Event Venues

4 Green Meetings Certifications Defined

Convention centers are more aggressively pursuing green certification because it’s becoming a competitive advantage for contracting events with certain meeting professionals.

The soon-to-be-released 2015 Green Venue Report is the focus of the latest article in our CMP Series. Here’s a quick guide to the four main green venue certifications in our industry.

LEED
Developed by the U.S. Green Building Council, the Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design (LEED) certification is a set of rating systems for the design, construction, operation, and maintenance of green buildings. The latest iteration, LEED v4, is more specialized and focused on improved user experience.

ISO 14000
The Geneva-based International Organization for Standardization’s (ISO) 14000 series of green benchmark standards helps organizations minimize how their operations negatively affect the environment and comply with applicable laws. ISO 14001 is part of the European Union’s Eco-Management and Audit Scheme, which is more demanding concerning performance, legal compliance, and reporting.

APEX/ASTM
Developed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Green Meeting Industry Council, the APEX/ASTM certification is a partnership between the Convention Industry Council’s Accepted Practices Exchange (APEX) and ASTM, the international standard-development organization. The certification was created by event-industry professionals and more than 200 non-industry stakeholders.

BOMA BESt
The Building Owners and Managers Association of Canada’s (BOMA Canada) Building Environment Standards (BESt) program establishes realistic benchmarks for energy and environmental performance of existing buildings based on independently verified information. In recent years, the certification has evolved from identifying key best practices to providing common standards.

Read the “The Greenest Convention Centers in the World” here.

Greg Oates

Contributing Editor Greg Oates is a writer and editor based in New York City.