FAQs

Green Building Specialists are companies and organizations using the LEED^® green building rating system for their sustainability projects. They may be involved in the continuous improvement of LEED through their CAGBC membership. Specialists include: owners, tenants, landlords, engineers, architects, designers, developers, contractors, builders, real estate brokers, and managers or government. Employees of Specialist members get free Individual membership. 

Green Building Advocates are companies and organizations that actively support the green building sector and CAGBC’s mission. Advocates aren’t building owners and usually don’t require access to LEED^® benefits. Advocates may include: manufacturers, retailers, non-owner tenants, government policy departments, utilities, academic or research institutions, industry associations and other NGOs. Employees of Advocate members get free Individual membership. 

Catalyst Members are the innovators helping shape green building in Canada. This premium level of engagement  provides valuable opportunities for sustainability champions to influence Canada’s growing low-carbon economy.

Individual Members are people interested in green building, including commercial, residential /homes, or neighbourhoods and communities. Note: Employees of Advocate or Specialist member companies are entitled to a free individual membership.  A Student membership rate is available for enrolled students.  

Corporate members: 

• Specialist and Advocate: Fee based on company revenue 
• Catalyst: Contact us
• Note: All employees of corporate members are entitled to a free individual membership as long as their employer is in good standing. 

Individual members: 

• Individual Members: $130 plus applicable taxes (Free for employees of corporate members in good standing) 
• Student: $45 plus applicable taxes

Yes. If you are an employee of a corporate member in good standing, you are entitled to a free Individual membership.

Current Individual members who are also employees of corporate members are auto-renewed for as long as your employer remains in good standing.

If you are an employee corporate member but don’t have your free Individual membership, ensure your MyCAGBC personal profile is linked to your employer. To do this, go to cagbc.org/MyCAGBC and log in. In the MyProfile area, click on your employer’s name. On the company account page, find your name.

If you do not have a MyCAGBC profile, create one here and select your employer under Primary Organization.

* If your company’s membership has lapsed, you will not be able to claim your free Individual membership. If you are unsure about your employer’s membership status email us.

If you are not an employee of a corporate member, you can join as an Individual member. The cost to join is $100 plus applicable taxes, or $35 for Emerging Green Professionals.

1. Sign in to your MyCAGBC profile and go to MyProfile
2. Click on the pencil icon beside your name
3. If your employer’s membership is in good standing, you will be able to select it from the list.
4. If you do not find your company on this list, contact your employer’s membership administrator or email us.
5. If you do not have a CAGBC profile, create a new account. 

Edit your profile by logging into MyCAGBC. Under MyProfile, click on the pencil icon beside your name. If the company’s membership is in good standing, select it from the list. Don’t see your company name? Ask the company administrator or email us. If your new employer is not a CAGBC member, your free membership will expire at the end of your term (please refer to the expiry date in your profile). You can purchase an Individual membership. 

No. Specialist and Advocate member types are chosen by your employer’s administrator. Please ask them to contact CAGBC about upgrading their membership.

Please refer to this Roster Management Guide.

Yes. All membership terms are one year from the date of purchase.

Contact your company’s membership administrator or if your CAGBC account is linked to your company’s membership, you can also find the ID number by logging into MyCAGBC. Go to MyProfile and click on the company name to access its membership page. 

Sign in to MyCAGBC go to My Profile. Your member number will appear there as ID.

No. Memberships are non-refundable.

Sign in to MyCAGBC to verify your subscription options by selecting My Email Subscription Options. If you need assistance, please email us.

Use the Forgot Password option on the MyCAGBC login page. A temporary password will be emailed to you. If you need further assistance, please email us.

For Corporate members, the administrator can renew by:

• Signing in to MyCAGBC
• Under MyProfile, click on the Company Name to be redirected to the company account.
• The RENEW NOW button will be activated on the company account page. Click it.
• Confirm the membership category, revenue level and industry type. This may adjust the fees indicated on your invoice.
• On the Shopping Cart page, enter your credit card information and click Submit Order.
• If paying by cheque, make it payable to: Canada Green Building Council and mail to: 100 Murray St. Suite 400, Ottawa, ON K1N 0A1.
• Receipts will be emailed.

LEED credential exams are offered through USGBC. All of the LEED Professional exams are available at Prometric test centers in Canada in English, and several of the exams, including the LEED Green Associate, LEED AP BD+C and O+M are available in French, Brazilian Portuguese, Spanish and Chinese (simplified).

