Ashkin Group, Green Cleaning Network to Help Revise LEED-EBOM

Bloomington, IN – December 7, 2009 - The Ashkin Group and the Green Cleaning Network, LLC have been selected to work with the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) as it prepares its next reversion (version 3), of LEED-EBOM (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design for Existing Buildings: Operations and Maintenance).

  Stephen Ashkin is president of The Ashkin Group and Sustainable Dashboard Tools LLC, cofounder of Green Cleaning University and founder of the Green Cleaning Network. 

  “Based on our experience working on the LEED-EB Core Committee, we have been asked to gather comments directly from the [cleaning] industry about LEED and its impact on Green Cleaning,” explains Ashkin.  “These comments will be summarized and then presented to the LEED Technical Advisory Groups (TAG) for consideration as they revise the prerequisites and credits for the 2012 Rating Systems.”

  Because Ashkin believes this process is so important, a new Web site has been launched specifically for collecting comments from industry professionals. 

  The new site is located at http://www.ashkinleedeb.com.

  Although the new standards will not be released for two years, the preparatory planning work, including feedback and comments from the industry, is needed in less than two months, by January 30, 2010, according to Ashkin. 

  “This is a big undertaking and [a] very important process,” he adds.  “The feedback is valuable because it helps us recognize where changes may be necessary.”   Ashkin expects the industry to provide “hundreds of comments.”  And, in order to make it easier to organize the comments for both users and TAG, the “Comments” page of the new Web site has 10 different e-mail addresses for different LEED-EBOM credits.

   “I believe it is crucial that all segments of our industry get involved with this process,” says Ashkin.  “The revisions made will impact our industry for years to come.  I want our industry to [continue to] play a leading role in not only promoting Green and sustainable issues, but setting some of the rules for creating healthy, high performing buildings.”