GREEN Vs. SUSTAINABLE: ANALYZING and EXPANDING LEED (LEADERSHIP in ENERGY and ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN)
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Please Note: The author retains the copyright while the New Jersey Institute of Technology reserves the right to distribute this thesis or dissertation Printing note: If you do not wish to print this page, then select “Pages from: first page # to: last page #” on the print dialog screen The Van Houten library has removed some of the personal information and all signatures from the approval page and biographical sketches of theses and dissertations in order to protect the identity of NJIT graduates and faculty. ABSTRACT GREEN vs. SUSTAINABLE: ANALYZING AND EXPANDING LEED (LEADERSHIP IN ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN) by Sonay Aykan This dissertation investigates the possibility of including new socio-economic indicators in green building rating systems in order to promote innovative practices in the building planning, design, construction and operations by introducing a broader definition of sustainability in the building industry. It provides a comparative analysis of the frameworks, indicators and measurement methods of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED), which is a voluntary green building rating system, and the reporting guidelines of Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) by examining several selected socio-economic indicators from GRI and questioning the possibility of introducing similar indicators (credits) in LEED. By doing so, it assesses the comprehensiveness of LEED against another widely-accepted list of metrics developed for sustainability benchmarking. The theoretical framework is based on a critique of contingencies inherent to various definitions of sustainability and an analysis of the new politics that is emerging through the discourse of sustainability. The research relies on the data collected from USBGC LEED Project Directory, documents submitted during the LEED certification process for four projects that pursue LEED certification and interviews with the participants of these projects, USGBC members and people who were actively involved in the preparation and implementation of the GRI guidelines. By depicting the intertwined relationship among the building industry, labor markets, financial and legal forces, the findings of this research show that development of socio- economic indicators for the building industry is not impossible, but is bounded to the methods of asset value calculations, regulations on labor markets, workflow structure of the building industry and the political structure behind the rating systems. ii GREEN vs. SUSTAINABLE: ANALYZING AND EXPANDING LEED (LEADERSHIP IN ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN) by Sonay Aykan A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of New Jersey Institute of Technology in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Urban Systems College of Architecture and Design January 2014 Copyright © 2014 by Sonay Aykan ALL RIGHTS RESERVED . APPROVAL PAGE GREEN vs. SUSTAINABLE: ANALYZING AND EXPANDING LEED (LEADERSHIP IN ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN) Sonay Aykan Karen Franck, PhD., Dissertation Advisor Date Professor of College of Architecture and Design, NJIT Hillary Brown, Committee Member Date Professor of M.S. in Sustainability, CUNY Deane Evans, Committee Member Date Director of Center for Building Knowledge, NJIT Philip Speranza, Committee Member Date Assistant Professor of Architecture, University of Oregon BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH Author: Sonay Aykan Degree: Doctor of Philosophy Date: January 2014 Undergraduate and Graduate Education: • Doctor of Philosophy in Urban Systems, New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, NJ, 2014 • Master of Science in Sociology, Bogaziçi University, Istanbul, Turkey, 2008 • Bachelor of Science in Economics, Bogaziçi University, Istanbul, Turkey, 2003 Major: Urban Systems Presentations and Publications: Aykan, S. (2013). istanbul'da Kentsel Sürdürülebilirlik için Dört Ad õm” [Four steps Towards Sustainability in Istanbul]. Unpublished Book Chapter. Metis Yay õnevi Publishing, Istanbul, Turkey. Aykan, S. (2012). Prophecies on the Urban Space through the Crystal Ball of Sustainability. New City Reader Istanbul, 6, 11, http://istanbuldesignbiennial.iksv.org/page/3/, accessed on December 2013. Aykan, S., & Lansman, D. (2012, June 8). Culture Corner: An Alternative Affordable Housing Model for Business Improvement Districts. Paper presented at the First Urban Systems Conference of NJIT/Rutgers/UMDNJ, Newark, NJ. Aykan, S. (2011, June, 14-17). Towards a Green Building Code in Turkey: Lessons from Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED). Paper presented at the 9th International Conference of the European Society for Ecological Economics, Istanbul, Turkey. iv Aykan, S. (2010, June 16 - 18). Learning from the Fair Trade: Tracing Social Sustainability in the Globalized World. Paper presented at the 2010 Social Equity Leadership Conference, Baltimore, Maryland. Aykan, S. (2010, October, 17-19). Rethinking Sustainability Indicators in Building Codes: The Case of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED). Paper presented at the First International Conference on Urbanization and the Global Environmental Change, Tempe, Arizona. Aykan, S. (2009, June 18). St James Hospital and the Community Healthcare. Paper presented at the Social Equity and Leadership Conference, Newark. v To live! Like a tree alone and free Like a forest in brotherhood Nâzım Hikmet Ran to my wife, who taught me love to my mom, who taught me patience to my dad, who taught me courage and to the giraffe in africa, whom I don’t know but I still love vi ACKNOWLEDGMENT I would like to offer my gratitude to people who encouraged and supported me during the time I worked on this dissertation. I should start by expressing my deepest appreciation to my committee chair Karen A. Franck, for keeping her faith in me and in this research. Without her wit and care, her guidance and thought provoking comments, I could have never completed this dissertation. Her patience in discussing the details of my research and her guidance in organizing the text provided me with invaluable assets that I will use all throughout my life. I should also thank each of my committee members for their endless support and the time they have devoted for this dissertation. I would like to acknowledge Hillary Brown for sharing her professional vision and for her meticulous edits especially during the development of my conceptual framework which helped me to better understand the process of sustainability assessment. I am very thankful to Deane Evans for both his intellectual and logistic support he has provided throughout my research, specifically for sharing his previous research on high performance building systems and helping me build the basis for my comparative analysis on the sustainability indicators. I am also grateful to Philip Speranza, for helping me develop a critical perspective about many issues that I cover in my dissertation, along with the joy and enthusiasm he has for the research which kept me motivated till completion. This research would not be possible without the technical and financial support provided by the people in School of Architecture and the Center for Building knowledge; they have been a source of friendships as well as good advice and collaboration. I am especially grateful to my colleagues Paul Romano and Christine Liaukus, who have vii constantly fed me with their professional advices and their friendship which gave me the psychological support I needed during this long journey. I would like to acknowledge Maya Gervits for her continuous efforts to find the best resources specially tailored to meet the needs of our dissertation topics, and her endless devotion to improve both the content and the technical capacities of the Architecture and Design Library. Mary Dellenbaugh, who has contributed at the early stages of this research by guiding me through philosophy behind sustainability indicators and Nancy Mancilla, who spared her time an effort to share her expertise on GRI reporting processes are also among the names that I would like to acknowledge here. Additionally, all the interviewees who did not refrain from putting their valuable time in this research and accepting to share their data with me are the primary actors of this study behind the scenes. For confidentiality purposes I cannot disclose their names or their institutions, but I would like to tell how grateful I am for the invaluable contributions they have made to this dissertation. My time at NJIT was made enjoyable in large part due to the many friends and groups that became a part of my life. I am grateful to Şevin Yıldız for always being with me starting from the first day I have stepped into NJIT and needless to say for making the endless trips from New Jersey