The 2024 Greenbuild International Conference and Expo convened in Philadelphia this month. Now in its 23rd annual cycle, the conference has grown into one of the largest gathering in the green building industry, attracting participants from around the world. Over the years, Greenbuild has served as a central forum to showcase the latest solutions that serve to advance sustainability in building design and construction.

While a conference of this size and magnitude offers a vast range of content and exhibits, Greenbuild 2024 harmonized around several key themes—a few of which are highlighted below.

Peter Templeton, CEO of the U.S. Green Building Council, takes the stage at the 2024 Greenbuild International Conference and Expo. Photo courtesy of author.

Decarbonization Takes Center Stage

Arguably, the core issue surrounding Greenbuild 2024 was decarbonization. With regard to the building sector, this refers to the process of reducing or eliminating carbon emissions throughout a building's lifecycle. This approach focuses on minimizing the carbon footprint associated with constructing, operating, and maintaining buildings. Effective strategies for decarbonization include energy conservation, renewable energy, low-carbon materials, building electrification, and innovative carbon capture technologies.

Central to the theme of decarbonization was the program content focused on LEED v5 — the first completely new version of LEED in a decade. The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) recently released the second public comment draft of LEED v5 and many of Greenbuild's sessions focused on the new version, which will launch in early 2025 and establish a five year update cycle for the rating system. The next version of LEED will offer a comprehensive framework to address three key impact areas: decarbonization, quality of life, and ecological conservation and restoration. Approximately 50 percent of the credits in LEED v5 will address decarbonization by targeting reductions in operational, embodied, refrigerants, and transportation emissions.

Climate Resilience

Solutions to address climate resilience continue to expand and evolve. Development-scale solutions were emphasized, such as "district geothermal" using community ground source heat pumps to make Phius certifications accessible for neighborhood developments. (Due to a partnership with Phius, for the first time ever, Greenbuild featured a Phius-exclusive track of programming and a Phius pre-conference summit.)

The "one water approach" to building projects (which will be championed in LEED v5) is opening up synergies to better realize water resilience in the face of chronic water stressors. 

Resilient site design is proving to effectively help building projects mitigate acute threats such as wildfire risks, flooding, and extreme heat events. LEED v5 will also take a much more rigorous approach to resilience as a quality of life priority.

Circularity Becoming More Mainstream

Greenbuild would not be complete without a compelling expo. This year's conference did not disappoint. Amidst a range of high-performance products and equipment was an emphasis around improved circularity. To cap it off, the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute (C2CPII) announced the a new certification option: the Certified Circularity Standard. This standard offers manufacturers measurable goals to guide circular product development. It covers product design, sourcing of materials, manufacture, packaging, and also considerations of material health.

Quality of Life

Greenbuild 2024 programming addressed several aspects of how buildings can improve the quality of life of project users (one of the three key impact area of LEED v5). Many of the solutions featured at the conference offered attendees an evidentiary approach at a range of scale: from case studies of applying the International Living Future Institute's (ILFI) latest Just 3.0 label; to equitable community development; to protocols for continuous indoor air quality (IAQ) monitorization in buildings. 

Central to quality of life for building users is occupant experience, which can be addressed through equipment that supports thermal, lighting, or acoustic comfort; products and solutions that enhance biophilic strategies; and healthy materials — a realm that is clearly expanding.  

Materials That Safeguard Health

For many years, Greenbuild's programs and expo hall have offered building products and materials that endeavor to safeguard human and environmental health. At Greenbuild 2024, it was clear that efforts are coalescing around initiatives and frameworks that helping the building design and construction industry elevate the use of products and materials that advance safeguards for human health, uphold human rights in the supply chain, support and regenerate ecosystem health, reduce carbon emissions, and strive to eliminate waste.

At this year's conference, the American Institute of Architects (AIA) released their inaugural AIA Materials Pledge By the Numbers report—tracking the progress on positive material specification from design firms who have signed the AIA Materials Pledge. 

The Health Product Declaration Collaborative (HPDC), a customer-led, non-profit member organization that advances information resources for healthy materials (including the the HPD Open Standard), highlighted their emerging Material Health ToolSuite — a collection of automated tools for members — which includes the HPD Collaborative Dashboard. The dashboard may serve as an evaluation tool and it allows access to an extensive health product declaration (HPD) database.

Wood products are largely perceived as low-carbon alternatives to steel or concrete for building structures. However, forestry management and the wood product supply chains are very complex. In the interest of beginning a dialogue that builds processes and pathways to bringer greater transparency and more accountability with regard to sourcing wood products, Sustainable Northwest (SNW) has engaged with an emerging coalition of sustainability leaders in the architectural community and has agreed to host, on their behalf, the first draft of a “Transparency Pledge Letter” to mass timber manufacturers. 

USGBC Looks Back on 30 Years of Impact

The USGBC also released a major report outlining the work of the nonprofit since its inception in 1993. The USGBC Impact Report provides a detailed review of the environmental, community, and economic impact of the organization.

Greenbuild 2025 is Coming to Los Angeles

For the first time since 2016, the Greenbuild International Conference and Expo is scheduled to be in Los Angeles next year. Mark you calendars for November 4-7, 2025. 

For more information, visit: informaconnect.com/greenbuild