Jason Metnick, vice president of customer affairs with Sustainable Forestry Initiative, posted on the organization's Good for Forests blog questioning the U.S. Green Buildings Council's (USGBC) continued exclusion of SFI from its Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system. The newest version of LEED was approved by its membership earlier this month.
While 86 percent of USGBC members voted in favor of LEED version 4, SFI voted "negative with comments" because the system's rating tools, which award credits for the use of Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)-certified wood products, do not award credits for SFI- or American Tree Farm System (ATFS)-certified products, according to Metnick.
Metnick wrote, "Since 2005, SFI certified-products have been excluded from the forest certification/sourcing credit without ever once having been told the basis of that exclusion … we encourage the USGBC leadership to clarify why FSC meets their credit expectations and why SFI's certification standard does not."
Metnick argued that only 10 percent of the world's forests are certified under any system, so the USGBC should reward all groups trying to make forestry more sustainable. He points out that the USGBC-sponsored International Green Construction Code (IgCC) does recognize all forest certification standards equally.
Prior to the passing of LEED v4, FSC asked the USGBC to more strictly define the meaning of "USGBC-approved equivalent" to FSC-certified timber.
