When resource choices drive big goals

One of the Living Future theories of change is that all our work reverberates. The ripple effects of the Sonoma Academy Guild & Commons — which were Petal Certified and Zero Carbon Certified in 2021 — are powerful and subtle. First and foremost, of course, as an education project — the academy is a college preparatory school in Santa Rosa, California — there is the fact that nearly every element, material, and service does something to teach about a more sustainable, resilient, equitable, and community-forward approach. This project exemplifies the principles of the Beauty Petal, which celebrates “design that uplifts the human spirit” and promotes broader societal change. It also serves as an illustration of regenerative design for a living future. 

This project program is a student center, community gathering, and dining commons, teaching kitchen and garden, and indoor/outdoor maker spaces. The school leadership and design team’s commitment to making this an all-electric project turned out to have immense ripple effects. “Creating a Net Zero Energy, all-electric project that included a commercial grade kitchen and a maker space was not something that everyone thought would be possible at first,” says Pauline Souza, principal with WRNS, the architects on the project. She credits the collaboration with Hormoz Janssens, David Kanada, and others for helping to realize this vision.

This was one of the first all-electric commercial kitchens with induction cooking in the country. The prep area has copious daylight and operable windows, and the kitchen area is on display to the community gathering/dining space. The food service operator, Flick/Compass, was uncertain at first about how cooking with induction would work for their processes and concerned about efficiency and effectiveness. “But they really came around,” says Souza. “This is a small kitchen, but after we worked with that team, it has become ‘the little kitchen that could.’ Since its completion, many companies and organizations have come to see how it works. This includes folks from Microsoft.” Pauline explains that this kitchen became an induction cooking proof of concept. 

Rick Theis was on the Sonoma Academy board during the project’s development and through construction and early occupancy. He was also Chair of the Buildings and Ground Committee and helped write the school’s Sustainability Guidelines. He recalls giving many tours of the project to people who could “hardly believe seeing a fossil fuel-free commercial kitchen with no gas range,” he says. “Seeing an induction wok that could get hotter than one fired by gas really amazed them.” Design teams brought their clients to see the Sonoma Academy kitchen in action — and reassured them about the effectiveness of induction cooking.

The induction cooking choice relates to the bigger missions of beauty and education. “We were able to show how the induction cooking allowed us to downscale the mechanical because there is less heat and much more. The choice became both a driver and a liberator for form. The space, though small, seems expansive, and the connection to the site is strong. It might not seem like a piece of kitchen equipment could be a design driver, allowing us to reach for the Beauty Petal, but these things are connected.”

From the project’s Beauty imperative: 

The resultant design strengthens the strong sense of place apparent in the school and tells the story of the region’s architecture, landscape, people, sustainability, and everyday life.

In today’s techno-centric world, people spend more time looking down at devices versus connecting to their place. For Sonoma Academy, a high school on the outskirts of Santa Rosa, their goal was to have people look up and out, to create a campus heart, and to bring the school and community together through dining and making, all while celebrating the region’s beauty.

The beauty of the site inspired the organization of two sweeping floors that stretch to views, grab onto the hillside, and work to blend this campus with many levels. With the open sliding doors, students are encouraged to wander in and through, making this building a part of everyday pathways. Exposing the materials, the radiant manifolds, the structure, and the systems invite the user into the daily functions of the building. Biophilic principles providing guidance for planning and material selection – everything was thought of as a critical piece of the story.

From the project’s Inspiration and Education imperative: 

Sonoma Academy also has launched a Connections program that brings the principles of sustainability into the classroom curriculum. The 9th-grade program includes classes such as Literature of the Environmental Movement and Environmental Science, and an Exploratory course revolving around food and the garden, just to name a few.

Additionally, Sonoma Academy holds Open Houses and campus tours to prospective student families as well as Community Fundraiser events. These Open Houses and fundraising events are held multiple times a year and are open to all. The project’s educational brochure is provided at the open house and highlights the building’s design and environmental features.

Another area that had an immense ripple effect was the project’s work on the Materials Petal. “It took us a long time and deep work to get there,” Souza said, “but the effort has changed our process and our understanding of engagement in the industry.” She explains that the team did a deep dive into material health for this project, and that has unrolled into several other projects. “I was moved by how the act of doing the hard work really changed us and inspired us to go farther. It was a lot of granular effort at the time but it was really exhilarating, too. We are still riding this wave of inspiration even now. We have worked with a lot of rating systems and standards, and I have not experienced this kind of shift in any other case.”

This project had the “all in” feel to it that can result in innovative solutions. For example, Souza explains, “We were able to add PV and a green roof — not just one or the other. This was important because this building is nestled into the site and the roof is highly visible from other levels. This is one of the special ‘beauty moves’ that we were able to realize, thanks to the persistence and care of the entire time.”

Indeed, the beauty of this project is partly a result of the fact that the design team conceived it as a building of its site. The sense of it being of its place is palpable. And Souza says it not only looks like that, but it feels like that, too. “It really doesn’t feel like it was ‘shipped in.’ It feels like it is from this place and belongs here. The materials are humble and tactile: wood paneling, green roof.” The result is a biophilic building — the beauty of the project feels more like land than sculpture upon it. 

RELATED LINKS

https://living-future.org/case-studies/sonoma-academy-guild-commons/

Living Future is able to support projects like these and share their stories with the world thanks to contributions like yours. Please donate to help us continue to build a living future.

Cover photo © Celso Rojas

Moore & Giles’ Path to Red List Free

Beverly McAuley, the Senior Director of Sustainability and Education at Moore & Giles, has advocated for material health and transparency for years. Her passion for material safety led Moore & Giles to be the first leather company with a Declare label in 2017. And now, because of her efforts, they have over a dozen Declare labels, all Red List Free, and most third-party verified. 

Beverly’s dedication to regenerative design and safe products transcends disclosure. By working with her suppliers to address hazardous chemicals within the supply chain, Beverly is changing the tanning industry. By leading with empathy and collaboration, she is safeguarding end users and protecting tanneries from harmful exposures.  

What made you decide to push your suppliers for the removal of Red List ingredients and to publicly disclose those ingredients?

Historically, people have trusted that the food we eat and the products we use are safe. Through the years, we’ve seen negative impacts resulting from that way of thinking, like using asbestos, lead, and Teflon in nonstick pans. Now, it feels like we are in an era filled with the desire to have the information to allow us to take control of our destiny and ultimately our legacy, through our decisions. That requires a certain level of transparency, whether it’s the food we put in our bodies or the products we put in our buildings. Moore & Giles became an early adopter and the first leather company to achieve a Declare label as our format of choice for ingredient transparency. 

Our process to achieve full material disclosure has been a journey—easy with some and requiring a bit more patience with others—but through gathering that deep level of disclosure, we’re now able to screen the chemicals against the Living Building Challenge (LBC) Red List to learn more about their impacts. That’s all meant to provide a background of what got us to this point.

Our process in general, is to ensure that our products are compliant with specific regulatory lists, like Cal Prop 65 and REACH, in addition to restricted substances lists like the LBC Red List. When entering a product and its ingredients, if we see any red flags, we’ll notify the supplier and request that they remove the ingredient and substitute it with a safer chemical. That’s simply become our standard procedure. I assume if a substance is on the Red List, we should remove it. It’s the right thing to do. It’s better for all of us. The whole process has opened our eyes to exploring other ingredients, even if they’re not flagged against the Red List. We are approaching transparency from a place of curiosity by asking what each chemical does, if we must use it, and if there might be a better way. This method has led to some inspiring side effects, with our suppliers now doing the same thing, and seeking out innovative options. If we can replace a chemical with something that’s safer and will still create the same product, why not? 

What was the process you used to convince your suppliers to share their ingredients and remove Red List ingredients?

There is historic evidence that leather is older than fire, next to wood and water, leather is the oldest material humans are still dealing with in the built environment. There’s a long history there. Some of these tanneries, our suppliers, are family-owned, multi-generational, over one-hundred-year-old companies. When we started requesting information, it was unexpected and new because no one else was asking. 

We originally sent a supplier survey, asking for full material disclosure for all of the products we purchased from each supplier as well as another five-page document full of questions for them to answer. We hit it hard, received a couple of responses… and a lot of crickets. It was too much, not only because of what we were asking but also the tech side was confusing across our global supply chain. So, we corrected our course and backed up a bit. 

We worked on educating our suppliers on the why. Why are we asking for this information? Who else is asking for this (clients, project architects, etc.)? What are we going to do with it? It was important to make it clear that it wasn’t just Moore & Giles asking for this level of disclosure, but that there was a return on investment connected to the ask. This informative approach supported the fact that we were doing this for a good reason.

When we started, some clients didn’t even know what Declare was. But now, some design libraries won’t specify a product unless you meet certain requirements like the Declare label. The industry is evolving to support these requests a lot more than it did when we began.

After educating on the why, we provided step-by-step training sessions to guide suppliers through logistics. We recorded a virtual training on how to fill out the forms and how to give full material disclosure. The most important thing that was really concerning suppliers was that they were worried they were giving away all their secrets. Consider your great-grandmother and her most loved recipe. If she is like my Great-Grandmother, she is protective of her legacy and will leave out an ingredient so that no one ever makes it as good as she did. (True Story). 

Giving up that secret recipe and potentially handing it over to competitors is a common concern for many suppliers when it comes to transparency. So, we worked with Toxnot, now 3E Exchange, to help our suppliers understand how they can make an ingredient proprietary to protect their recipe while still providing the ability to screen against hazard lists like the Red List. 

Putting their fears at ease and requesting one product per supplier really started to shift things in motion. Once we achieve one Declare label with a supplier, they seem to get it and feel confident doing more! Today we’re receiving regular product disclosures and tanneries are much more open to the process. 

I often think about an experience I had with one tannery. Something had been flagged on the Red List, and when we reached out to them to remove that ingredient, they responded later to thank us. That doesn’t happen very often. But they reached out and told us that no one had questioned it. They’d always made it that way and never had a reason to change because it’s what worked, it’s what people purchased, and it’s just the way it was. And that right there is the way humans have been operating, whether it’s the food we buy, the clothes we wear, or the products we specify—it’s business as usual. However, in this case, when we questioned their ingredients and asked if they could seek a safer alternative for one product, they found a much safer ingredient and incorporated that change throughout their entire product offering. This created a shift in the way of thinking and changed the way we deal with that tannery now. If they make a change or find something innovative and sustainable, we’re their first call. We celebrate these positive shifts together, which is important for all of us to remember to do, as we navigate our way to a sustainable and regenerative future. Today, this tannery is investigating regenerative farming solutions, upgrading to more energy-efficient equipment, and using renewables, in addition to material health. It is so rewarding to look back and see how that chemical change request was the tipping point to where we are today, with all parties looking through a lens of curiosity to ask, “What better solutions might exist?”.

