From Zero Carbon to Living Buildings

Cover photo: ©Tom Holdsworth

Celebrating 2024–2025 Living Future Certified Projects

At Living Future 2025 in Portland, our Buildings Team had the incredible opportunity to connect face-to-face with passionate owners, designers, and practitioners committed to creating a regenerative future. Together, we explored how to scale impact across campuses, evolve the Living Building Challenge (LBC) to meet today’s climate realities, and rethink what “good” wood really means in a low-carbon world. We also shared how LBC aligns with global frameworks like the Common Materials initiative and the Nine Planetary Boundaries—reinforcing our shared commitment to climate action through materials, design, and innovation.

From the main stage, we announced our continued critical building work through our Affordable Housing and K-12 Schools cohorts and our Zero Carbon Pilot. The latter will support project teams pursuing the updated ZC 1.1 standard, focusing on the participation of existing building assets. We can’t reduce carbon emissions without addressing the ongoing operations of existing buildings. Parties interested in participating in the Pilot program can complete this form, and a member of the Building’s team will follow up.

Importantly, we celebrated projects—their owners, architects, and project teams—that have achieved one of our performance-based building certification programs. You can view project case studies for many of our certified projects on our case study page.  

Zero Energy Certified 

This year’s cohort of Zero Energy (ZE) projects includes several single-family homes, a large commercial building, and a mascot’s house. Some were existing buildings that had been electrified, while others were new construction projects. All are certified under our ZE 1.0 program:

• Ardor Wood Farm Studio and Workshop in Red Rock, TX by Julia Cook Webber. 
• 1042 Highland in Chicago, IL by Tom Bassett-Dilley Architect
• Antigua Solar Cabin, Jumby Bay, Antigua, by Colin John Jenkins Assoc.
• Campbell Collective, LA, CA, Gaia Development
• Daybreak Library, South Jordan, UT, by Architectural Nexus
• The Singh Residence, East Greenbush, NY, D2D Green Design
• The Bush School’s Upper School, Seattle, WA, by Mithun
• King County’s Vashon Recycling and Transfer Station in Vashon, Washington.
• The Ramblin’ Reck Garage at Georgia Tech, Atlanta, GA, by Square Feet Studio
• Target in Vista South, CA, by MG2

Zero Carbon Certified

This year’s cohort reflects the diversity of project types that pursue Zero Carbon (ZC), from major event centers to distribution facilities and a small office interiors project. All have been certified under our ZC 1.0 program. 

• Amazon has achieved certification for the following projects. They have certified more projects under our ZC program than any other owner:
  • The MAB7 Amazon Fresh grocery store in Seattle, WA, the first grocery to achieve Zero Carbon certification
  • The MCI9 logistics facility in Liberty, MO, the largest Zero Carbon certified new construction project to-date
  • SCA5 logistics facility, in Sacramento, CA, the first North American logistics facility to achieve Zero Carbon certification 
  • The MEL8 logistics facility in Craigieburn, Victoria, Australia, is the first distribution warehouse in Australia to achieve ZC certification.
• Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle, WA, developed by Oak View Group in partnership with the Seattle Kraken, Amazon, and the City of Seattle. 
• Microsoft’s Silicon Valley offices in Mountain View, CA, by WRNS Studio.
• Trent University Forensics Training Facility, Peterborough, Ontario, Canada, by Christopher Tworkowski Architect.
• Alfa Campus, in Kfar Vitkin, HaMerkaz, Israel, was redesigned by Alfa Sustainable Projects. 
• Vicinity Centres-Chadstone Place, Victoria, Australia, by Bates Smart.
• Prologis’s DC4, in Eindhoven, Zuit Holland, Netherlands, by Archifit. The project was the first distribution facility in the world to achieve ZC certification. 

LBC Certifications

Our Living Building Challenge (LBC) 3.1 Petal projects must achieve all requirements for at least three Petals (including at least one of Materials, Energy, or Water). LBC 4.0 projects must achieve all ten Core Imperatives to achieve Core certification. Petal projects must achieve the Core Imperatives and meet all the requirements for one of the Materials, Water, or Energy Petals. To achieve Living Certification,  projects must achieve all seven Petals and 20 Imperatives (with some typology exceptions). 

This year, the certified projects reflect a range of sizes and typologies across many climate zones. They provide housing, spaces for learning and work, and even our first LBC infrastructure project.  

