The Army is still going for Gold and Platinum despite recent legislation calling a halt to LEED spending.

Fort Carson is piloting net-zero energy, water, and waste--and expects to meet that target by 2020.

The federal government has been one of the biggest supporters of LEED certification in the last few years, with the General Services Administration (GSA) requiring basic LEED certification for all federal buildings starting in 2003 and then upping that requirement to LEED Gold in 2010.

Windows, carpet chemicals, spray-foam, and LEED lawsuits: these are a few of your favorite things.

It's been a big year for green building. People are tightening up their buildings even as they tighten their belts. The retrofit market and multifamily housing have taken off in a big way in this new financial landscape.

The most-read Environmental Building News articles of 2011 reflect these new realities. Please check them out below and tell us in comments what you'd like us to cover in 2012! Don't forget that you can also get continuing education credits for reading many of these articles.

(NB: many of our most popular articles are available for BuildingGreen members only. You can check out affordable membership options here.)

Double the fun by reading your favorite EBN articles to help you meet your LEED CMP requirements!

Looking for ways to meet your "prescriptive" continuing education (CE) requirements with the LEED Credential Maintenance Program (CMP)? Here at BuildingGreen.com we have long offered articles to help you earn your credits--articles that will truly help you learn cutting-edge green building information.

But meeting those LEED CMP requirements for GBCI can still be tricky, so we are providing this handy guide. As you're looking for hours to meet each of the various prescriptive requirements, here are suggested courses that you can use. Please read, learn, and earn!

By the way, not sure what these prescriptive requirements are all about and if they apply to you? Feel free to post questions below in the comments section, and also download the CMP guide from GBCI.

Project Site Factors

The Cost of LEED Certification (1 LEED-Specific CEU; AIA HSW/SD)

It's easy to get bogged down in the details of one credit or another, but Greenbuild offered a refreshing look at the bigger picture.

Scot Horst opened the LEED master session series with a dramatic production of the first scene of The Tempest. Here, Prospero and Miranda watch the storm and subsequent shipwreck. The play provided the narrative arc for the whole series. Notably, Prospero chose to use his power to heal past relationships instead of exacting revenge. What will we do?

You might not expect a lot of drama from an early Friday morning conference session about the still-forming guts of LEED 2012. But between a passionate discussion about certified wood and the finale to a week-long riff on The Tempest, this session had more than its share.

Green building is about more than saving money, but policymakers are embracing the business case for LEED and other rating systems--with sometimes confusing results.

A school bike rack is standard, but it doesn't help anyone if the bike rack stays empty. Schools, like all buildings, need to find ways to bridge the gap between design features and the people who end up using them. (Photo: Century Cycles)

What is it about the bike racks?

We grumbled when GBCI overhauled the LEED AP program, introducing specialities, fees, and difficult-to-navigate credential maintenance. Is this the silver lining?

Today and at Greenbuild Toronto we stand and applaud the first class of LEED AP Fellows--the top tier of the LEED Accredited Professionals. Today, GBCI announced the 2011 class, the first of many deserving sustainability professionals to receive this honor. Yes, we may continue to grumble about the hoops you have to go through to get this honor, but apparently those hoops were worth it for at least 34 individuals, and from our long experience with many of them, we know they deserve it.

A new LEED for Homes tool can help designers get the jump on certification--and is great for homeowners too.

A new online scoring tool should make the complex LEED for Homes rating system more accessible for both builders and homeowners. The Web-based application allows users to explore and compare a variety of green building options starting very early in the design process. Designed by BuildingGreen (publisher of BuildingGreen.com) for the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), the tool is intended to make the certification process easier for all team members regardless of their prior experience with LEED for Homes or other LEED rating systems.

This screen capture from the webinar shows how each piece of the matrix is filled in in the Assessment Tool. Here, you can see the three associators (relative efficacy, benefit duration, and benefit control) and their respective options.

The USGBC recently hosted an “Introduction to LEED Rating System Weightings Process” webcast detailing how point allocations for credits in the next version of LEED, a.k.a. LEED 2012, will be determined. As with LEED 2009, the system will still be based out of 100 points (plus 10 “bonus” points), with no credits earning less than one point. The webcast was led by Brendan Owens, Vice President, LEED Technical Development, and was also presented by Corey Enck, Director, LEED Technical Development, and Chrissy Macken, Associate, LEED Technical Development.

Among the key changes coming down the road for LEED, as I recently wrote about (Your Guide to the New Draft of LEED), is a change to the LEED AP credit, formerly IDc2, now dubbed IPc2 (that's "Integrated Process" credit 2).

Up until now, projects have been able to earn a point for having one LEED Accredited Professional (LEED AP) on the project team. If the current proposal were to take effect, that would no longer be enough. First, a LEED AP with a relevant specialty (such as LEED AP BD+C, or LEED AP Homes) must be on the team. In addition, two other team members must also be LEED APs (any specialty--gotta have one, though), or LEED Green Associates (LEED GA).

There has been a lot of rumbling about this change from the ranks of the 100,000+ "legacy" LEED APs who worry that their credential loses value under this proposal.

I spoke with USGBC's Corey Enck to understand the proposal a bit better. Here are some things we discussed.

Alex Wilson, the founder of our company and our current executive editor (i.e., my boss), is being named the 2010 Hanley Award winner in a special event here at Greenbuild 2010 tomorrow. In recognition of this achievement, and to better understand how this innovative, always-curious visionary looks at the world, I recently asked him 10 questions. Here's the conversation.