Sustainable green building rating systems for energy efficiency for new residential buildings in us

Abstract

The Building Industry places a high demand on world’s resources and there by impacting the environment. Currently Engineers are paying attention to sustainability based design concepts rather than traditional cost effective design concepts for buildings. In US there are about seventy five million residential buildings as opposed to mere five million commercial buildings. As such this paper addresses residential buildings as opposed to commercial buildings. In US there are several metrics to measure eco friendliness for homes. Three such systems are National Association of Home Builders Model Green Building (MGB) Guidelines, National Association of Home Builders Green Building Standard (ICC 700-2008) and United States Green Building Council’s LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design). The Model green building guidelines address, seven criterions, lot design, resource/water/energy efficiency, indoor environmental quality, homeowner education, and global impact in determining sustainability. The ICC 700 uses very similar six criterions, lot design, resource/energy/water efficiencies, indoor environmental quality, operation, maintenance, and building owner education. The LEED recognizes sustainability with eight criterions of Innovative design process, location and linkage, sustainable sites, water efficiency, energy efficiency, materials selection , indoor environmental quality, and awareness and education. This paper discusses two rating systems used in US for eco friendly building design for homes with special emphasis on effects of energy efficiency in rating values. For energy efficiency requirements of International Energy Conservation Code is also addressed. Using a new home in California as an example the paper describes how to evaluate green building ratings for energy efficiency using three software tools for the MGB and GBS for homes in US.