What have been the impacts on your business and your consumers since removing Red List ingredients from the supply chain?

One important aspect to consider while you’re looking for sustainable attributes that we learned early on is aesthetic. The quality and aesthetic of the product needs to be as similar as possible to what the client is used, or better. You can be as sustainable as you want to be, but if it’s not desirable, it typically won’t be specified. Thankfully, the ingredient changes on our products haven’t had a negative aesthetic impact. We can’t tell the difference. Our clients can’t tell the difference and there is no change in quality or performance. The switch is a success and has been a no-brainer and encourages designers to consider sustainable products in their projects. 

The architectural and design industry has become more aware of the Declare label, and it’s recognized on green building platforms and scoring systems, helping our products’ recognition. Many design libraries, like the Genslers, the Perkins & Wills, and others who are making their own material specification requirements are also recognizing Declare Red List Free labels, emphasizing third-party verification, which is so important, and something we believe in and incorporate. 

All of this effort has led to more specifications resulting in purchases. That’s bottom line, return on investment right there! Some companies are still in that space where you have to prove ROI before you can do anything from a sustainable perspective. And for those folks, I can say that we’re there, we’ve done the work, and we’re experiencing results. Sure, it’s taken a lot of work and building trust to shift our age-old industry to this level of transparency. But now they’re just proud to be part of it and join hands with us to lead the way forward! 

Having a healthy portfolio of third-party verified, Red List Free Declare labels is important to us, and it will continue to be part of our plan. We’re beginning to see our competitors come along behind us. Paving the way is invigorating, but it can also be a challenge because rather than navigating an existing path, you are instead making the effort and investment through trial and error to create it. I always say celebrate your trailblazers in every market because they’ve done the work. Ultimately, we’re doing the work so that people will follow. My only question is: what’s taking so long?

Any final thoughts you want to leave with our readers?

Take the risk, BE the leader, and blaze those trails! I’m happy to talk to anyone about my process and the value beyond ROI that having a Declare label has brought our team and our tanneries.  

We will never fully realize the extent of the ripples of the positive impacts that are created from decisions like these. And that has to be okay. To companies that need proof of return on investment before change will happen: you are falling behind. We must consider and discuss the cost of doing nothing. When determining the cost of the materials we specify, purchase, use, and ultimately discard, we must shift to a culture of including the impact on our planet, human health, and future generations of using those materials and their ingredients as part of the cost, multiplied by the impacts created by frequent replacements if it is a low-cost, short-term product. We must choose well, not often, making verified sustainable choices that support environmental and human health and take an active role in a circular economy. These key elements need to become part of the ROI equation. For now, we might not know what the final numbers are, but we do know that there is an impact to every decision that we make, creating our legacy in real-time. The question is, will the legacy you leave behind be a good one?

Living Future believes that justice and equity are at the core of creating a regenerative future. Regenerative work creates a positive impact across social, cultural, and ecological systems. A truly regenerative future is one in which community members are intentionally and actively engaged in co-designing and co-creating their built environment so that it reflects their values, meets their needs, and cultivates thriving communities.

Equity has been an explicit component of Living Future programs since the introduction of the Equity Petal in the Living Building Challenge in 2009. Since that time, we have continued to elevate and champion equity as a core pillar of our work by introducing our Affordable Housing program in 2013, launching our Just program in 2014, and continually evolving all the equity components of our programs regularly. We are eager to invest more resources to enhance equity in our standards and to use them as transformative frameworks for the building industry. We are now excited to embark on a new initiative to sharpen our focus on equity further.

Living Future’s Equity in the Built Environment (EBE) Initiative will integrate and center equity throughout all of our programs. Living Future is in the process of developing major updates to our regenerative building and sustainable materials programs, and the EBE Initiative, which is grant-funded through June 2026, provides an opportunity for us to focus our efforts to reflect on, reimagine, and refine how equity shows up in all of our standards. Through performing in-depth analyses of our current programs as well as other industry standards and frameworks, conducting research, and engaging with a diverse range of organizations and individuals working toward aligned goals, we will listen and learn new ways Living Future can more effectively advance equity and justice through our work. We will then integrate what we learn into future  updates to our programs as well as tools and resources that equip and support organizations toward centering equity in the built environment. 

Spotlight on the steering committee

The EBE Initiative is co-led by a steering committee of Living Future staff and equity leaders in the built environment. Together, the committee aims to define key equity goals and priorities, identifying how Living Future can drive transformational change and create lasting impact within the industry. You can learn more about the steering committee on our EBE Initiative landing page. 

“I am excited to synthesize the results of our community engagement efforts, conversations with industry professionals, and research in a format that will be beneficial long-term both for Living Future and for other organizations committed to bettering the world through our built environment. There are still currently many gaps in how equity is classified and prioritized within sustainable development, and I am proud that we are working to fill those gaps!” – Daraja Brown, EBE Steering Committee member

“I chose to join the steering committee because it is a great way to join forces with like-minded leaders who are actively working to shift current mindsets, practices and systems toward equitable, regenerative futures for communities. “ – Precious Rideout, EBE Steering Committee member

* Living Future would also like to acknowledge Ganesh Nayak, one of our founding EBE Steering Committee members, who tragically passed away in July 2024. He is greatly missed and we are forever grateful for his kindness and passion for inclusion and accessibility in the built environment, which he generously lent toward the development of this work. You can learn more about Ganesh and his legacy in this blog post.

The EBE Initiative represents a pivotal moment for Living Future to continue growing and learning, as we deepen our commitment to advancing equity through every aspect of our work. As the work progresses, we will be sharing what we learn through our research as well as inviting our community members to review proposed program updates. We hope you will join us on this journey and look forward to your engagement with us along the way. 

Join our mailing list for future EBE updates and engagement opportunities!

Our 2023 Impact Report Is Out

Our 2023 Impact Report is out, showcasing the incredible progress we’ve made together. This isn’t just about our organization – it’s about the collective energy and achievements of our community and the movement as a whole.

Imagine a world where buildings are regenerative, products are sustainable, and our impact on the planet is positive. This is the vision we’re building, and our Impact Report lays out the powerful trends and patterns that fuel our journey.

At the heart of our work are frameworks that challenge the norm and redefine possibility. The Living Building Challenge, a global standard for regenerative design, sets the benchmark for a sustainable future. Our other programs – the Living Product Challenge, Zero Carbon, Zero Energy certifications, and the Declare and Just labels – are driving innovation across industries, creating a ripple effect of positive change.

Join us as we continue to push boundaries, accelerate progress, and shape a more sustainable world, together.

We are especially gratified to share some of the 2023 numbers and milestones. For example:

• Products: We supported 370 manufacturers to publicly disclose ingredient information on 1,325 Declare labels (up 175 YoY) representing some 16,000 products across 25 product types. 

• Buildings: We registered 65 projects for our building certifications (Living Building Challenge, Zero Carbon, and Zero Energy), and certified 20 projects, representing 3M sq. ft. (2x more than previous high). These diverse projects ranged from a 100 sq. ft. affordable housing project to an almost 1M sq. ft. hockey arena.

• Critical Buildings: We engaged 7 new projects to participate in our Affordable Housing program, which now includes 64 registered projects located in 28 U.S. states and 1 Canadian province. With these new projects, totaling 500+ housing units, the cohort represents 3,000+ housing units that will provide healthy, efficient, and affordable housing for 9,000+ residents. 

• Organizations: We engaged 62 new firms to start using the Just framework to evaluate their organization’s policies, practices, and  performance (up 15 YoY), and ended the year with 161 active Just labels. These labels represent a diverse range of organizations and a total of 36,000 employees (up 5,000 YoY), with organizational sizes varying from 2 to 8,500 employees. 

This is why we are doing this work. 

As our CEO, Lindsay Baker shares so eloquently in her letter in the report: 

“We are promoting a philosophy: to build in a way that is regenerative, not just sustainable. The Living Building Challenge can guide decision making. It is also an advocacy tool — a way to ask for the building that you want, the materials that you want, in the private and public sphere. It is also a certification, with all of the specific requirements and documentation that such a designation requires. The goal is to heal ecosystems, to make us healthier than before we entered the building, and to create good and healthy jobs that sustain families. This is the task of regeneration, which our planet calls upon us to do more deeply today than ever before.”

Ready to see the incredible things we’re accomplishing together? Dive into our Impact Report and witness the power of our collective efforts. Get inspired, and join us today by donating to make an even bigger difference!

RELATED LINKS
Celebrating Over 200 Certifications with Our 35th Living Building

PHOTO CREDIT:
The “deckony” at the ZGF-designed PAE Living Building in Portland, Ore., is a fifth-floor oasis offering a multi-sensorial biophilic environment that invites people in with sweeping views, fresh air, and indoor-outdoor connectivity. © Benjamin Benschneider.

At the International Living Future Institute, we have the privilege of working with affordable housing practitioners who are transforming the industry through groundbreaking innovations on every project. At this year’s Affordable Housing Summit, we are honored to showcase these projects and share them with you all. During the Summit, we will learn about projects such as a 28-story haven for LGBTQ+ seniors in Harlem that is designed for net zero operational energy and embodied carbon (see Innovations in Embodied Carbon Session below), a housing structure setting a new precedent for sustainability and designed with deep engagement with its First Nations residents in British Columbia (see Designing for Culture and Connection Session below), and houses designed to address the shortage of missing middle residential construction in the northwest and be adaptable to grow with families (see Innovative Housing Models and Pathways to Homeownership Session below).

The Summit will kick off with opening remarks by designer, urbanist, and social justice activist, Liz Ogbu, a global expert on engaging and transforming unjust environments. Her work is rooted in collaborating with communities and leveraging design to address systemic harm, catalyze community healing, and foster environments that support people’s capacity to thrive. We will also be joined by other noted experts in regenerative design such as Sonja Bochart and Chris Hellstern (both Living Future Heroes!). 

Our speakers this year have so much inspiration and knowledge to offer, and we are thrilled to host them all. We hope you will join us on October 24th and 25th as we celebrate innovation in the affordable housing field. As we look forward to this event, here’s a peek at more of our sessions and speakers:

Designing for Culture and Connection

These speakers are reshaping how we engage with the built environment by centering our deep connection with nature and with culture. 

