There is no such thing as a “LEED License.”

Many people confuse the terms license and certification, so let’s get that out of the way right now.

 
But wait, I thought you said that “green buildings earn a designation called LEED Certification.” I am a person, not a building…

Right. As a person, you’ll want to earn LEED Accreditation.

People Get LEED Accredited

I know, it doesn’t roll off the tongue very easily. But buildings and people both can’t be certified – that’d be confusing. So buildings get LEED certified, and people get LEED Accredited.

The first step to LEED Accreditation is called LEED Green Associate.

To become a LEED Green Associate accredited professional, you have to pass a 100-question, multiple-choice exam.

LEED Green Associate is the required first step for ALL candidates, regardless of occupation, education, or experience.

Now, going back to our original topic about licensure…

The Relationship Between Licensure and LEED

The professionals commonly involved with LEED Certification building projects are architects, engineers, and facility managers who already possess a state license specific to their trade.

For example…

 
To become a licensed architect

 
To become a licensed engineer

 
To become a licensed general contractor

 
To become a licensed interior designer

 
To become a licensed landscape architect

As these professionals orient their careers to offer more sustainability-related services, they add onto their existing license by pursuing LEED Accreditation.

That’s not to say that you can’t learn about LEED unless you have a license.

Can I Learn LEED Without a License?

Yes! If you are changing careers or simply want to provide sustainability-related services, LEED Accreditation can help be a foot-in-the-door to job interviews for admin and office roles.

There are occupations in the building industry that benefit from LEED knowledge, even if those professionals aren’t directly working on building projects.

Office jobs where LEED Accreditation can be helpful:

Although they aren’t working in the field and managing LEED building projects, these professionals still have to talk-the-talk and understand the terminology and processes.

You can’t adequately sell your product without understanding the greater context of how it benefits LEED building projects.

The reality is, LEED Green Associate is an entry-level credential that has no prerequisites. The reason for that is because the topics introduce everyone to LEED and are applicable to a wide range of occupations.

If you’re ready to learn more, start with LEED Green Associate Exam Prep training. Our course provides a thorough introduction to LEED building practices. Regardless of whether you go on to take the LEED Green Associate exam and earn the accreditation, you’ll gain a wealth of knowledge.

In our previous post about resilient buildings, we talked about how the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has recognized the importance of resilience during the design, construction, and operations of our building stock. They’ve also expanded this vision to cities, with initiatives that include the LEED for Cities Pilot and RELi.

Climate-related events not only affect our buildings; climate change can also impact the water, air, and health of our communities as a whole.

Climate-resilient cities have become a focus for several major organizations. The National Resource Defense Council (NRDC) is another leader working diligently to help cities defend themselves.

The NRDC is working with the American Academy of Pediatricians, American Thoracic Association, National Hispanic Medical Association, and other partners to educate communities and government officials about how climate change impacts human health. For example, warmer temperatures lead to wildfires and worse smog, which can trigger asthma attacks and other respiratory problems.

The NRDC’s main focus areas include:

• Expanding green infrastructure financing
• Improving climate change preparedness
• Improving urban water management
• Preparing for drought
• Preparing for flood
• Promoting urban water efficiency

Perhaps the most well-known initiative for community-wide climate resiliency is the 100 Resilient Cities program, which was pioneered by The Rockefeller Foundation in 2013.

100 Resilient Cities (100RC) is dedicated to helping cities around the world become more resilient to the physical, social, and economic challenges that are a growing part of the 21st century. 100RC supports the adoption and incorporation of a view of resilience that includes not just the shocks—earthquakes, fires, floods, etc.—but also the stresses that weaken the fabric of a city on a day to day or cyclical basis.

Examples of these stresses include:

• High unemployment
• An overtaxed and inefficient public transportation system
• Endemic violence
• Chronic food and water shortages

By addressing both the shocks and the stresses, a city becomes more able to respond to adverse events, and is overall better able to deliver basic functions in both good times and bad, to all populations.

Cities in the 100RC network are provided with the following resources:

• Financial and logistical guidance for establishing an innovative new position in city government, called a Chief Resilience Officer, who will lead the city’s resilience efforts
• Expert support for development of a robust Resilience Strategy
• Access to solutions, service providers, and partners from the private, public, and NGO sectors who can help them develop and implement their Resilience Strategies
• Membership of a global network of member cities who can learn from and help each other

In late February 2019, the City of Chicago announced its participation with the 100 Resilient Cities coalition. As the first action in implementing Resilient Chicago, Mayor Emanuel shared Chicago’s aim to transition to 100% renewable energy in buildings community-wide by 2035 and to an electric CTA bus fleet by 2040 with the Sierra Club’s Ready for 100 campaign.

Developed by the City of Chicago in collaboration with 100RC, the city’s Resilience Strategy outlines 50 actionable initiatives which aim to reduce disparities between Chicago’s neighborhoods, address the root causes of crime and violence, ensure the provision of critical infrastructure, and promote engaged, prepared, and cohesive communities. Learn more online at the Resilient Chicago website.

With so much controversy concerning how we should tackle climate change, the 100 Resilient Cities initiative provides a tangible action plan for communities to take a step forward and work on resilience as a whole – whether that be related to climate, the economy, or something else. When a city is resilient, it’s more capable of reacting to, or managing, the impacts of any disaster. I look forward to seeing which other cities join the coalition and following their progress.

