LEED™

In 2000, the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), a nonprofit organization, developed a rating system known as the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design or LEED™ system. The main purpose of LEED™ is to increase the use of green building and accelerate sustainability in building construction. There are five categories that LEED™ uses to rate building construction: sustainable site development, water efficiency, energy and atmosphere, materials and resources, and indoor environmental quality. LEED™ awards innovation credits for design and building processes to construction projects for both new construction and renovation (LEED™-NC) and for existing buildings (LEED™-EB). These credits are rated as platinum, gold, silver or certified. Other objectives of LEED™’s include: defining “green building,” promoting integrated whole-building design practices, recognizing environmental leadership in the building industry, stimulating “green” competition, raising consumer awareness of “green” building benefits, and transforming the building market.

The LEED™ rating system references to roofing are concerned mainly with the reduction of the “urban heat island” effect through landscaping and exterior design using reflective roof coverings which reduce the cooling energy demand of a building. Other topics of roofing applicable to LEED™ certification include the energy and thermal performance of insulated roof assemblies, the use of recycled content, the reduction of air leakage in roofing systems, and the management of storm water through the use of vegetative covered roof systems, rooftop gardens or green roofs. Additional LEED™ points are often available with a roof coating or roof recover option due to the reduction in waste (versus a re-roofing project). Due to the increased demand for “green building”, architects and construction specifiers are striving to make efforts to work on projects with are LEED™ certifified to increase their environmental and sustainable profile.

CREBS

Another federal renewable incentive, which arose from the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (P.L. 109-58), is that of Clean Renewable Energy Bonds, CREBS (http://www.crebs.org/ ). EPAct provides electric cooperatives and public power systems with the ability to issue CREBS to qualified bondholders. A CREB is a special type of bond, known as a “tax credit bond,” that offers cooperatives the equivalent of an interest-free loan for financing qualified energy projects for a limited term. Renewable energy generation projects that qualify for the CREB financing include wind, closed-loop biomass, open-loop biomass (including agricultural livestock waste), geothermal, solar, municipal solid waste (including landfill gas and trash combustion facilities), small irrigation power and hydropower


Clean Renewable Energy Bonds (CREBs)