Sonja Bochart is a prominent biophilia expert who has led biophilic design workshops that span 10 recent Living Building Challenge projects.

StudioHuB Architects will share how trauma-informed design principles and deep engagement with the local Indigenous community informed everything in the Chilliwack Housing Project in British Columbia, down to the facade pattern.

Innovative Housing Models and Pathways to Homeownership

We will feature the work of visionaries who are paving the way for greater access to homeownership through forward-thinking housing and development models. 

The three speakers in this session are all affordable housing developers utilizing strategies to rapidly increase the availability of housing in their communities and to leverage unique financial structures to provide opportunities for homeownership. These developers are creating new communities taking the form of structures such as community land trusts, co-ops, tiny house villages, grow homes and shared ownership models, all while employing sustainable and regenerative design principles.

Equity and Inclusion

Explore frameworks for incorporating robust equity and inclusion, including Arch Nexus’ recently-launched Comprehensive Equity Toolkit. 

This session will also feature two members of Centering Equity in the Sustainable Building Sector (CESBS), an initiative that brought together leaders in environmental justice, architecture, affordable housing, transportation, economic development, and sustainability to create a multifaced plan to universalize access to sustainable, healthy, regenerative building design for the places where we live, work, learn, and play.

Scaling and Shifting to Safer Materials

Marilyn Specht and Chris Hellstern, recognized leaders in the regenerative design movement and members of Living Future’s Material Health TAG, will lend their extensive knowledge of selecting materials to this group. 

We will also introduce our new Safer Materials Shift initiative with our partners at Housing Partnership Network and Stewards of Affordable Housing for the Future.

This session will also include an interactive (but low-pressure!) game with the group to help test out everyone’s knowledge of healthy materials.

Innovations in Embodied Carbon

This session will illuminate strategies for comprehensive decarbonization as pioneers in Zero Carbon affordable housing shed a light on the growing importance of embodied carbon in the sector. 

This panel will include four speakers, all of whom have been visioning and working diligently to decarbonize the affordable housing sector. These case studies will include a presentation on the tallest Living Future Affordable Housing Pilot Project to date, as well as an introduction by Ruwan Jayaweera of PAE, the engineering firm behind some of the largest Living Buildings, with 60+ projects having certified or in pursuit of the Living Building Challenge and Zero Energy Certification.

Don’t miss out on this opportunity to learn from these amazing speakers. Sign up here to register.

Cover photo credits:
Chilliwack Housing Project, rendering courtesy of StudioHub Architects
The Kelsey Civic Center, rendering courtesy of WRNS Studio, Mercy Housing, The Kelsey, and SPA
Hazelwood Biophilia Workshop, image courtesy of Rothschild Doyno Collaborative and Sonja Bochart
Carmen Villegas Apartments, rendering courtesy of Magnusson Architecture and Planning

The Impact of Declare Labels

Over the last few years as Declare has grown, material transparency has become the rule in sustainable building. The Living Building Challenge requires some Declare labeled products to be used in projects, LEED offers points to projects using Declare labeled products, and the Green Building Council of Australia recognizes Declare. As self-disclosure becomes more common practice, the industry is pushing manufacturers to do more. 

Building standards are starting to offer more benefits to optimized and verified products. Red List Free products—products whose bill of materials have been verified—and those that have done the work to improve their declaration status will be getting more attention as we move into the future. And we are excited to share the stories of three manufacturers spearheading that movement.

Breaking Barriers: The Moore & Giles Story

Suppliers often resist disclosing chemical formulas due to proprietary concerns. However, Beverly McAuley tackles this challenge head-on by working empathetically with leather suppliers, explaining the intent of the Red List, and educating them on the health risks of Red List chemicals. Her approach not only safeguards the end users, but also protects tannery workers from harmful exposures. Beverly’s success story can inspire manufacturers, contractors, and designers to adopt similar strategies for fostering change.

Overcoming Hurdles: Vode’s Journey to Transparency

Vode, a forward-thinking lighting manufacturer, faced the risk of losing their Declare label due to a non-compliant adhesive supplier and the use of fluorinated ethylene propylene (FEP), a Red List ingredient, in their cabling. To comply with the essential use exception of FEP, Vode had to disclose all proprietary ingredients. Despite several attempts, Vode had to make the tough decision to switch to a supplier willing to disclose adhesive ingredients. This pivotal move ensured the continuation of their Declare label, demonstrating that changing suppliers is a feasible step towards material health and transparency. Leti from Vode’s experience can motivate others to overcome supplier challenges and prioritize transparency.

Achieving Healthier Interiors: Allsteel’s Commitment

Allsteel, known for its interior office facades, have updated their Declare labels by removing PVC, a Red List ingredient, from their architectural products. Initially, they only achieved a Declared status, but through persistent efforts, they successfully reformulated their products to exclude PVC and advance to LBC Red List Approved. This inspiring journey showcases Allsteel’s dedication to healthier, more transparent materials and serves as a testament to the positive impact of Declare labels.

Why These Stories Matter

These narratives from Moore & Giles, Vode, and Allsteel underscore a common theme: the pursuit of healthier, more transparent products. By sharing their stories, we can illuminate the significant strides made towards safer materials and inspire others to follow suit. Each of these manufacturers has demonstrated that transparency and material health are achievable goals, paving the way for a healthier future.

We invite you to delve deeper into these transformative stories through our compelling Trim Tab interview series. Hear firsthand how these industry leaders navigated challenges and made impactful changes. Let their journeys inspire you to prioritize transparency and health in your own supply chain.

Stay tuned for our upcoming series, where we celebrate the power of Declare labels in driving positive change and advancing our mission for a healthier world.

How the Living Future Community is Shaping a Sustainable Tomorrow

When I set out to write about ILFI’s new Introductory Membership, I knew I had to create something more than a Top 5 list of reasons to join. It needed to be authentic, inspirational, and a little fun–a lot like our Living Future Community! Inspired by the storytelling elements of the  Living Building Challenge (LBC) and the curiosity and playfulness central to Biophilic Design,  I’ve taken the opportunity to virtually connect with five of our members, learn more from some of the brilliant and passionate people that make up the Living Future Community, and share our stories. I’ll start with mine. 

Bri DiNicola (she/her) | Austin, TX | International Living Future Institute

Being a part of the Living Future Community, I’ve found a space where I’m not just seen and heard but truly understood. This community has become my anchor, especially during times when the challenges of climate change feel overwhelming. My journey into sustainability was sparked by Professor McLelland (you’ll hear from him later in this post) during my first sustainability course at the University of Alabama. That passion deepened through my Sustainable Built Environments program studies at the University of Arizona and led me to the heart of the Regenerative Buildings movement.

In 2023, I officially joined the Living Future Community, drawn by the opportunity to stay up-to-date with the most cutting edge industry developments and expand my knowledge through becoming a member and enrolling in Living Future Accreditation (LFA) with my Professional Member discount. The $0 Introductory Membership, now available, would have been a game-changer during my student years. It’s a perfect gateway for those eager to integrate into the professional realm of this inspiring movement.

A little over a year later, I found myself facing probably the biggest opportunity of my life so far: the chance to join the Living Future Membership team and officially dedicate my career to the regenerative buildings movement. While I may not be on the front lines creating products, buildings, or cities like many of you, I am truly grateful and honored to be able to have a role in connecting those who are— By creating opportunities for you to learn together and work together, I know that this community is unstoppable. 

Ateet Singh (he/him) | Meerut, Uttar Pradesh, India | Institute of Advanced Architecture of Catalonia (IAAC)

Ateet is a young architect driven by a deep passion for continual learning. His passion for sustainable design was ignited during a pivotal course at Thomas Jefferson University, where he was first introduced to the LBC by Professor Rob Fleming. This experience opened his eyes to a holistic approach to architecture, beyond the traditional rating systems prevalent in India. Previously working to support the Sustainable Architecture initiative at FivD, Ateet is now pursuing a master’s degree in Advanced Ecological Building & Biocities through the IAAC. Since joining the Living Future Community in 2021, Ateet has deepened his commitment by earning his LFA and is now working towards advancing regenerative design in a market still dominated by conventional, more prescriptive methods.

“ILFI has been my go-to source of knowledge since I first heard about it. Here in India, we usually focus on rating systems, but ILFI helped me approach sustainable building design in a new way. It has drawn my attention towards the finer details of building design, such as the importance of equity.” 

Despite the challenges, Ateet remains committed to developing a greater level of expertise and connecting with like-minded individuals to help expand the adoption of more holistic and equitable approaches to building design.

Lauren McNeill (she/her) | Denver, CO, USA | Group 14 Engineering

Lauren’s introduction to ILFI came at an early Living Future Conference, where the launch of the Just Label ignited her passion for sustainability. 

“I found ILFI right out of college and I wasn’t very technical at the time, so it was nice to find a group that was welcoming me with open arms, even at a baseline understanding of what these principles were. Everyone was always very willing to share their experience, share their background, and just widen the circle. That was something different in the [AEDC] industry, and I found it really motivating and inspiring.”

As a direct result of Lauren’s LF conference attendance, her firm, Group 14, pursued their first Just Label. The process of earning the label catalyzed internal changes, prompting the firm to formalize practices such as paid volunteer time to employees. The Just Label became a cornerstone in Group 14’s journey, and as they soon pursue their 5th Just label under the newly-updated Just 3.0, they continue to ensure that their internal practices reflect the values of sustainability and social responsibility they champion in their projects.

One of Lauren’s standout projects is the Northglenn City Hall project, which is pursuing Core certification under the LBC. This project is a shining example of regenerative design and innovation through collaboration, particularly with its rainwater capture system—an impressive feat in a state like Colorado, where water laws are notoriously strict. Made possible through Lauren’s collaborative work with Denver Water & City of Northglenn, the project team worked closely with local water authorities to create an augmentation plan that ensures compliance with Colorado’s water laws while still achieving their goal of no potable water use for irrigation. Lauren’s work has made a substantial impact, demonstrating that industries traditionally intensive in energy and water use, like distilleries, can also adopt sustainable practices, inspire broader change, and even seek Net Positive Water under the Living Building Challenge!

Lauren’s work, both in her professional projects and as a leader of Colorado’s Regional Member Community (RMC), providing locally-focused education and fostering connection, exemplifies the collaborative and innovative spirit that defines the Living Future Community. 

Jonathan McLelland (he/him) | Tuscaloosa, AL, USA | McLelland Architecture | The University of Alabama

Though Jon initially envisioned changing the world through diplomacy, it was the discovery of sustainable architecture that truly resonated with him. In addition to his work as an architect, he finds a deep sense of purpose and optimism in his role as an educator. 

