by Bill Walsh, National Coordinator
Healthy Building Network
May 31, 2006
A May 23, 2006 US Green Building Council press release announced "USGBC
Board Tackles [the] Wood Issue." [1]
The Board has taken the unusual step of sending proposed new credit
language, and a supporting whitepaper, to the LEED Steering Committee
who will decide how the membership will consider and vote on the
proposals. [2]
The USGBC Board is recommending changes to the LEED Rating System that
would eliminate the distinction between wood and other bio-based
materials (e.g., cork or bamboo). One change would make all bio-based
materials eligible for a LEED credit based on compliance with an as yet
undefined "robust" certification similar to that now offered to wood
products by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). Raising the bar
for a bio-based materials credit may be a good idea.
Then the Board goes out of bounds by recommending a new LEED credit for
just about any wood, no matter how it was grown or harvested, as long
as the harvest has not been proven "illegal." This would grant timber
industry trade associations what they have long sought -- LEED
recognition of their notorious greenwash labeling system -- the
Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI). Lowering the bar for obtaining
a LEED credit for wood products is a very bad idea.
USGBC's Board justifies these proposals as a "response to the
escalating debate over wood and wood certification" in LEED. But there
is no legitimate debate over wood certification. Forest conservation
groups overwhelmingly agree that the only credible certification system
is the program run by the FSC. [3]
Rob Watson, a USGBC Board member and Senior Scientist at the Natural
Resources Defense Council, offered a more candid explanation: "We
needed to start the process because, like it or not, AFPA [timber
industry trade association] efforts to undermine the adoption of LEED
nationally are working and we need to take the 'LEED is anti-wood'
arrow out of their quiver." But LEED is not anti-wood, as we shall
see.
The objections being tackled here are the contrived arguments of the
timber industry trade association -- the American Forest Products and
Paper Association (AFPA) -- hell bent on undermining the FSC
certification process. They are turning up the heat on the USGBC
precisely because the FSC consensus certification, and the existing
LEED credit, is beginning to work and restrict unsustainable logging
practices.
For over a decade multiple stakeholders have negotiated in good faith
with timber companies to craft a consensus-based FSC standard for
environmentally preferable wood. The current LEED credit for
FSC-certified wood is heralded as "a turning point in the market for
FSC-certified wood products." [4] Approximately 33% of LEED-certified
projects have achieved the certified wood credit; in some markets such
as the Pacific Northwest, the achievement level is 42 percent. [5]
The record is unambiguous. The existing LEED credit is an effective,
possibly an essential market stimulus to catalyze responsible,
sustainable forestry practices -- perfectly fulfilling the mission of
the USGBC to foster a sustainable materials economy and keep the market
moving in that direction.
Acceding to the AFPA pressure campaign and granting a new LEED credit
to uncertified wood or wood certified by an industry controlled
greenwash "certification" system does not make LEED or the USGBC
stronger. It makes the green building movement weaker by undermining
the established and effective multi-stakeholder consensus process that
gives FSC certification -- and LEED -- legitimacy in a market place that
is fast becoming bewildered by competing green labels and
certifications.
If tackling the wood issue risks losing this much ground, let's try
another play.
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HEALTHY BUILDING NEWS SOURCES
1. USGBC press release, May 23, 2006,
http://www.usgbc.org/News/PressReleaseDetails.aspx?ID=2322
2. The LEED Steering Committee is scheduled to meet next week. The
Whitepaper and proposed credit language can be found here:
https://www.usgbc.org/ShowFile.aspx?DocumentID=1423
3. http://www.healthybuilding.net/news/060324forestethics.html
4. Going to market Builders hope to find a wider variety of Forest
Stewardship Council-certified products as green building grows in
demand by Allison Ryan, Daily Journal of Commerce, Portland, OR, March
23, 2006,
http://djcoregon.com/news/2006/03/23/going-to-market/
5. ibid
