Arc Performance Certificates provide a new, incremental way to recognize leadership for spaces and buildings. Each certificate provides a numeric 0 to 100 score for an Arc performance category: energy, water, waste, transportation or human experience. This can be the same Performance Score referred by LEED v4.1 O+M or the Arc Improvement Score. The 0 to 100 score is supported by key performance indicators (KPIs) for the category. For example, the energy certificate provides KPIs for site and source energy intensity, total greenhouse gas emissions and greenhouse gas emissions energy intensity.
The certificates provide information about performance. However, they are not certifications, and they do not receive manual review by GBCI. They are subject to a battery of automated tests to evaluate the integrity of the underlying performance information. To be valid, each project must pass the following five tests. Data must be:
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Complete: Information is provided for the entire performance period (12 months for Performance Score and 24 months for Improvement Score).
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Timely: Data must be recent. For Arc Performance Certificates, this means that data must be submitted within 12 months (i.e., the end of the performance period is a maximum of 12 months from the current date).
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Relevant: Information is entered in appropriate types and units (e.g., numeric values for kilowatts, therms, etc.).
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Checked for Outliers: Information falls within a reasonable range based on the project type and circumstances. This is initially defined as values less than 95 percent of the maximum value observed in the reference set and more than 5 percent of minimum value observed in the reference set.
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Documented: Information is backed up by supporting documentation. This means that documentation is provided for each metric contributing the Performance Certificate.
These tests increase confidence that Arc Performance Certificate scores and key performance indicators are meaningful and actionable. They cannot catch every situation, and they will continue improving over time.