Jon uses his teaching platform to inspire students to embrace regenerative design and challenge students to think critically about the future, not only of architecture, but of everything. Achieved through collaborative work on semester-long independent projects, he shared that his students’ work restores his faith [in the movement] every time. Jon describes his small seminar community as “a great wellspring of possibility that keeps [him] inspired,” as he faces the challenges of implementing sustainable architecture in a conservative industry and geographic region. 

In a similar spirit, Jon shared what being part of the Living Future Community means to him:

“Joining the Living Future Community has kept me inspired, even when local projects don’t always align with my vision. The community provides hope and a sense of belonging, reminding me that we can make a difference.”

Despite challenges, he remains optimistic and continues to educate future generations about the importance of sustainable design. Jon’s story is a testament to the power of community and the potential for change when like-minded individuals come together.

Angela Iraldi (she/her) | Philadelphia, PA, USA | Re:Vision Architecture

Angela became involved in sustainability through energy auditing and managing energy systems in buildings as a part of her master’s degree. Later, her experience in HVAC Commissioning led her to recognize the widespread waste of energy and resources, even in projects aiming for high levels of sustainability certification. This fueled her passion for sustainability consulting. 

One of her most impactful projects involves collaborating with a major building product manufacturer to pursue Core LBC certification for their office building. Through this project, Angela has encountered challenges with product sustainability, particularly with materials that lacked Declare labels or contained Red List substances. This challenge led Angela to work closely with ILFI and lean into the greater philosophical framework of ILFI’s programs to approach the challenge by fostering collaboration and open dialogue. As a result, the manufacturer is expanding their product offerings for better compliance with Red List and biophilic design principles. They’ve also increased engagement with the Institute through a Corporate Package and event sponsorship. 

Angela reflected on her involvement with the Living Future Community and the personal and professional impact it has had on her:

“The Living Future community is the best group of ego-free people I’ve ever met. Everyone is in it for the right reason, trying to do better without any competition. It’s refreshing and inspiring to be around people who are genuinely trying to figure things out together. The organization has influenced how I approach projects and even how I live my life. It’s my North Star.”

By connecting professionals committed to sustainability, the Living Future Community empowers its members to foster meaningful change in the building industry.

Shayna Kerkstra (she/her) | Grand Rapids, MI, USA | Catalyst Partners

After first learning about the LBC as a part of her education in the Sustainable Business program at Aquinas College, Shayna’s involvement with ILFI began through her firm, Catalyst Partners, which engaged with ILFI to pursue the Just Label and buildings programs. One of Shayna’s notable projects is the John Ball Zoo Pygmy Hippo exhibit, currently pursuing Materials Petal Certification under the LBC. The project faced unique challenges, particularly with materials and water management, but the resources and support from the Living Future Community played a crucial role in overcoming these hurdles.  

Reflecting on her experience, Shayna shares, “The process of working together with the owner, construction manager, and architect, trying to find sustainable solutions has been an incredible learning journey. Living Future Membership is more than just access to resources—it’s about being part of a supportive, innovative community that empowers us to make a real impact.”

In all the conversations I had, members highlighted ILFI as a source of inspiration and a beacon of hope for the future. The Living Future Community is one that is uplifted and accelerated by education and mutual knowledge sharing. United by shared values and a commitment to a socially just, culturally rich, and ecologically restorative world, this community continues to exceed expectations and drive industry transformation.

To close, I’ll leave you with the words of our CEO Lindsay Baker, shared at the 2024 Living Future Conference:

“We know that it is deeply possible to build buildings that celebrate place, create good jobs, and are built out of the materials of the ecosystem in which they are constructed. Many might think that this vision for the future sounds impractical. We are not those people.”

If these stories resonate with you, we invite you to join us. Our Introductory Membership offers a preview of our full-access Professional Membership with no financial investment. Join the Living Future Community today or open our community door for a friend or two!

Cover photo: Jessica Yurinko Photography

Key Principles for Real Progress

At the International Living Future Institute (ILFI), our mission is to advance the creation of a truly regenerative built environment. In this pursuit, organizations must operate with the same clarity and integrity as individuals—setting clear goals, seeking consistent encouragement, and measuring tangible progress. However, misplaced credit can undermine these collective efforts. Whether building from scratch or renovating existing structures, every action creates impacts on people, communities, resources, and the environment. To ensure genuine progress, it’s essential to claim both positive and negative impacts with integrity.

Identifiable Impacts: Real

To maintain the credibility of Living Future projects, it’s crucial that claimed impacts are tangible and identifiable. Unfortunately, some entities take credit for actions they haven’t actually undertaken. For instance, certain carbon offset programs may claim reductions in emissions simply by preserving undeveloped lands, which can detract from genuine sustainability efforts.

Measured Impacts: Metered

Quantifiable impacts are a cornerstone of ILFI’s programs. We require a 12-month performance period backed by verifiable data to support the benefits claimed. Accurate measurement ensures that the progress reflected in Living Building Challenge, Zero Carbon, and Zero Energy projects is real and impactful.

New Impacts: Additionality

Recognizing only new impacts is essential for continuous progress. Awarding credits for pre-existing achievements can stagnate advancement. Zero Carbon and other ILFI-certified projects must demonstrate that their positive impacts extend beyond what has already been achieved, ensuring that every project pushes the boundaries of what’s possible.

Attributed Impacts: Earned

Proper attribution is vital to prevent double-counting benefits. Credit should only be given where it is due. For example, a project cannot claim benefits that rightly belong to another entity. By adhering to this principle, Living Future projects maintain the integrity and transparency that drive real progress.

In conclusion, ensuring that impacts in regenerative design are identifiable, measured, additional, and correctly attributed is fundamental to sustaining the integrity of sustainability efforts. By embracing these principles, we can collectively advance toward a regenerative future.

.Join us in this commitment to real impact. Explore how you can contribute to a Living Future by certifying your next project with ILFI. Contact us at sales@living-future.org or click here to get started.

2024 Midyear Stats and Takeaways

Living Future is excited to share the latest stats, milestones, and key takeaways highlighting the growth of our programs over the first half of 2024.

Building Certifications

Living Building Challenge, Zero Carbon, and Zero Energy

In the first half of 2024, we celebrated 11 new certified projects, including our 34th and 35th Living Buildings:

• PAE Living Building, Portland, OR – Living Certified 
• Class Of 1966 Environmental Center At Williams College, Williamstown, MA – Living Certified (upgraded from Petal)
• Semans-Griswold Environmental Hall, Chestertown, MD – Petal Certified (Energy)
• The Living Homes on Mill Creek, Moab, UT – Petal Certified (Energy, Water)
• Architectural Nexus Salt Lake City, Salt Lake City, UT – Petal Certified (Water, Materials)
• Muhlenberg College Fahy Commons, Allentown, PA – Core Certified
• Trent University Forensics Training Facility, Ontario, Canada – Zero Carbon Certified
• King County Solid Waste Division – Vashon Recycling and Transfer Station, Vashon, WA – Zero Energy Certified
• Singh Residence, East Greenbush, NY – Zero Energy Certified
• Antigua Solar Cabin, Jumby Bay, Antigua – Zero Energy Certified
• 1042Highland, Oak Park, IL – Zero Energy Certified

Additionally, 8 projects have recently achieved Ready Designation by completing the Ready Audit post-construction. These projects will undergo a Final Audit after a 12-month performance period.

In the past 6 months, 110 projects have registered (7 Living, 7 Petal, 18 Core, 61 Zero Carbon, and 17 Zero Energy), covering 10.8M sq. ft. Worldwide, there are 417 registered projects, representing 41M sq. ft., actively pursuing certification. (Around 900 projects have registered all time.)

Registered and certified projects are predominantly in the US (485), followed by Canada (29), Australia (20), New Zealand (16), and Italy (15), with a total of 38 projects in Europe.You can find most of our certified and non-confidential registered projects on our Project Map. If your project is not listed and you wish to be included, please email maps@living-future.org.

There are now 208 certified projects, ranging from 130 to 990k sq. ft., representing a combined total of 7.8M sq. ft.

Materials

Declare and Living Product Challenge

Currently, there are 42 active certified Living Products and 1,441 active Declare labels (a 20% increase over last year), including 809 Red List Free (RFL) and 407 Red List Approved (RLA).

More than 10% of Declare labels are third-party verified, which is a focus area for the team to grow, adding 5 new approved verifiers in 2023 and another lined up to start in Q3.

Out of the 41 CSI divisions and subdivisions (product types) represented in Declare, the most common are Furnishings (17%), Thermal and Moisture Protection (11%), Carpeting (9%), Electrical (9%), Resilient Flooring (8%), Ceilings (7%), and Openings (6%).

The fastest growth within the Living Future Institute’s Declare program continues to be in the lighting sector. In 2019, there were only 5 lighting products with Declare labels. Today, fueled by advocacy work promoting transparency in the lighting sector, we proudly have over 100 published labels for lighting products.

18 manufacturers published their first label in the first half of 2024, including: A. Zahner Co, ALUZ, Encore Hospitality Carpet, Felt Right LLC, Goodwe Power Supply Technology Co, Heath Ceramics, Kenall Manufacturing, Kirlin Lighting, KPNE Products Ltd, LANTANA LED, Linea Ceiling & Wall Systems, LITON, Pa-Co Lighting, Rubio Monocoat Australia Ply Ltd, Swan Surfaces, Tivoli, Trespa International BV, and Wools of New Zealand.

Manufacturers with more than 25 active Declare labels include Armstrong World Industries, Godfrey Hirst, HMTX, Humanscale, Knauf, Milliken, Mohawk, Q-Tran, Toto, and USG.

Oceania saw growth in 3PV (third-party verified) labels with the addition of verifiers in the region, including labels for Acoufelt, Autex, Brickworks Building Products, and District Australia. Outside of Oceania, Kenall Manufacturing and Moore & Giles achieved 3PV status in 2024.

ORGANIZATIONS

Just

In the first half of 2024, the Living Future Institute registered 30 new and 41 returning organizations in the Just program. There are currently 190 active Just labels, representing a diverse range of organizations and a total of 39,000 employees, with organizational sizes varying from 1 to 8,500 employees.

These firms span 15 industries, with architecture firms representing more than half (59%) of the participating organizations, followed by consulting and engineering firms. The firms are based in 9 countries, with the vast majority in the US (87%), followed by Canada (4%), Australia, and Italy (2% each).

