Organizations Collaborate to Improve Green Codes and Standards

In a move applauded by building professionals, the organizations that develop codes and standards for the building and operation of green facilities, are now working together to streamline the International Green Construction Code (IgCC), ANSI/ASHRAE/IES/USGBC Standard 189.1, and LEED. The agreement aims to create one regulatory tool from the IgCC and Standard 189.1 while ensuring thatLEED’s program requirements are in line with those set forth in the new package.

As part of the process, Standard 189.1 will still be produced as an ANSI consensus standard and used by the International Code Council to incorporate its code-compliance requirements, providing an easy building code that can be adopted by states in a uniform manner. The IgCC will include the mandatory, prescriptive, and performance-based requirements developed in Standard 189.1 and a new standard will be developed every three years.

“Building designers and operators know the benefits of integrated design and planning very well – we’ve taken our cue from them and will create a system where the whole is substantially more effective than the sum of its individual parts,” says Brendan Owens, chief of engineering for the USGBC.