I like choices. Who doesn’t? When I was in college on a study abroad program for a semester, I visited then communist-ruled East Berlin and got a little taste of what it was like to live life with very few choices.

I have long been bothered by the fact that legislative bodies have been broadly requiring that buildings be certified by nongovernmental private organizations such as the USGBC and its LEED green building rating systems (also included on the list is the GBI’s Green Globes rating system).

A series of design guides developed to help building designers and owners achieve 50 percent energy savings over ASHRAE Standard 90.1 - 2004 are now being rolled out.

Early in my career, I was among a small group of architects and specifiers invited to Europe to learn about the state of the art in PVC building materials. At that time, the anti-PVC propaganda machine in the U.S. was picking up a lot of steam, preying on the ignorance of thousands of architects and persuading them (myself included) to believe that PVC was the “devil’s material.”

Thermal performance of exterior steel stud framed walls has always lagged behind that of wood. This critical difference often overshadows steel’s many benefits such as its dimensional consistency, high recycled content, high recyclability, strength, and mold, rot and termite resistance.

In my February 2009 article “The Uncertain Future of Green Building,” I made reference to an article by Joe Lstiburek titled “Prioritizing Green-It’s the Energy, Stupid,” in which he shot gaping holes in the analysis made in a USGBC-commissioned report “Energy Performance of LEED for New Construction Buildings” by the New Buildings Institute.

A recent report titled “The Green Outlook 2011: Green Trends Driving Growth through 2015,” by Harvey M. Bernstein, paints a very rosy picture for green building growth in the coming years.

In November 2010, the USGBC issued a LEED Rating System Draft scheduled to go into effect in 2012. 

Creating buildings in this day and age is surely near the top of “most difficult things we do” list. The challenges faced by designers and builders are many and great. 

“Rapidly Renewable” (or “Bio-Based”) materials points in green building rating systems are some of the most challenging to acquire.