CAGBC’s Zero Carbon Building™ (ZCB) standards are a made-in-Canada framework that makes carbon the new measure of building innovation. Among the world’s first zero-carbon building standards, they recognize the importance of building emissions in reaching national climate commitments. The ZCB standards are an important tool supporting the green building sector’s efforts to decarbonize Canada’s buildings.

The Zero Carbon Building Standards were developed through extensive consultation with experts and stakeholders across the country over a two-year period. The initial version of the Standard was published in May 2017.

Updates to the Zero Carbon Building Standards were developed using the following guiding principles, established by the Zero Carbon Steering Committee:
• Prioritize carbon emissions reductions
• Ensure energy efficient design
• Encourage good grid citizenship
• Incentivize reductions in embodied carbon
• Keep it simple and accessible

Revisions to the Standard have been informed by the initial pilot program, subsequent years of market feedback, as well as changing market expectations related to operational and embodied carbon emissions. The Zero Carbon Steering Committee oversaw the changes to the Standards, with the support of Working Groups and the CAGBC’s Energy & Engineering Technical Advisory Group.

A zero-carbon building is a highly energy-efficient building that produces onsite, or procures, carbon-free renewable energy or high-quality carbon offsets, in an amount sufficient to offset the annual carbon emissions associated with building materials and operations. Learn more in the opening pages of the Zero Carbon Building Standard.

CAGBC’s Zero Carbon Building standards provide two pathways for certification — Performance and Design. They offer both rigour and flexibility, opening the door for buildings to minimize their climate impact. Office towers, arenas, warehouses, multi-unit residential buildings, and schools, have been certified under the standards. The ZCB Standard applies to all individual buildings except single- and multi-family residential buildings that fall under Part 9 of the National Building Code.

Major renovations to existing buildings may pursue ZCB-Design certification provided they include HVAC, envelope, and/or interior renovations that require a new certificate of occupancy and/or prevent normal building operations from occurring while they are in process.

To avoid the worst impacts of climate change, all nations must focus their efforts on carbon reduction. In Canada, building construction and operations must effectively eliminate greenhouse gas (GHGs) emissions to meet the national target of carbon neutrality by 2050. CAGBC’s research explores critical areas of sustainability within a building context. 

Published in 2019, the CAGBC’s Making the Case for Building to Zero Carbon report confirmed that zero carbon buildings are both technically feasible and financially viable. On average, zero carbon buildings can provide a positive financial return over a 25-year life cycle when considering national carbon pollution pricing and require only a modest capital cost premium. Zero carbon buildings’ financial returns will only grow as the cost of carbon rises, while also helping to mitigate future costs for utilities and retrofits.

In 2021, CAGBC released the Decarbonizing Canada’s Large Buildings report, which studied the costs of deep carbon retrofits for 1970s and 1990s vintage buildings and identified key market barriers and solutions. The archetypes within the study were able to reduce fossil fuel consumption by at least 93 percent, while slashing energy by more than 70 percent. Many of the archetypes also yielded a positive financial return on a deep carbon retrofit using a 40-year life cycle, with the remainder becoming cost viable as carbon and energy prices increase.

Explore CAGBC’s research.

Pursuing ZCB is simple. Review the Standard and register online. Complete the workbook, providing data and support for your achievements. When you are ready, pay the certification fee and submit your documentation for review. Earn your certification.

For details, please see the ZCB Certification Guide

Inquiries may be sent to ZeroCarbon@cagbc.org and the individual with the appropriate technical expertise will help answer your questions. CAGBC provides a number of online courses and events specific to zero-carbon buildings. We encourage you to take a look at the courses available.

Project teams should visit the News section of the website for the most up to date information. The CAGBC Technical Bulletin is a monthly newsletter gathering the newest information available to specialist members. It includes insights from the review team at CAGBC about all programs including ZCB. You can manage your communication preferences in MyCAGBC

Publicly available project information can be found in the CAGBC Project Database, where you can limit the entries by selecting “Zero Carbon” under the “Other Rating Systems” column, hit the “Search” button and then hit the “Export” button to pull project information into Excel. There are additional options under the “Advanced Search” function that allow differentiating between ZCB-Performance and ZCB-Design.

Visit the Green Building Spotlight for a more detailed look into projects. Case studies are also provided in the Standards themselves.

If you are a member of the project team, log into MyProjects. You will see a list of certification projects where you are an assigned team member. New in 2023, project teams can add to the Project Database profile using the “Edit Profile” button towards the bottom of the individual project summary. As early as project registration, you can add photos or renderings, a description or abstract, and the organizations involved in the project.

The Standards, workbooks, and project resources are available in French on the CAGBC website. CAGBC is happy to support clients who provide documentation in French by providing a certification review report in French. Certificates are available in French upon request.