So far this year, we have welcomed nearly 40 new organizations to the Just community and published about 70 Just labels, including new labels and renewals. By July 2024, we had already published as many Just labels as we did throughout the entire year of 2023, putting us on track for a record-breaking year.

Stay tuned for more updates and milestones as we continue to drive transparency and sustainability across industries.

Cover Photo: PAE Living Building
Credit: Jamie Goodwick / PORTLANDRONE

In this insightful interview, architect Jason F. McLennan speaks with publisher Michael Berrisford about the enduring impact of McLennan’s book, The Philosophy of Sustainable Design. Originally published 20 years ago and now in its seventh reprint, the book remains a cornerstone in the green building industry.

McLennan, the mind behind the Living Building Challenge and author of seven sustainability books, shares his journey and the book’s continued relevance.  Berrisford, Editor-in-Chief of ILFI’s Ecotone Publishing, offers his perspective on their longstanding collaboration. Enjoy their conversation as they delve into the principles that continue to inspire and inform the industry.

In 2004, you published your seminal book, The Philosophy of Sustainable Design (POSD). Can you take us back to the circumstances of your career that led to its creation?

In the early 2000s, there was a glaring absence of comprehensive resources on sustainable design in architecture. I was committed to sustainability and saw the need for a book that holistically covered the principles of sustainable design. By 2004, I felt ready to fill this gap, providing a guide that balanced nature, art, technology, and materials.

POSD has been utilized in over one hundred design schools, reprinted seven times, and translated into several languages. Why do you think it remains relevant after twenty years?

The book’s deep green design philosophy and principles are timeless. Concepts like Respect for the Wisdom of Natural Systems, Respect for People, and Respect for Energy and Natural Resources remain crucial. While some technological details may be dated, the core philosophy ensures the book’s longevity in academic and professional settings.

What are the most enduring principles of sustainable design addressed in POSD?

The overarching philosophy of holistic thinking is central. The book is not about checklists or specific aesthetics but about a comprehensive approach to design. I emphasized “respect” to reframe the dominant paradigm of exploitation to one of stewardship. This holistic approach, addressing interconnected issues simultaneously, is still unique and crucial today.

How has POSD served as a blueprint for evolving the AEC industry?

POSD introduced concepts like Living Buildings and material ingredient transparency, which have become industry standards. It has influenced many designers, providing them with tools and language to build consensus with clients and peers. The book continues to impact professionals who were introduced to it early in their careers.

What’s the role of love in regenerative design?

Love and passion are essential for alignment with our values and for creating beneficial changes. Regenerative design professionals must act from a place of love for all life and nature. I encourage consistency in values and actions, highlighting the importance of love in our decisions for a sustainable future.

Why is looking to nature for solutions more important today than ever before?

With ecological systems undermined worldwide, regenerative restoration is urgent. Solutions must be based on working with nature, going beyond minimizing harm to actively healing the environment. This philosophy is embedded in the Living Building Challenge and must be central to any sustainable design approach.

Is there a The Philosophy of Sustainable Design 2.0 in your future?

I envision a new edition with updates on recent approaches and technologies while maintaining the original philosophical framework. Expanding on regeneration and refining the content to reflect current advancements is essential. It’s a matter of finding the time to research and write.

Is your copy of The Philosophy of Sustainable Design dog-eared, “borrowed,” or otherwise missing from the office resource library? Do you know of a colleague who may be interested in exploring the holistic principles of regenerative design? In any case, we have you covered at ILFI’s new Marketplace for all things to do with publications, membership, and education. 

GET YOUR COPY

Featured image: HMTX. Photo by Anton Grassl.

2025 marks the 20^th anniversary of the launch of zHome, the first ILFI certified Zero Energy community in the United States.  This groundbreaking project aimed to make zero carbon living mainstream by demonstrating an array of new, but available, technologies under one roof.  Over the last 20 years, the solutions zHome showcased have become much better, more accessible, and less expensive.  

Today, the climate crisis is advancing, but so are the solutions. Living a near-zero carbon life is now within reach with manageable efforts. Here’s how:

• Energy Efficiency Solutions: From energy monitors to LED lighting and vacancy switches, affordable efficiency solutions are readily available at your local home improvement store. New products are aggressively reducing standby energy use, making vampire loads a thing of the past.
• Renewable Energy: In most parts of the country, generating your own renewable electricity is now cheaper per kWh than purchasing fossil-fuel-generated electricity from the utility. Additionally, many utilities have a 100% renewable electricity purchase option is available for a nominal cost.
• Heat Pumps: Heat pumps are scaling rapidly and decreasing in cost, including models suitable for cold climates.
• Sustainable Mobility: Infrastructure for walking, biking, and micromobility is improving. Public transit is expanding, and electric vehicles (EVs) have become mainstream. EVs, combined with renewable electricity, offer zero-carbon mobility and are increasingly affordable.
• Sustainable Diets: Vegetarian and low-carbon diets are more accessible and easier to adopt, contributing to lower carbon footprints.

For decades, advocacy and professional communities have diligently crafted a range of sustainability and climate-positive solutions that are now ready for prime time. These innovations enable mainstream individuals to adopt climate-positive lifestyles effectively.

Reflecting on nearly two decades since the zHome project, the collective impact of these communities is substantial. However, many climate-conscious individuals, myself included, still struggle with reducing their carbon footprints. Despite implementing a passive house retrofit, installing a solar array, doing our best to live simply, and owning an electric vehicle, my family’s carbon footprint was higher than expected. Factors like air travel, meat consumption, and high material consumption offset our climate-friendly efforts.

Many in the climate movement excel in certain areas while falling short in others—vegans who love to travel long distances by air, beef eaters who drive gas-guzzlers but rarely leave their locale, or climate activists who attribute their footprint to systemic issues. Why is it challenging to achieve a low-carbon lifestyle despite its relative ease?

The one-two punch of COVID-19 and significant social, political, and cultural shifts have undoubtedly played a role. However, I believe the primary barrier is a lack of accessible information. People are busy and often unsure where to start. Even within decarbonization communities, knowing the right actions can be difficult. After calculating my carbon footprint, I found no comprehensive source prioritizing actionable steps. Many resources were either too broad or too specific.

To address this, I created a website which is a one-stop shop for reducing personal climate impact. The platform is organized around two key themes—what to do and why to do it—covering essential areas like home, mobility, food, and consumption. Prioritized action tiers and a downloadable action checklist help users make meaningful progress.

Launched three months ago, Climate Responsible has received positive feedback and recognition from environmental leaders like Denis Hayes and Bill McKibben. Although the platform is Western and North America-centric, it focuses on places with the largest footprints and greatest responsibility. Amidst global turmoil, those who can act must do so. Collective action can create a virtuous cycle of mainstreaming and normalizing sustainable practices, ultimately reducing costs and improving market readiness.

Climate Responsible isn’t about debating the reality of climate change or the ethics of inaction. It’s for those who understand the urgency of our slow-moving crisis and are ready to take responsibility. I hope you find it helpful and, most importantly, use it. Personal decarbonization within our movement can drive market change, set examples, and catalyze widespread transformation.

Check it out: Climate Responsible. Be sure and sign up for my newsletter if you’d like to stay updated

What role can the built environment play in supporting the transgender community?

Last year, to mark Transgender Day of Remembrance, ILFI’s Danielle Gonzalez shared her experiences outside ILFI as a transgender consultant and educator and shed light on the impact Just organizations can make towards supporting the transgender community. We now delve deeper to explore the larger role the built environment—and building professionals—can play in enhancing this support.

The Institute’s Affordable Housing + Equity Manager, Lea Celestial, sat down with Danielle to chat about action steps the building sector can take to create safe, healthy, regenerative spaces for transgender people.

You wrote last year about the role of Just organizations in ensuring the safety and support of transgender people. In the broader context of the building industry, how does the way we design, construct, and manage our built environment impact the quality of life of the transgender community?

Well, the built environment isn’t really built with transgender people in mind. It’s important to note that while transgender people have been around for all of human history, the word “transgender” didn’t arise until the early 1970s, and the word “cisgender”’ didn’t show up until the mid to late 1990s. Before then, the term for “opposite of transgender” was “normal.” Even today, trans people are considered an anomaly, rather than a possibility of human existence. Now, I’m not saying we need to completely change what we’re doing with architecture and engineering, but I am saying that there are some experiences and needs faced by transgender people (and other groups like neurodiverse people and people with disabilities, for example) that we could pause to consider.

Can you describe the unique experiences, needs, and issues faced by transgender people that can be better addressed by the building industry?

[Laughs] What a big question! I’m not sure I can capture all the ways trans folks experience the world. After all, every individual has their own way of navigating their environment, but in terms of some generalized considerations for the built environment, there are more than a few. 

Currently, a big one that’s a major part of the national discussion here in the US and in other places like the UK is bathrooms and changing rooms. That is a unique experience, that leads to considerations such as all-gender bathrooms or changing rooms. But that topic is a much larger conversation.

To give another example, we can also consider something as seemingly benign as reflective surfaces. Many trans folks—myself included—avoid our reflections like the plague, each for their own reasons. And that’s not necessarily unique to the transgender community. Reflective surfaces can be a challenge for people prone to visual overload and overstimulation, like those with autism. And rates of neuroatypicality are elevated among transgender individuals (though we’re still not sure of the specific relationship here). Simply put, conditions like autism, ADHD, OCD, things like that, affect trans and gender diverse people at a higher rate. I’m not saying we need to remove reflective surfaces and cater to a particular group. But it’s just something that could be considered. Are we building a shopping center or a healthcare center? If it’s healthcare, is it mental health focused? Will there be a higher than average influx of neurodiverse people here? Are these highly polished marble columns going to be a problem in the waiting room? That kind of thing. 

But, if I’m being completely honest, I think housing—or a lack of it—is one of the more immediate threats to the transgender community.

What role does the affordable housing sector play in supporting the transgender community? Where do you think we should focus our efforts?

Two out of every three transgender people either are experiencing or have experienced homelessness in the US–including myself. One in three LGBTQ youth—people 18 or younger—have reported housing instability, either because they were kicked out or because they fled abuse. One in five transgender and gender non-conforming people in the US have been discriminated against when seeking housing, and more than one in 10 have been evicted simply for being transgender. I’d say homelessness is a huge issue facing the transgender community.

According to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, there are three distinct types of needs people need to survive: basic needs, psychological needs, and self-fulfillment needs. Basic needs are pretty obvious: food, water, shelter, sleep, safety and security. Psychological needs are things like community, recognition and feeling accomplished. Most affordable housing projects are pretty good at focusing on those types of needs for people, but there are some specific considerations around these needs for the trans community. 

