In developed nations, 20-40% of greenhouse gas emissions and more than one-third of energy consumption are attributable to buildings. Among various available strategies, the building sector has the greatest potential for carbon emission reduction. Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) took early action to promote sustainable designs in buildings and has become the most well-known rating system in the field of building sustainability. However, little research has evaluated the effects of LEED on occupant pro-environmental behavior. To examine this, a Post-Occupancy Evaluation (POE) was conducted in a traditional, green featured, and LEED certified building case to compare the similarities and differences in environmental awareness, perceptions, and perceived ease or difficulty of pro-environmental behaviors, as well as to assess the degree to which pro-environmental behaviors were exhibited by occupants. This was used to determine if the aforementioned factors influence occupant behavior in different building cases. Ease or difficulty of pro-environmental behaviors and environmental awareness were found to be significant factors in influencing pro-environmental behavior in the LEED certified and green featured building cases. In addition, being in a LEED building appears to influence occupant pro-environmental behavior in a positive way. Also, there is evidence to suggest that being in a green featured building appears to influence occupants to exhibit pro-environmental behavior as well. These findings are valuable for owners and designers that want occupants in their buildings to exhibit pro-environmental behavior. / Master of Science / Climate change is an issue that has risen to national and global importance with the increase of rising sea levels, temperature and precipitation, and extreme weather events. To combat the issue of climate change, changes in building design through the avenue of green rating systems have been used to encourage the building sector to reduce energy consumption and thus, a building’s environmental impact. LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design), is one of the most well-known green rating systems used to rate energy efficient buildings. However, the effect of LEED on occupant pro-environmental behavior has been less studied in understanding how occupant behavior impacts energy consumption in a traditional, green featured, and LEED certified building case.
This thesis aims to explore if occupying different buildings influence occupants to exhibit proenvironmental behaviors. For this study, I investigated whether occupant’s environmental awareness, perceptions, perceived ease or difficulty of set behaviors and pro-environmental behavior differed between different building cases. This thesis concludes that being in a LEED certified and green featured building appear to influence occupants to exhibit pro-environmental behavior, more so than being in a traditional building.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VTETD/oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/74971 |
| Date | 08 February 2017 |
| Creators | Hill, Adrienne Marie |
| Contributors | Civil and Environmental Engineering, Shealy, Earl W., Taylor, John E., Pearce, Annie R. |
| Publisher | Virginia Tech |
| Source Sets | Virginia Tech Theses and Dissertation |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | ETD, application/pdf |
| Rights | In Copyright, http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
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