Illinois Led U.S. Green Building Council’s Top 10 States For LEED In 2021

Illinois once again tops the U.S. Green Building Council's (USGBC) annual ranking of the Top 10 States for LEED, demonstrating leadership in green building.

The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) has announced the ranking of its annual Top 10 States for LEED, with Illinois once again topping the list and demonstrating leadership in green building. Illinois certified 3.16 square feet of building space per person under LEED in 2021. The LEED rating system provides a framework for healthy, highly efficient, and cost-saving green buildings and was created by USGBC as a leadership standard defining best practices.

LEED Green Building“Amidst the challenges of 2021, governments, companies and other organizations committed to taking bold actions to protect the climate, their employees and their communities,” said Peter Templeton, President and CEO, USGBC. “Transitioning our buildings to be healthier and more sustainable is essential to meeting these commitments, and we’re proud to recognize states where that work is well under way.”

In 2021, the top 10 states, plus the District of Columbia, certified 1,105 projects and more than 247 million gross square feet under LEED. Washington, Massachusetts, Colorado, and Virginia round out the top five, and Utah made an appearance on the list for the first time since 2015.

The Top 10 2021 rankings are as follows:

LEED Green Buildings

Despite Washington, DC not appearing in the official top 10 list because of its status as a federal territory, it consistently leads the nation in LEED-certified square footage per capita. In 2021, the nation’s capital certified 29.46 square feet of space per resident across 103 green building projects…

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