The Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System, developed by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), provides a set of standards for environmentally sustainable construction. The certification system has recently been updated and now includes an energy reduction component called Sustainable Food. The idea is that what goes on in a building after it's designed and constructed also contributes significantly to a building's environmental impact.
Many of the existing LEED standards had an energy reduction strategy. The new Sustainable Food strategy is considered complementary to the other strategies that aim to reduce the carbon footprint of a building. A LEED project provides incentives to purchase building materials within a 500-mile radius of the site, enhancing local economies by keeping profits in the community. The same strategy applies to building operations, and a natural extension of this policy is to include purchasing food sustainably. No matter the size of a business operation, at one time or another, food will be served at an event or a meeting.
Building owners and managers can now gain credit towards LEED certification by using sustainably harvested foods certified by pre-approved organizations including USDA Certified Organic, Food Alliance Certified, Protected Harvest Certified, The Rainforest Alliance, Fair Trade, and the Marine Stewardship Council's Blue Eco Label, and/or by acquiring food from within a 100-mile radius for food service and catering functions at the building. The threshold for achieving this credit is for 25 percent of all food and beverages to meet one or more of these sustainability criteria. Double points are awarded if the food is both certified and locally harvested.
The Bay Area already boasts many certified green buildings. The Orchard Hotel is San Francisco's first hotel to be LEED-certified by the USGBC, one of just two in California and four in the world. Since 1998, the USGBC has certified over 14,000 buildings worldwide. The potential for advancing the use of sustainable food through LEED certification by adding the Sustainable Food credit is significant.
The U.S. Green Building Council
Orchard Hotel earns LEED certification
LEED on wikipedia
The documentation on this credit can be found in the LEED 2009 for Existing Buildings: Operations and Maintenance, page 49 (of the .pdf document). The text reads as follows:
1 point
Intent
To reduce the environmental and transportation impacts associated with food production and distribution.
Requirements
Achieve sustainable purchases of at least 25% of total combined food and beverage purchases (by cost) during the performance period. Sustainable purchases are those that meet 1 or both of the following criteria:
* Purchases are labeled USDA Organic, Food Alliance Certified, Rainforest Alliance Certified, Protected Harvest Certified, Fair Trade or Marine Stewardship Council’s Blue Eco-Label.
* Purchases are produced within a 100-mile radius of the site.
Each purchase can receive credit for each sustainable criterion met (i.e., a $100 purchase that is both USDA Organic and is produced on a farm within 100 miles of the project counts twice in the calculation, for a total of $200 of sustainable purchasing). Food or beverages must be purchased during the performance period to earn points in this credit.
When purchasing food and beverages, specify that the items meet 1 or both criteria in this credit. Consider using catering companies that purchase locally grown and/or organic foods.
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