, Reality Check 2008 is halfway under way and will soon be done (for a definition of Reality Check, see the post directly below).

The fact that so many regional leaders are playing with Legos is definitly interesting and will no doubt be the major focus of the plethora of different news organizations that are here from NPR to TV to print papers. But something else is happening beneath the surface of the Legos… people are listening to the concerns of other regional leaders they might not necessarily otherwise hear.

That’s one of the main points of this excercise, said Greg Johnson, ULI Seattle chair and president of Wright Runstad & Co. For example, members of my table included representatives of Microsoft, Fort Lewis, a Snohomish County economic council member, and the Washington Roundtable. Other people at my table were Seattle City Council Member Sally Clark, Seattle developer Jim Soules, Executive Director of the Puget Sound Clean Air Agnecy Dennis McLeran and Bert Gregory, president of CEO of Mithun.

Representatives of ULI said they spent an awful lot of time planning those tables, and making sure differnet groups were represented, to come up with broader solutions.

What do you think? Will this event come to anything, or will it become yet another regional plan that people trumpet as the next big thing, then forget about a month later? Does this region have any hope of coming up with a comprehensive plan to deal with density, jobs and people?

If you live in an area that has went through this excercise already - Sacramento, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles…. have you seen any differences because of this process? Tell me what you think, you never know who may be listening.

I’m about to head out to Reality Check 2008, along with 250 of my closest business, environment, political and civic leader friends.

Held at the University of Washington and presented by the Urban Land Institute, it’s a high profile day-long event where leaders in their field come together to play with Legos. Yes, I’m serious. After a series of welcome speeches, the 250 leaders will do a planning exercise that uses Legos to represent people, transit and other things. They will physically plan for where a whole lot of people projected to come to this area by 2040 - 1.7 million people and 1.2 million jobs, to be exact - will go.

Perhaps the most impressive thing is the guest list, and the group of people ULI has been able to get it one place. Attendees should include Gov. Chris Gregoire, U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell, Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, the mayors of Auburn, Redmond, Bothell, Sumner, Lynnwood (and other cities), and an impressive list of council members from different city and civic councils.

On the business front, there’s going to be representatives from Mithun, CamWest Development, Vulcan Inc., Microsoft, Opus Northwest, Wright Runstad and Co., Boeing, and Uwajimaya. Most of the attendees are high level executives, if not presidents. Basically, anybody who is anybody in planning and development is going to be there (or at least is sending a representative). The event is by invitation only.

The exercise has already been done in Washington, D.C. and Sacramento. For more information on it, press here. I’ll keep you updated as it moves along.