You can explore the public Project Database. Search CAGBC’s database to view information on over 8,000 registered and certified Canadian projects. Use the filters to search for a specific project or by location, rating system, and more. You can even export a list of projects after a search.

If you are a member of the project team, log into MyProjects. You will see a list of certification projects where you are an assigned team member. New in 2023, project teams can add to the Project Database profile using the “Edit Profile” button towards the bottom of the individual project summary. As early as project registration, you can add photos or renderings, a description or abstract, and the organizations involved in the project.

If you are part of the building sector and believe in a more sustainable future, CAGBC is the community for you. CAGBC membership provides opportunities for organizations and individuals to get involved in shaping a more sustainable and resilient future. Individuals may pursue LEED professional credentials, to demonstrate your proficiency in today’s sustainable design, construction, and operations standards.

CAGBC has opportunities for green building leaders. If your employer is a member organization, you can contribute by volunteering on CAGBC committees, advisory boards, and groups.

CAGBC is always encouraged when service providers and manufacturers reach out wanting to demonstrate their product’s sustainability features. However, LEED does not certify products; LEED certification only applies to buildings. Organizations can read up on requirements in the Credit Library to see how their services and products meet the criteria required for LEED credits and could contribute to a project seeking LEED certification.

Whoever registers the project in LEED Online will automatically be the project administrator unless they reassign the role.

If changes are required, the current project administrator must log into LEED Online and reassign the role to another team member.

Incorrect ‘bill to’ information – Changing billing information causes unwanted delays. It is best to check with your accounting department before processing your transaction in LEED Online to ensure you have the correct ‘bill to’ company information to enter in the LEED Online shopping cart when generating an invoice. If an invoice has already been generated and a change is required, please send your request to LEED Coach Canada, and CAGBC finance will make the change.

An invoice has been generated at the non-member rate however the LEED AP or Owner company is a specialist member of the CAGBC – The project team member who is a CAGBC specialist member should be the individual processing the transaction and LEED Online will apply the correct member rate. If this has not been done correctly, please contact LEED Coach Canada, and CAGBC finance will make the change. 

CAGBC is happy to support clients working in French. Project documentation can be uploaded to LEED Online in French and LEED forms can be completed in French however forms and calculators themselves are only available in English.

A copy of the LEED v4 BD+C Reference Guide is available for free in French on our website, as well as the LEED v4 glossary of terms. Project teams will also benefit from the certification guidance and review team insights provided in both languages in the CAGBC Technical Bulletin and kept in the News section of the CAGBC website.

You’ll find the information you need to get started including registration, and certification processes in the LEED Certification Guides available online. If you are having trouble selecting a rating system, please read the Rating System Selection Guidance.

The LEED Credit Library contains all credit requirements and much more, visit the Credit Library.

LEED Canada certified projects must complete the Wufoo form to qualify for recertification. You will be contacted to let you know the project is set up in Arc. Projects previously certified using LEED Online (LEED v4 projects) will open the project profile in LEED Online and choose “Recertification” to access your profile in Arc.

CAGBC administers the LEED program in Canada including LEED Recertification. Projects located in Canada must pay CAGBC and cannot use the Arc shopping cart at this time.

You must contact CAGBC to process your invoicing and payment and receive pricing that reflects CAGBC member discounts, in the correct currency, with appropriate taxes applied. Include in your email the project name and number, confirm the project gross floor area, provide the name and information of the individual to invoice.

If the project team submits documentation in Arc before the fees are paid, the Arc platform will automatically generate an invoice with GBCI fees in USD. Please disregard this invoice. Should the USD invoice be paid, GBCI finance will refund the USD payment and refer the client to CAGBC, which causes unnecessary delays.

The selection to indicate that your project is confidential is initially made in the registration form in LEED Online. If you indicate “this project is private” it will not be listed in these publicly available LEED project directories. This use of the word private does not indicate that the project is privately held or a private residence but rather that the project details, such as the name and address, should be held confidential. Note that, a private project may not be advertised to the general public as being registered or certified. You can update this selection within the project details in LEED Online at any time.

All submission documentation is treated with care. You can read more in the LEED Certification Agreement. If your project has detailed documentation security requirements contact LEED Coach Canada early in the design process. CAGBC has a secure submittals process with various options available to projects for an additional fee. All projects register for certification in LEED Online and acknowledge the LEED Certification Agreement, those that require the secure submittal process then sign a Certification Agreement Amendment with project specific details.