In our previous post, we introduced the concept of resilience as it applies to infrastructure and disaster relief. To continue this theme, let’s look at what organizations are doing to encourage resilient building strategies.

The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) is the preeminent thought-leader on transforming the way buildings are designed, built, and operated. Their focus is to encourage green building practices at all stages of construction.

Resilience is a clear byproduct of this work. Green buildings drive resilience by including practices such as the use of durable materials, thoughtful site selection, rainwater collection, demand response, grid islanding, maximal energy efficiency, on-site renewable energy generation, and more.

Recognizing that natural and manmade hazards pose a threat to the safety of our buildings, the USGBC and its partners issued a statement in 2014, which was updated at the end of Jan. 2018, about what resilience means to them and how they will actively work toward building a more resilient infrastructure.

Specifically, USGBC outlined its commitment to resilience by way of these efforts:

Researching building materials, design techniques, and construction procedures that improve the standard of practice

Educating professionals with continuous learning

Advocating at all levels of government for effective land use policies, modern building codes, and smarter investment in the construction and maintenance of our nation’s buildings and infrastructure

Responding alongside professional emergency managers when disasters occur, including surveying damage, coordinating recovery efforts, and helping communities rebuild better and stronger than before

Planning for the future and proactively pursuing a more sustainable built environment

These activities are housed within USGBC’s Center for Resilience, which exists as a consolidated resource to explain resilience and identify related progress.

As noted in the statement, disasters are expensive to respond to, but much of the destruction can be prevented with cost-effective mitigating features and advanced planning.

USGBC is driving resilience, in more ways than one, by making buildings more sustainable, durable, and functional through the application of LEED. Through integrative design and key credits, LEED guides project teams to invest in climate adaptation strategies to enhance building and community resilience.

There are three pilot credits in the LEED Rating System about resilient design. They were first introduced in 2015 and were recently updated to enhance project resilience more than ever.

Assessment and Planning for Resilience (IPpc98): This credit encourages project teams to determine potential vulnerabilities at the project location. With recent revisions to the credit, risks that must be considered as part of this credit now include sea level rise, extreme heat and more intense winter storms. To earn the credit, project teams must identify risks related to the effects of climate change (this consideration was previously considered optional).

Designing for Enhanced Resilience (IPpc99): This credit ensures that the risk-related information collected as mandated by credit IPpc98 is taken into account via mitigation measures. Originally, this credit required the top three hazards to be addressed in turn for one point. The revised credit states that project teams must address either one or two of the top hazards, with one point available for each. This tiered approach allows teams to earn acknowledgement for mitigating multiple types of risks.

Passive Survivability and Back-Up Power During Disruptions (IPpc100):This credit centers around the concept that buildings should be able to safely shelter occupants during a power outage, as well as be able to provide back-up power. Originally, this credit also addressed access to potable water, but that path has been rewritten as an option for one of the compliance paths.

If you’re interested in learning more about resilient building strategies, consider enrolling in a LEED Green Associate training course.

The LEED Green Associate class is the first step toward learning about proactive building strategies that result in lowered energy use, water use, and construction costs.

With the natural connection between LEED and resilience, you can kill two birds with one stone and start improving buildings with a preventative and holistic approach.

Many people wonder, “How hard is the LEED exam?” Well, that’s a subjective question, isn’t it? Gauging LEED exam difficulty depends on your work experience and familiarity with the subject matter.

And yet, there are some facts about the LEED exam that make it inherently challenging, which we’ll get into below.

But a realistic answer from me to you about LEED exam difficulty, is this: You’ll get a different answer from each person you ask because the answer depends on…

• a candidate’s level of experience
• time spent studying
• general confidence in test-taking

LEED Exam Pass Rate

And if you’re wondering about the pass rate for the LEED exam, unfortunately the U.S. Green Building Council (who created the LEED standards and exam) does not release official pass rates.

The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC, for short) likes to keep the exam a mystery, as in…

• you have to score a 170 out of 200 to pass but questions are weighted differently, so there’s no magic number as to how many questions you have to answer correctly
• there are 15 unscored questions on the exam (that USGBC will evaluate for experimental purposes), but you won’t know which questions are scored and which are unscored
• there are 1000+ questions in the pool to form your 100-question exam, so no two exams will have the same questions in the same order.

Why It’s Challenging

I can tell you that the LEED exam is challenging from the standpoint that it forces candidates to balance:

• subject-matter expertise (LEED)
• time management skills
• test-taking strategy

The most successful candidates are able to equally balance all three. So if you know that you’re weak in one of those areas, it’s important that you work on cultivating that skill set.

How To Be Successful

Our LEED Exam Prep training is designed to improve those skills; not only will we teach you everything you need to know to pass the LEED exam from a content standpoint, but we’ll also share best practices for managing your time and approaching the test questions.

And by the way, though a background in architecture or construction will certainly be helpful, do know that the LEED exam is NOT an occupational licensing exam (i.e., the ARE exam for architects or a PE exam for engineers).

This internationally-recognized exam is wholly devoted to Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design (LEED) concepts, such as:

• the LEED building certification process
• LEED rating system structure
• LEED credit requirements, etc.

In other words, you need to learn the LEED terms and processes, regardless of your occupation, if you want to do well on the exam!

Candidates with backgrounds in Accounting, Political Science, and Marketing have taken our LEED Green Associate Exam Prep, followed our 30-day study pacing guide, and passed their exams on schedule. You can do it too!