Green Design:

Top 10 Smartest Buildings

05/ 4/11 - This week I am writing my article in a hotel that shall remain nameless -- it is 40-plus floors high, with a complete glass façade, lights on wherever you walk and air conditioning blowing in each room. This building is LEED certified. For those of you unfamiliar with the LEED certification, it is 'an internationally recognized green building certification system, providing third-party verification that a building or community was designed and built using strategies intended to improve performance in metrics such as energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality, and stewardship of resources and sensitivity to their impacts.' The hotel labels itself a green building and advertises the fact in its marketing materials, building signage and even in the elevators.

This got me thinking about the sustainable-design movement that is now becoming such an integral part of our lives: the simple idea that by choosing materials and systems that do less harm to the environment, this hotel considers itself a 'green building.'

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