Alternative Compliance Pathways (ACPs) provide project teams the flexibility to use locally-relevant, equivalent means of demonstrating compliance to credit requirements. CAGBC has developed several ACPs for Canadian teams. You can read up on these in the Technical Resources section of the website. ACPs are incorporated into the USGBC’s Credit Library.

Project teams should visit the News section of the website for the most up to date information. The CAGBC Technical Bulletin is a monthly newsletter gathering the newest information available to specialist members. It includes insights from the review team at CAGBC. You can manage your communication preferences in MyCAGBC.

Project teams must follow addenda (for their rating system and version) published prior to the date of registration of that project. Addenda published after the project registration date is not required to be followed. That said, addenda can be helpful clarifications and guidance, and it is strongly recommended that project teams follow all addenda. Addenda lists are available on the USGBC website.

Substitutions can be done in LEED Online. The initial LEED v4 credit must be marked as “attempted”, then the substitution can be completed by clicking on the grey icon (a circle with arrows) on the far right of the credit. The circle will turn blue to indicate a substitution.

We recommend completing all forms directly in LEED Online. The USGBC recently updated all of the forms to HTML so they can be completed online, and any files can be uploaded directly to the form.

In LEED Online, once you have selected to attempt a credit and you click on the credit name, a button will appear below for the form. If you click on the form, you will be able to complete it directly in LEED Online and it will save you time. Note that you will also have to click on the button beside the form for “Thresholds” for any credit where partial points are available.

For LEED BD+C and ID+C rating systems, you need to submit for your standard or construction phase review no later than two years after substantial completion of your building or space.

For LEED O+M, initial certifications and recertifications are required to submit for review within 60 days of the end of the performance period to ensure the certification reflects recent building performance.

Each rating system version remains open for certification after the close of registrations for a period until the version sunset date. View the certification version sunset dates. If you have difficulty meeting this deadline, contact us.

Project teams are encouraged to submit their response within 25 business days, however if your teams needs additional time to prepare the response there are no penalties.

LEED Building Design and Construction certifications are a one-time certification awarded for the design and construction of a building or space and do not expire.

LEED Operations and Maintenance certifications and Recertifications are awarded for building performance and expire. LEED Canada EB:O&M 2009 and LEED v4 O+M certifications are valid for 5 years. LEED v4.1 O+M certifications are valid for 3 years.

LEED credential exams are offered through USGBC. All of the LEED Professional exams are available at Prometric test centers in Canada in English, and several of the exams, including the LEED Green Associate, LEED AP BD+C and O+M are available in French, Brazilian Portuguese, Spanish and Chinese (simplified).

The LEED credentials demonstrate you have a strong foundation in sustainability practices useful for all green building projects. These credentials are earned by passing the LEED exams, administered by the Green Business Certification Inc. Exam registrations are submitted through the USGBC website.

There are three tiers of LEED Credentials: LEED Green Associate, LEED AP with specialty, and LEED Fellow. You must become a LEED Green Associate before attempting a LEED Accredited Professional (AP) with Specialty exam. Learn more. 

Visit the USGBC website for more information. To register for an example you need to create a free USGBC profile. Applicable exam fees are in U.S. dollars. You will receive an on-screen and email notification to confirm registration is complete. Correspondence will include a link to Prometric Testing Centers’ online scheduling system where you may register for your exam.

You may choose the location, date and time that is convenient for you, up to three months in advance. The exact address of the Prometric test center in your city/province can be found on the Prometric website. You can find a step-by-step guide to the exam applications in the LEED v4 candidate exam handbooks which are available as free downloads from the USGBC website.

You can now also take the LEED Green Associate and LEED AP with Specialty exams online. More information can be found on the USGBC website. Note that if you have already scheduled your exam at a Prometric test centre and wish to change the delivery method to the online exam, you must first cancel your original appointment by visiting prometric.com/gbci before scheduling your online exam.

The LEED v4 exams includes content focused on Task Domains necessary to perform LEED safely and effectively, and Knowledge Domains that reflect the rating systems’ credit categories. Knowledge Domains include concepts such as LEED Process, Integrative Strategies, LEED credit categories, Project Surroundings and Public Outreach. Exam candidates should also be familiar with concepts relating to LEED Project and Team Coordination, LEED Certification Processes, Analyses Required for LEED Credits, and Advocacy and Education for Adoption for LEED Rating Systems. You can find more information about these updates in the applicable LEED v4 exam handbooks.

Yes. CAGBC Corporate members are eligible for member pricing on LEED Professional Exams. To receive the member discount, call USGBC customer service at +1-202-742-3792 prior to scheduling an exam. The USGBC will verify your membership status, and will to confirm your credential account information, your company name and company member ID number.