The following projects have achieved Core certification:

• Fahy Commons at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, PA, by Re:Vision Architecture. The project is the first to achieve Core certification. 
• Heartwood Annex Classroom at the Waldorf School in Pittsburgh, PA, by Bohlin Cywinski Jackson 

The following  projects achieved LBC 3.1 Petal certification:

• The Watershed, owned by Fremont Watershed Realty, in Seattle,  by Weber Thompson
• Google’s Gradient Canopy, in Mountain View, CA, by Heatherwick Studio and BIG 
• Mill Creek, owned and developed/built by Community Rebuilds, Moab, UT, by Architectural Nexus 
• One Riverstone,  in Bend, OR, by  Tozer Design LLC 
• Semans-Griswold Hall, Washington College, Chestertown, MD by Ayers Saint Gross

The following projects have achieved LBC 4.0 Petal certification:

• Arch Nexus’s office in Salt Lake City, Utah, by Architectural Nexus 
• Mithun’s Pier 56 Office Renovation, by Mithun. This project is the first Interiors Typology project to achieve LBC 4.0 Petal certification. 
• Unison Windsor Substation, Hawkes Bay, New Zealand, was designed by Charissa Snijders, Architect. It is the first Landscape and Infrastructure Typology project to achieve LBC 4.0 Petal certification.

The following projects have achieved Living Certification through the Living Building Challenge:

• The Phipps Exhibit Staging Center at Phipps Conservatory in Pittsburgh, PA, by Forty Eight Architecture 
• The Class of 1966 Environmental Center at Williams College, in Williamstown, MA, designed by Black River Design
• The PAE Living Building, in Portland, OR, designed by PAE Engineers and ZGF Architects
• Santa Monica City Hall East, in Santa Monica, CA, designed by Frederick Fisher & Partners  and Buro Happold

Feeling inspired? Connect with us to learn how our certifications can help you and your clients achieve your goals, meet ESG commitments and industry pledges, and inspire the broader building community. 

Q&A

What is the difference between Living, Petal, and Core Building certification?

Living Future offers three pathways for Living Building Challenge (LBC) certification: Living, Petal, and Core. 

Living certification is for projects striving for the highest level of positive ecological and community impact, water and energy efficiency, improvements in material health, and embodied carbon reductions. A project achieves Living certification by attaining all the Imperatives assigned to its Typology–all 20 Imperatives are required for New Buildings.

The Core certification pathway lays the holistic foundation for sustainable building performance with a requirement to achieve all 10 Core Imperatives, including all requirements within the Equity and Beauty Petals. 

Petal certification is for projects that want to dive deeply into one or more particular issue areas, or Petals, of the Living Building Challenge. This certification requires, at minimum, the achievement of all 10 Core LBC Imperatives and all Imperatives in one or more of the Water, Energy, or Materials Petals.

All levels of certification are performance-based, verified through a third-party audit.

Get started with LBC Certification

What is the Living Future Zero Carbon certification?

Living Future’s Zero Carbon Certification program makes the vision of a fully decarbonized built environment a reality by evaluating, reducing, and offsetting buildings’ operational and embodied carbon impacts. This program fosters the development and use of carbon-free renewable energy resources and neutralizes building materials and construction impacts.

Achievement of Zero Carbon Certification requires that projects:

1. They are highly efficient, demonstrating operational energy efficiency against a targeted reduction goal
2. Address embodied carbon through quantifiable reductions via low-carbon material choices, building reuse, and other strategies.
3. Offset operational energy through on-site or off-site renewable energy
4. Offset embodied carbon through a one-time carbon offset purchase
5. Address refrigerant emissions through design and operations

Learn more about Zero Carbon certification

NEW! Zero Carbon Certification is expanding to cover existing assets, and Living Future is looking for projects that are interested in participating in a pilot program scheduled to launch this summer..   We can’t reduce carbon emissions without addressing the ongoing operations of existing buildings. If you would like more information about how to apply to join the Zero Carbon Pilot program, please complete this form to express interest.

What is the Living Future Zero Energy certification?

The Zero Energy Certification requirements reflect the simple concept of a project living within a site’s carrying capacity, utilizing only the energy resources available locally. The certification scope follows this idea by measuring only the energy consumed and produced within the Project Boundary. Project teams are not required to account for the additional complexities or losses associated with the regional energy infrastructure beyond the site.

Achievement of the Zero Energy Certification (ZE) requirements requires project teams to follow three key strategies:

1. While there is no specific reduction target, projects must reduce operational energy use through design optimization and the selection of highly efficient building systems and equipmen to meet their needs on-site.
2. Electrify all energy systems (for all uses, such as heating, cooling, food preparation, and process demands). No combustion is allowed.
3. Offset all energy use associated with the project through producing renewable energy on-site. 

Discover more about Zero Energy certification.

Lisa Carey Moore

Lisa is the Director of the Buildings Team. In her role, she is the team’s lead for engaging new and existing clients interested in pursuing Living Future’s three leading performance-based building certifications: Zero Energy, Zero Carbon, and Living Building Challenge. She’s also responsible for promoting our registered and certified project work through stories to serve as catalysts for regenerative design across the real estate industry. With an education in political science and environmental studies, she believes everyone can serve as a change agent, no matter how small their role is in bringing a project to reality.

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