For instance, I mentioned recognition as a psychological need. For the trans community, recognition includes identity affirmation, something most folks probably don’t consider, because for something like nine out of 10 people, the world isn’t constantly communicating doubt about their fundamental identity. Trans folks have to constantly assert that we are who we say we are.

Or we can look at safety and security. Yes, safety and security means not having to worry about being physically and sexually assaulted (one in two have experienced sexual and/or physical assault) and just having a house or room with a locking door can help there, but we should also consider things like financial security and access to safe healthcare so we don’t need to rely on black market medications.

I think the affordable housing sector can play a major role here by trying to think outside the box in terms of new housing projects. Can we develop an affordable housing project that provides safe, affordable housing for LGBTQ youth (25 and under) in a mixed-use zoned building, where some of the commercial space is reserved for services for this community, such as a low-cost medical clinic that specializes in transgender and LGBTQ health care? Can this hypothetical housing project use identity-affirming language in all of its policies, communications, and legal paperwork? Can we rent some of the commercial space to a LGBTQ or minority owned business that can both operate as a community space (like a coffee shop) and help offset building operating costs so we can offer free utilities to tenants, helping their financial security in the process? These are the kinds of questions I’d love to see the sector begin asking. I think this is how the affordable housing sector can really begin to address this problem and make a huge difference.

Can you give examples of best practices or case studies of successful strategies that can be replicated in building projects?

No, not really. Be the case study you want to see in the world! But in all seriousness, that’s a hard question to answer. Right now, unfortunately, trans people have been—and still are—an afterthought in most spaces, if we’re even considered at all, so this is kind of new territory. There aren’t a lot of examples to point to because this is just the beginning, I think. 

There are a few examples of new projects that are moving in the right direction. Here in Seattle—just two blocks away from my front door, in fact—is Pride Place, an affordable housing project for LGBTQ seniors in Seattle’s historic “gayborhood.” And another, is the upcoming Capitol Hill YouthCare HUB project. It’s a project that plans to renovate a currently vacant landmark building here in Seattle and offer a variety of education, employment, and leadership programs for LGBTQ youth, and is partnering with Pride Place’s parent company, to build affordable housing next door. So those are two great examples here in Seattle. 

I was also recently introduced to the story of San Diego’s Truax House, which is a historic landmark for the local LGBTQ community there, and it’s being restored and converted into apartments. 

In closing, what is the value of the Institute’s certifications and labels to catalyzing change and achieving better outcomes for transgender people?

I think the Institute has always been great about encouraging people to think outside the box. I mean, that was why the Living Building Challenge was created, right? To challenge how we think about the way we build our environment and ask the question, “What does good look like?” 

We can encourage people in these different sectors of our industry to pause and ask ourselves questions we’ve never asked before. You know, we live and work in this industry that’s millenia old, right? Buildings have been around for as long as human civilization invented agriculture and began settling in ancient river valleys. As a species, humans excel at adapting the environment to suit our needs. But have we paused recently to ask ourselves who the “our” is in that?

We’ve been doing things a certain way for so long, and I think we don’t pause to ask ourselves why. Why do we do things that way? Is it because there’s no other way to do it? Or is it just because we haven’t tried anything different lately? Is the current way we build alienating certain communities, and does it need to? Or is that just a product of our momentum over the ages? Can we do something about it? 

I think we can.

Inspired to learn more about what you can do to create better spaces for our transgender community? 

Verification matters as we scale our progress.

I suppose we never really know where our careers will take us, but I have recently realized with considerable surprise that despite my training as an environmentalist and building scientist, I have found myself learning how to become, well, an accountant. Not a normal financial accountant, but rather a carbon accountant. Along with my fearless colleagues at ILFI, we have been wading through the complex and critical details of the carbon impacts of our built environment in such a way that we can provide clear and rigorous accounting guidelines for buildings and companies that have made commitments to reduce their carbon emissions in line with the Paris Agreement and other related climate action regulations. We do this under the auspices of our increasingly popular and well-referenced standard, ILFI’s Zero Carbon certification. 

Our Zero Carbon certification program, launched in 2018, covers the embodied and operational carbon impacts of buildings. Since that time, we have registered nearly 20 million square feet all over the world. We believe that it is the most well-used certification in the world that exclusively covers the carbon impacts of a building. Although it was before my time with ILFI, we launched this program to help catalyze the rapid decarbonization of our global built environment by providing the best guidance we could find on what a “zero carbon” building was at that time, considering such industry-leading issues as whole building embodied carbon emissions caps, offsite clean energy purchasing, scopes of analysis for whole building life cycle analysis, and more. It was the first of its kind, and it was clearly an effort to build the plane while flying it. Our industry (along with our entire global economy) has to make incredibly difficult transitions in our efforts to drive down emissions, adapt to our warming world, and apply regenerative design principles. We are all doing our best to attempt to create the right standards, market mechanisms, public policies, softwares, and other innovations to make this happen. For us at ILFI, this has meant a continuous evolution for our Zero Carbon program as we seek to provide the clearest and most scientifically sound requirements possible. 

Creating a standard that is documentable, verifiable, clear, concise, and applicable to a wide variety of buildings around the world is not an easy task. But we are building on decades of experience in this work, and I am incredibly impressed with where we are today. And we would not be nearly as far along if we didn’t have friends on this journey. This week, our announcement of our collaboration with four of our largest clients — Amazon, JLL, JPMorgan Chase, and Prologis — is built on years of shared learnings on what is working and what needs evolution around carbon accounting for not just buildings, but more broadly for carbon accounting as a field and scientific landscape. 

When I worked for Google’s Real Estate team over a decade ago, I learned just how different the scale of thinking is when you have a global footprint. In order to achieve our global carbon goals, it is critical that we develop solutions and infrastructure for large companies that work at the global level. Thinking at that scale ensures that the tools that we build can themselves scale at the pace we need. This is the kind of standard-setting that is critical to the success of large-scale public policy, and really any policy that is intended to help the entire global building stock move rapidly towards decarbonization. 

It is this scale and speed that excites me about our new collaboration with these four leading companies and the wonderful individuals working with us in this effort. All four companies have incredibly passionate and knowledgeable in-house experts working on carbon issues for their businesses, and so our collaboration benefits from these teams of professionals who are working with real carbon targets and the complexities of design, construction, and operation of real estate around the world. 

The new version of our Zero Carbon certification will advance our guidance on carbon accounting for buildings in a variety of areas including embodied carbon, refrigerants, the integrity of carbon markets, and more. But the most exciting aspect of this work for me is that we are including explicit guidance for existing buildings seeking certification without major capital investments. As someone who comes from the building operations side of the industry, I believe that some of our greatest unsung climate heroes are the folks who operate and maintain our buildings with decarbonization and efficiency aims. In case you are envisioning that our built environment will be decarbonized by a one-by-one major renovation of every building in operation today, I want to dispel that particular misconception. There are opportunities to gradually decarbonize buildings every day— not during design or construction projects, but just during the day-to-day life of a building. Equipment dies and is replaced, people move in and out, buildings are bought and sold, rented and leased. Building certifications (at ILFI and elsewhere) have historically done a much better job of defining “what good looks like” when we are designing and building, but haven’t always been as effective at defining “good” for buildings over the course of their long lifespans. There are many particularly nerdy but critical questions that we must answer about the carbon accounting of existing buildings, and the next version of our Zero Carbon certification will address  those issues. Having the consultation of these four major companies with vast portfolios is extraordinarily helpful in that piece of the work.

In case you think this work is flying under the radar and only on the minds of a few greenies on the fringe, let me update you: just weeks ago, a group of some of the largest real estate asset investors in the world published a white paper under the auspices of an effort they have been working on for nearly two years. The group, known as Leaders of the Urban Future, issued a call to action for the global real estate industry to align on definitions, metrics and accounting practices for carbon in the real estate sector. The white paper analyzed the current state of certifications that cover carbon emissions for buildings, noting how they line up with a set of rigorous principles for what should be counted in the carbon footprint of a building or portfolio of buildings. We were impressed and delighted with the team that worked on the white paper, led by consultants from the well-respected London-based consultancy, SystemIQ. And we were honored and pleased to see how well our standards line up with the ‘North Star’ that these leading voices put forward. Indeed, aside from the wonderful new UK Net Zero Carbon Buildings Standard that is in development, our Zero Carbon certification is most aligned with the rigorous definition that this group of major investors has put forward based on the most advanced and rigorous carbon accounting schemes in the world (see page 14 of the White Paper to see how others stack up).

And it is not just the largest and most progressive investors in the world that are calling for this critical carbon accounting work to be done. The official ‘Buildings Breakthrough’ Agenda, launched at COP28, is a major piece of the infrastructure for our industry in guiding our contributions to the Paris Agreement target for a 1.5 degree future. In that recently launched Agenda, the very first priority action speaks to the need for clear and rigorous definitions and assessments for near-zero emission and resilient buildings. Doing this well is at the top of our collective to-do list! We at ILFI are trying to do our part by rallying our community to evolve the best possible standard we can, and will be helping to ensure that this work happens around the world.

I will admit that it can feel frustrating at times to feel like we are caught up in the details of ‘what counts’ when it comes to the carbon emissions of a building. Our planet needs us now, and these technical details can feel small in the face of our global challenge. But we are learning rapidly that we simply cannot run this race together if we don’t all play by the same rules and know where the finish line is. We are committed to doing that work as quickly and effectively as possible, and we are deeply grateful to Amazon, JLL, JPMorgan Chase and Prologis for making this work possible through their support and collaboration. We look forward to sharing our progress with our members, partners and clients, and welcome your help and feedback as we make this journey together.

Header photo 6 Pancras Square, Courtesy of Google and Tim Soar.

At Living Future this year, in my hometown of Atlanta, I kicked off the conference by sharing 10 things that are on my mind. Here’s a recap.

While you all are out there designing products, building buildings, doing innovative research, writing policy, I spend a lot of my time on movement strategy work, along with my colleagues and our co-conspirators. I am observing various tactics we’re using to try to transform our industry, thinking about how we can make things work better or faster or more equitably, how we’re advancing regenerative design, and how we’re engaging at the international scale. That work gives me a perspective that I hope will be a helpful spark. 

