Green Globes™ Rating/Certification

Recognize and Market Achievements in Environmental Sustainability

The Green Globes™ New Construction and Existing Building tools are the ultimate in evaluating, quantifying and improving the environmental performance of commercial buildings. However, corporate executives, building owners and property managers have additional needs to recognize, communicate, and market their achievements in environmentally responsible facilities design, engineering and operations. Tenants, investors, potential buyers, property brokers, and the general public are all seeking an independent, reliable, and credible means to ascertain how "green" a new building really is or how environmentally sound the ongoing management and operations of an existing building portfolio may be. Read the Green Globes rated/certified building case studies.

Formal rating and certification programs further provide a mechanism to ensure that new construction project teams or facilities management staff are fully aware of the environmental impact of design and/or operating management decisions, have a visible means to quantify/measure their performance, and are recognized for their achievements and hard work at the end of the process.

By pursuing a formal Green Globes Rating/Certification, project teams and building owners/managers are not only able to benchmark the performance of their buildings with a recognized and accepted rating scale, but are able to differentiate themselves from those organizations that invest in marketing hype about "going green" rather than actually investing in the environment. While investment in environmental/sustainability ratings and certification is currently a choice for the leading proponents of ecological responsibility, emerging standards (GBI Proposed ANS Standard 01-200XP) and legislative recognition of "green building and operations" practices may portend broader adoption in the future. For these reasons, The Green Building Initiative offers independent, third party building assessment services and formal Green Globes Rating/Certification.

Comprehensive Environmental Assessment and Rating Protocol

The Green Globes™ Continual Improvement Tool for Existing Buildings delivers a comprehensive, thorough, and proven means for evaluating, identifying opportunities for improvement, and rating the environmental footprint and/or sustainability of commercial buildings. The assessment protocol covers 6 different areas, with each area having an assigned number of points that are utilized to quantify overall building performance.

Assessment Category	Points	Description
Energy	350	Performance, Efficiency, Management, CO2, transportation
Indoor Environment	185	Air Quality, Lighting, Noise
Emissions& Effluents	175	Boilers, Water Effluents, Hazmat
Resources	110	Waste Reduction, Recycling
Environmental Management	100	EMS documentation, Purchasing, Environmental Awareness
Water	80	Performance, conservation, management
Total	1000

You can learn more about the history and development of the Green Globes system. The scoring for these six categories is based on approximately 150 questions that are completed via the intuitive, online questionnaire within the Green Globes Tool. While completing the survey, there are pop-up "tool tips" embedded within the questionnaire to address frequently asked questions and add clarifications regarding the input data requirements. Although more time may be required to research and gather the necessary information to complete the survey, the data input process on average takes about 2-3 hours per building.

Green Globes™ Ratings

In order to earn a formal Green Globes rating/certification, a building must be assessed by an independent third party which is recognized, trained and affiliated with The Green Building Initiative. Both new construction and existing buildings can be formally rated or certified within the Green Globes system. Those buildings that achieve 35% or more of the 1000 points possible in the rating system are eligible candidates for one or more Green Globes rating. The Green Globes system provides higher levels of rating based on the number of points achieved. A summary of rating levels, and how they relate to environmental achievement is detailed in the following chart.

Green Globes™ Ratings
85-100%		Reserved for select building design and delivery processes which serve as national or world leaders in design and delivery focused on reducing environmental impacts.
70-84%		Demonstrates leadership in design and delivery of energy and environmentally sensitive buildings and a commitment to continual improvement.
55-69%		Demonstrates excellent progress in reducing environmental impacts by applying best practices in energy and environmental design and delivery.
35-54%		Demonstrates movement beyond awareness and a commitment to good energy and environmental design and delivery practices.

How to pursue Green GlobesTM Rating/Certification for your Building

The process for obtaining formal Green Globes rating/Certification is straightforward:

Step 1: Register your new building project within the New Construction tool or Continual Improvement for Existing Buildings.

To Register now, click here, and then fill out the registration page, select either CIEB or NC and the appropriate number of projects, enter your contact and payment information then click submit.

If you already have a free trial or other green globes user account, Login to your account first, then select "subscription information". From the Manage your subscription section, you can then register and pay for one or more CIEB building subscriptions or selected NC projects.

Step 2: Complete the online questionnaire, review your report of environmental features, customized improvement suggestions, and self assessed rating.

Step 3: Implement those enhancements or environmental improvements identified by Green Globes, update your building or project data online, and review your new self-assessed Green globes rating.

Step 4: Decide if you would like to pursue formal Green Globes rating/certification. When ready, schedule and complete your independent, third party building assessment by contacting: info@thegbi.org. For New construction, the third-party assessment process takes place in two stages and is conducted by a qualified practitioner and building sciences professional. The first stage includes a review of the Construction Documents developed through the design and delivery process. The second stage includes a walk-through of the building post-construction. Additional information regarding the New Construction process is available at Green Globes New Construction System Overview.

Step 5: Receive your Green globes certification plaque and market your commitment to reducing the environmental footprint of buildings you are constructing or managing. Consider purchasing optional case study advertising materials to further publicize your achievements.

Advantages of the Green Globes™ Rating/Certification System

Green Globes is an economical, practical, and convenient means for obtaining comprehensive environmental and sustainability certification for new or existing commercial buildings. As a complete, integrated system, It has been developed to enable design teams and property managers to focus their resources (time and money) on the actual environmental improvement of facilities and operations, rather than on an expensive, cumbersome, and lengthy certification and rating process.

Specific Advantages of Green Globes relative to other Rating/Certification Systems

• Buildings and projects can be evaluated and informally self-assessed for a low registration fee
• Commitment to a lengthy and costly rating/certification process is not required upfront
• Expensive consultants are not required for the certification process
• The entire process is fast from start-finish, with minimal waiting for final rating/certification
• Complicated paper forms, numerous digital media files, and complicated submissions packets are not required
• On-line web tools are a convenient, proven, and effective way to complete the assessment process
• Implementation of Customized improvements suggestions enable a potentially higher rating to be achieved
• The estimated rating (number of Green Globes) that will be achieved is largely known in advance of the decision to pursue certification because the self assessed score is always available to users