What is LEED gold standard?
 

From my understanding, LEED is a third-party certification program that determines how "green" a certain building is. Less carbon foot print, less waste, more energy efficient with heating and such.

Now I have problem with the whole idea with a green building. A building management company had a lecture talking about green buildings. Take Vancouver Convention Center for example, it has been awarded LEED platinum. The speaker int he lecture says he have major concern with the VCC building and it is going to cost a lot of money to maintain. More bells and whistles in a building = more expensive for upkeep.

He mentions green building looks great on paper but it's a trap. I get the impression LEED condo = biodegradable condo. I think I may be grossly misinformed. What do you guys think? LEED condo = good for investment? Good for live in? Any good at all?

The OV is LEED platinum and I commented to my GF I would not want to live there until I've seen the costs associated with maintaining the various green initiatives.

The sewer powered heating system sounds awesome, until you realize it cost $30M, is located by Cambie bridge far from the OV site, and involves underground pipes for sewage and water. Can you imagine the bill if any of that fails? Does the condo have an alternative heat source if it does fail? Could I as a condo owner, with the majority of other condo owners, vote down the use of this system if it ever fails?

To me these initiatives are like awesome new gadgets. You pay a small fortune to be the first, and you get to pay a small fortune to deal with all the problems of being first.

Correct, LEED is a third-party certification. Canada's LEED program is based off of the one in the US but there are a number of differences between the two. There are 4 levels I believe, Ceritifed, Silver, Gold and Platinum. You get certain amount of points based on the types of systems implemented, different building materials, location of where goods are produced, how goods are produced.

As for if costs would be greater, it's all relative. Certain things will be more expensive upfront and costs will be recouped in the long run. I believe the city of Richmond now requires all commercial buildings starting at a certain square footage to be designed with a green roof. There are developments across Canada that are fairly green, shopping centre on Vancouver Island, housing developments in Calgary and Toronto.

This doesnt look good.
1990's = leaky condo fiasco.
2000's = all senior developers went to help build olympic venues while the juniors build tons and tons of residential condo in a matter of short time (save time by cutting corners)
2010's = LEED

What some people don't realize is that not everything that's used to get points with LEED is new technology. It isn't too difficult to get the points for LEED Certified or Silver. I'm not too familiar with what green products have been used in some of the new residential developments. The only products that I do remember being used are thermal rods, green roofs, green walls, water reclaim systems and recycled air systems.

General maintenance is more as well. Paint is a good example of that. LEED paint is flat out not nearly as durable as non-LEED. Bathrooms/kitchens/trim that used to be painted in oil are now done in latex that is barely washable. Exterior paints need to be repainted far more often. Metal rusts like a son of a bitch. The simplest way to put it is that all the good shit in paint will also kill you in 40 years.

Rusting metals, non-durable paint?

LEED gold? More like bio-degradable Gold!

I believe there's a lot of misunderstanding about LEED and green products in general. The speaker that you listened to talk about the VCC sounds like he was talking out of his ass a bit to. There are additional fees to maintaining some systems, but there are others that also can save or make you money. There is a low incoming housing development that was rebuilt outside of Toronto that used a combination of thermal rods and solar panels along with a few other things i don't quite recall now. With the upgrades they had done, the residents no longer have to pay for electricity and sell the excess back to the city. Also with green roofs there is a misconception that the greenery will need to be watered. If done properly there are many plants that can be used in the green roof system where they won't need water for up to a couple of months or get by with very little. As for upgrading structure, there are also systems that can be used without upgrading the roof structure.

I don't know the specifics about what products or systems the convention centre is using, but most projects i know haven't used much or any exterior paints to get LEED credits. Most housing developments i've looked at don't use much exterior paint at all nowadays, they've turned to products like vinyl siding, cmu, masonry and products like Hardie-Panel/Planks which have an integral colour.

^ That's true, most LEED buildings have very little exterior paint.

The VCC in specific is pretty much all aluminum panels and glass. The only things that were painted was some steel beams for the glass canopies and bollards. Since they account for 0.00001% of the total project materials, they applied for a credit and we got to use the most toxic chemicals available on the market :D

The OV is completely open to traffic now, go check it out!