Global alignment on carbon accounting

This year at the very first UN Global Forum on Buildings and Climate, we celebrated the unveiling of the official Buildings Breakthrough Agenda for our sector: it is the global plan to achieve the decarbonization goals of the Paris Agreement by 2050. The very first item on our collective to-do list is for standards and certification bodies to align on definitions and assessment methods for near-zero emissions and resilient buildings. This may seem technical, but it is critical: In our work to decarbonize our sector, we can’t get very far without having clear rules of the game that are shared around the world. 

US alignment on carbon & buildings

Many of you know that we have been leaders on this effort here in the US, along with our co-conveners, via the ECHO Project that we began a year ago. We have also been at the table with the White House and other government leaders to help them create a Federal Zero Emissions Building definition that is very much a part of this larger global effort. This is incredible momentum at the US level. When we align on the ways we measure, it enables us to push harder, move faster and reduce confusion in the industry. It allows us to work across borders, which is critical in a deeply globalized world. And of course, it’s a great sign that we have super sharp people in the White House who are directly engaged in this particular piece of the decarbonization landscape — there is a building scientist working for our President right now!

Alignment on materials

Decarbonization is not the only place I’m seeing big efforts around alignment. I want to give a shout-out here to our friends and partners at mindfulMATERIALS for their work on aligning on a common ask for building materials manufacturers around the impacts of our products. This is allowing us to send a stronger market signal, clear up confusion, prevent greenwashing and, critically, to avoid the tendency to focus on only one attribute like carbon emissions, instead showing how all impacts — climate, health, social justice, biodiversity, etc. — matter and need to be accounted for. This has been a big year for alignment on the common ask, and I have confidence that these moves are going to rapidly accelerate change for building product manufacturing.

Understanding wood and forests

I’ve also been spending time this past year thinking about our precious forests and the wood industry. This past year, ILFI joined the Climate Smart Wood Group, where a number of forest-focused nonprofits are sitting with buildings-focused nonprofits and other building industry leaders to ensure that the push for mass timber and wood as a construction material is not contributing to negative ecological impacts but instead contributing to regenerative forestry. BuildingGreen has wonderful coverage on this issue. We are building great momentum here by working collectively.  We are stronger together. And that is worth celebrating.

Inequality & access to housing

Not every sign this year has been a positive sign. It has been a hard year for many who work on building peace, liberation and foundational quality of life for all people. In our vision for a living future, we imagine a socially just world, which is one in which housing is a fundamental human right. However, we are seeing trends that are sending us in the wrong direction. First, economic inequality is growing. Second, buying a home is becoming less and less possible as the price of housing continues to rise while incomes don’t rise at anywhere near the same fast rate. These larger economic trends are then impacting what can be built, such that housing (even rental housing) is becoming more and more out of reach for people in the US and in many countries like ours. 

This is a problem for our community to help solve. We need to find ways to build and maintain affordable housing. We need to help contribute to the creation of housing security in the form of ownership models like Community Land Trusts, cooperative models, and policies and regulations that promote affordability. At ILFI we are working on a new initiative to address equity and justice issues in a deeper way across our work, and that our Affordable Housing program is going strong with a new cohort of members. But these problems will require systemic change, more of us working together, and deeply intersectional approaches.

A shifting landscape for DEI work

The next big thing I’m thinking about in the world of justice and liberation is around Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. We’ve seen a disturbing thing happen this year around DEI work, which can best be described with the word backlash. We can expect more backlash on more of the issues we care about in coming years, and we need to double down on our commitments to increasing diversity, promoting cultures of belonging and inclusion, and real equity work, especially around racial equity here in the US where racial inequalities continue to have tragic and lasting impacts on society and on our lives. As the outrage of racial reckonings of 2020 fades for some, it’s especially important for us to keep up momentum in our DEI work. 

Launching Just 3.0

With that urgency I am very proud to announce the re-launch of our Just program in Just 3.0! For those who don’t know Just, Just is a voluntary disclosure tool and framework for reflection, evaluation, communication, and continuous improvement that helps organizations address social justice and equity throughout all aspects of their policies, practices, and culture. Through Just, organizations publicly commit to an equitable and healthy workplace, examine their existing systems, culture, and practices, and take action.  Many organizations in the building industry are waking up to equity issues or a deepening desire to address them, but need a guiding framework to help them get started and keep moving. That is how we hope to help with Just. Just 3.0 is the result of a rigorous development process that involved extensive research and collaboration.

“A Living Future is one where life wins, where our many global cultures thrive, where we all are treated fairly and where we treat our planet with the same respect and love.“

Working towards a living future amidst destruction

I am also thinking about how much harder our work is to find our Living Future in a world with so much destruction and death. The past six months in particular have felt like heartbreaking times to watch the politics of society play out around the world. There are no words I can find to describe the grief and the disappointment that I feel, that I know many of us feel, watching as people kill each other and destroy each other’s worlds. 

We are not disconnected from this as people working towards a living future. A living future is one where life wins, where our many global cultures thrive, where we all are treated fairly and where we treat our planet with the same respect and love. It’s a future where we don’t bomb each other, we don’t destroy each others’ homes, we don’t cut down our trees as an act of war, we don’t destroy our precious infrastructure. To be a part of this community is to fight for life for everyone, and to find the ways to make that possible. And community finds space to heal together, to grieve together, and to support those in need together. 

Bio-based materials resurgence

One of the most exciting parts of the past year is the building momentum for natural and biobased materials. Obviously, we’ve been seeing a rise in interest in Mass Timber for a few years now, and we’ve been seeing a lot of new biobased products grow in the market like Hempcrete and panelized straw technologies, but this year was a particularly great year for biobased materials and I really hope that trend continues. 

One big boost this year was the UN Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction Report released in collaboration with the Yale Center for Ecosystems & Architecture on Building Materials and Climate. I love how it places this shift in its rightful place in a set of three cascading priorities for our industry. The first priority is to avoid the use of new materials in the first place through building and materials reuse. The second priority is to shift to biobased materials wherever possible. The third priority is to improve the carbon footprint of conventional extracted materials. I love this framing. It shows the growing momentum and importance of bio-based materials especially in the Global South where so much of the new construction is occurring in the world today. 

Decarbonization and decolonization 

The last thing on my mind stems from a moving experience I had — visiting the 2023 Architecture Biennale in Venice, Italy. For the first time in history, the exhibition focused on the work of the African diaspora with the themes of decarbonization and decolonization. Many in the exhibition highlighted connections between global extractive and polluting industry and the history of colonization and war. At the same time, there were many depictions of a better world that is possible (such as contributions from Francis Kéré and MASS Design Group). A core characteristic of many visions for that better future is indigeneity — indigenous labor, craft, and materials that are biobased and regenerative. 

Many might think that this vision for the future sounds impractical. We are not those people. We know that it is deeply possible to build buildings that celebrate place, that create good jobs, that are built out of the materials of the ecosystem in which they are constructed. It is time to link arms and support these visions, to find inspiration from them ourselves. I certainly did.

Earlier this month, ILFI proudly launched the latest iteration of our Just® program during the 2024 Living Future Conference in Atlanta, Georgia—Just 3.0!

Initially introduced in 2014, Just is a disclosure tool and framework for reflection, evaluation, and continuous improvement that helps organizations address social justice and equity throughout all aspects of their policies, practices, and culture. Just uplifts the understanding that it is people who make up businesses and communities and that people are the core of creating a Living Future.

Through Just, organizations publicly commit to an equitable and healthy workplace, examine their existing systems, culture, and practices, and then take meaningful action. While Just is primarily focused on organizations working in and adjacent to the building industry, the program is open to organizations across all industries.  

Taking a step back: why does justice matter for organizations?

While there has been ample research to show a strong business case for embedding social justice and equity into company policies and practices, the real reason for doing so is much simpler and more profound: it is the right thing to do. 

In recent years, there has been increased attention and awareness around workplace equity, showing a trend toward fostering more inclusive and diverse environments. However, there is still a long way to go to ensure equal opportunities and treatment for all employees. For example:

• 1 in 4 C-suite leaders is a woman, and only 1 in 16 is a woman of color
• In the U.S., women earn 84 cents for every dollar men earn
  • This gap expands to 69 cents for Black women, 59 cents for Native women, and 57 cents for Latinas
• Globally, women earn an average of 77 cents for every dollar men earn for work of equal value
• Only 33% of workers report being engaged at work (down from 36% in 2020)
• 84% of workers reported at least one workplace factor that negatively impacted their mental health and well-being

The good news is that organizations can play a role in reversing these trends. Many organizations in the building industry are waking up to equity issues and have a deepening desire to address them, but need a guiding framework to help them get started and keep growing. For individuals, the best place to start on this journey is with self-reflection and personal work. This holds true for organizations as well.

The best way for organizations to begin their social justice and equity journeys is by taking an introspective look inward. They can examine the current state of their own employee experience and operations and start transforming their internal policies and practices. That’s where Just can help: Just is a tool to help organizations better the lives of their employees and the broader community by providing measurable benchmarks to demonstrate commitment and action. 

How does Just work?

Just 3.0 is organized around 21 social justice and equity Indicators that are housed within six Categories: Diversity, Inclusion, Compensation, Health, Benefits, and Stewardship. It’s worth noting that overlaps and intersections inherently exist between both Categories and Indicators. For example, Gender Diversity affects Belonging, Accessibility affects Engagement, Workforce Empowerment and Living Wage affect Well-Being, and more.

The Categories and Indicators are not meant to convey defined boundaries or distinctions; rather, Just provides a framework for organizations to focus on specific actions that when taken together across all Indicators, help to collectively create more socially just and equitable workplaces. 

Each Just Indicator includes four levels of performance with associated metric criteria at each level, starting from the beginning of the journey of reflecting and assessing, all the way up to executed actions.

• Level 1 requires organizations to develop a policy. This focus on policy first is designed to prioritize codifying an organization’s commitments to equity and also makes participation in Just possible for all organizations.
• Levels 2 to 4 require actions of increasing effort toward embodying equity and justice related to the respective Indicator’s domain.
• Achieving Level 4 indicates an organization has demonstrated significant action toward “what good looks like” based on the current understanding of justice and equity and represents the highest performance level within the Just program.

ILFI encourages all organizations, including ones that achieve Level 4, to continually look at ways to further optimize equity, diversity, and inclusion within their organization. Our hope is that Just organizations partner with ILFI to work in tandem in evolving Just and the industry’s understanding and action plan for addressing health and equity. In the same way that ILFI will continuously seek to learn and push the bar further, organizations will similarly challenge themselves to take greater action to enhance equity in their workplaces.

A Just label provides basic information about an organization, such as organization type, location, and number of employees, as well as “at a glance” information about its progress across 21 social justice and equity Indicators.

