“A third charge leveled at the system is that LEED has become pro forma, more about earning points than achieving actual environmental performance. The two are not unrelated, of course, but there is a belief that applicants and their consultants ‘game the system’ by going after low-hanging fruit to rack up a good score, even if the underlying measure doesn’t result in a significant environmental improvement. I worked in a building that, when applying for a LEED-gold certification, simply turned off its water fountains, presumably in a strategy to grab another water efficiency credit point. The result was that the building probably did use less water, but at the cost of reducing workers’ access to drinking water.”
Read the entire article at Switchboard: As good and important as it is, LEED can be so embarrassing.