An organization’s performance in the 21 Indicators is summarized on their Just label, which also includes high-level organizational information and a link to its individualized page on ILFI’s public Just database. This public disclosure of an organization’s achievement at the time of label publication:

• demonstrates an organization’s commitment to its equity and justice goals;
• facilitates transparency and accountability to its employees and prospective members of its workforce, clients, partners, and the rest of the industry; and
• provides a platform for showing continued improvement over time.

In the same way that ILFI will continuously seek to learn and push the bar further, organizations will similarly challenge themselves to take greater action to enhance equity in their workplaces.

What’s new in Just 3.0?

Just 3.0 is the result of a robust development process that took place over several years and involved conducting extensive research; collaborating with the 20 collective members of our Organizational Equity TAG; soliciting input from peer organizations, industry partners, and the public; and integrating feedback from our existing community of Just organizations. In an effort to encourage the further advancement of equity in the building industry, Just 3.0 includes additional and adjusted metrics to more holistically represent “what good looks like” as well as provide further guidance and clarity around how an organization can demonstrate its commitments and take action. 

Just 3.0 includes updates that apply across the program:

Just 3.0 introduces several new Indicators:

Other Indicators include significant refinements, resulting in a shift in focus and/or intent as well as impact:

For more details, including specific revisions made to existing Indicators to address challenge and gap areas, please visit our Resources page and review the Just 2.0 to 3.0 Program Update Summary. Note that the Program Manual itself will be your one-stop shop for all of the performance metrics and documentation requirements as well as supporting information and resources for organizations to undergo the process of pursuing a Just 3.0 label–we highly encourage you to review the Program Manual for full details of the current program requirements!

The Just journey

An organization’s Just label is a snapshot of the organization’s performance at the time of label publication. ILFI intends for the Just program to be a tool for organizations to use in their long-term journey toward holistically embodying social justice and equity. We encourage organizations to see their first label as a benchmark of where they are and to use the Just program to create a roadmap for where they want to go within each of the Indicators. We advocate for organizations to routinely reassess the relevance and impact of their policies, programs, and actions in order to understand what is working well and where changes can be made to increase the social justice and equity benefits for their employees and communities.

We invite you to join the Just community and start on your journey of growth and transformation toward social justice and equity in the workplace.

A New Chapter for ILFI’s Building Programs

In the ever-evolving landscape of sustainable building standards, ILFI has consistently been at the “tip of the spear,” defining a vision for the future, pushing the boundaries of what’s possible, and challenging practitioners of the built environment to reach new heights of performance and impact. Recognizing the clear role that buildings play in creating and exacerbating climate change and the need for even bolder action to mitigate the negative impacts, ILFI has unveiled significant updates across our three building programs: Living Building Challenge® 4.1 (LBC), Zero Carbon Certification^TM 1.1 (ZC), and Zero Energy Certification^TM 1.1 (ZE). These updates represent a critical next step in the evolution of ILFI’s standards to drive market transformation and create a Living Future, with a specific focus on aligning our energy and carbon program requirements across all three programs while moving toward science-based metrics and advancing industry-aligned best practices.

These updates are more than just an interim step; they are a strategic move to position ILFI’s building standards for a more comprehensive update that ILFI is now embarking on. This integrated approach to all three programs tees up a cohesive framework that enables project teams to understand the requirements of each program more clearly and achieve multiple certifications seamlessly, fostering synergies and driving innovation. By aligning energy and carbon requirements across ILFI’s suite of programs—LBC, ZE, and ZC—we are setting the stage for a future where buildings are key to the solution to climate change, not contributors to the problem.

The Imperative of Alignment

The magnitude of the problems we face is immense, and the need for collective action has never been greater. ILFI is leading the way nationally and internationally in aligning its standards and pushing for the highest level of achievement.

Beyond ILFI’s program alignments, we are making strides industry-wide to foster alignment in energy and embodied carbon accounting methodologies. ILFI’s collaboration and leadership with the ECHO Project, the White House’s National Definition for a Zero Emissions Building, and involvement with Buildings Breakthrough (co-led by the UNEP-hosted Global Alliance for Buildings and Construction (GlobalABC) and others) underscores this commitment to aligned carbon accounting. This collective effort signals a paradigm shift towards a future where relationships and knowledge-sharing can build a movement strong enough to catalyze the transformation our industry needs to meet its share of the Paris Climate Commitment to limit global warming to 1.5°C. 

As we work towards industry alignment, the International Living Future Institute (ILFI) remains committed to leading the way. As our programs evolve, we continue to push the boundaries of what’s possible and achievable in the building industry—to define What Good Looks Like. These program updates are the first steps toward implementation, with more to come! 

What’s New in LBC 4.1, ZE 1.1, and ZC 1.1

With these program updates, ILFI has preserved the tenets of our certification programs, which operate as a philosophy first, an advocacy tool second, and a certification program third. These updates reinforce and advance the highest standards of regenerative building, marking a pivotal moment in aligning and strengthening energy and carbon requirements within ILFI and the broader industry.

The updates to LBC 4.1, ZC 1.1, and ZE 1.1 are a culmination of ILFI research and development with our Technical Advisory Groups (TAGs) and feedback from our incredible ILFI Staff, trail-blazing project teams, auditors, Board of Directors, Living Future Europe, Living Future Institute Australia, partner organizations, and so many others. Thank you to all who contributed!

Although this round of program evolution specifically focuses on ILFI’s energy and carbon requirements, critical updates were made to other Petals and Imperatives in LBC 4.1. For details beyond the major updates included here, please visit our Resources page to access the Program Change Guides. You can also learn more about ILFI’s Building Certification Process here. 

Core as an LBC Certification Pathway

With this update, ILFI will no longer operate a separate Core Green Building Certification® program and instead solidifies Core’s place as the baseline for what good looks like across the seven Petals of the Living Building Challenge. As such, projects pursuing LBC 4.1 can achieve Core, Petal, or Living Certification under the Living Building Challenge. Requirements for certification remain the same:

• Core Certification requires the achievement of all 10 Core Imperatives;
• To earn Petal Certification, projects must achieve one of the Water, Energy, or Material Petals in addition to the Core Imperatives; and 
• Living Certification requires the achievement of 20 Imperatives within all seven Petals.

Comprehensive, Accessible Program Manuals

The Standard and Handbook for each of the three building programs have been reorganized into one comprehensive Program Manual. This change brings cohesiveness to each program’s broad goals and specific requirements, providing clarity and a singular resource to project teams. Additionally, all Program Manuals are publicly available at no cost, removing them from behind the ILFI Membership paywall.

Efficiency Based on ASHRAE 90.1-2019

One of the standout updates is the integration of energy efficiency standards based on ASHRAE 90.1-2019. This shift aligns ILFI’s requirements with industry best practices while also requiring projects to go beyond the targets set by the industry, ensuring that projects certified under LBC 4.1 and ZC 1.1 are at the forefront of energy performance. For example, new Buildings must achieve a 20% improvement beyond the energy consumption levels required by ASHRAE Standard 90.1-2019 or later (demonstrating compliance under Appendix G) or IECC 2021 or later. 

Updates to Potable Water Requirements

All LBC 4.1 projects must now develop and adhere to a comprehensive water budget that includes reducing interior fixture flow rates by 25% relative to the EPAct 2005 standard, utilizing best-in-class water-consuming equipment and appliances, and implementing a leak detection system. These changes simplify the potable water baselines and conservation targets while retaining an emphasis on performance.

Science-Based Carbon Cap

In a significant step towards aligning with the 1.5-degree Celsius target set by the Paris Agreement, ILFI has introduced a science-based carbon threshold to LBC 4.1 and ZC 1.1 that serves as an interim target until the industry is aligned on budget-based whole life carbon thresholds that factor in allocations based on project density and type, building element, and location. This stringent target challenges project teams to rethink their carbon emissions, pushing for designs that are a positive force in the face of urgent and escalating climate impacts. 

Combustion Updates + Retired Exceptions

In a significant move reflecting the industry’s progress and the availability of viable alternatives, ILFI has retired exception EC-003 Combustion in Commercial Kitchens across all three programs, which previously allowed for combustion-based equipment in commercial kitchens where electricity-based equipment was insufficient. With advancements in technology and increased awareness of sustainable practices, solutions are now readily available to meet the cooking needs of commercial kitchens without relying on combustion-based equipment. The retirement of this exception underscores ILFI’s commitment to pushing the industry towards fully sustainable and electric-based solutions, reducing carbon emissions as swiftly as possible.

Fugitive Emissions

To begin to address and assess the critical issue of fugitive refrigerant emissions, all LBC 4.1 and ZC 1.1 projects must now have a maintenance plan in place to monitor and reduce fugitive refrigerant emissions from sources such as refrigeration, air conditioning, and fire suppression systems. Furthermore, a designated team member is required to join industry efforts by committing to reduce both embodied and operational carbon within the MEP industry. This requirement represents an important first step toward project teams understanding and tracking where there is opportunity to minimize impacts and then work toward reducing the significant climate impact associated with refrigerants and MEP systems.

Additional Updates:

• Requirement for 20% reduction in embodied carbon now applies to ZC and includes exterior materials (LBC 4.1, ZC 1.1)
• Embodied carbon calculation scope now includes additional specificity for site activities (A5a) and material waste (A5w) (LBC 4.1, ZC 1.1)
• Scope of carbon offset now includes primary materials, exterior materials, and interior materials (LBC 4.1, ZC 1.1)
• Amended biogenic carbon reporting and calculation requirements to include that any product claim of sequestration must be based on Product Category Rules (PCRs) in accordance with ISO 14025 and ISO 21930 (LBC 4.1, ZC 1.1)
• Tables indicating embodied carbon scope categories are now more closely aligned with those used by LCA tools and practitioners (OmniClass Table 21) along with updated content for Approved LCA Tools (LBC 4.1, ZC 1.1)
• And more!

ILFI envisions a future where buildings are a crucial part of the solution to climate change, the pathways to mitigation are more clearly laid, and industry and community leaders are working together to accelerate change. LBC 4.1, ZE 1.1, and ZC 1.1 represent a commitment to transformative and collective action, and future updates to the LBC, ZE, and ZC programs will drive even more transformation. If you’d like to contribute your thoughts toward this future visioning, please participate in our survey: Visions for LBC 5.0.

Together, let’s build a future where every building is a living building, contributing to a sustainable, equitable, and resilient world for all.

If you’d like to contribute your thoughts toward this future visioning, please participate in our survey: