Green Business Certification Inc. (GBCI) and the Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC) recently announced an agreement to promote and advance the WELL Building Standard in Canada.
Administered by the International WELL Building Institute (IWBI) and third-party-certified by GBCI, the WELL Building Standard is a performance-based system for measuring, certifying, and monitoring features impacting human health and well-being through air, water, nourishment, light, fitness, comfort, and mind. It complements other green-building rating systems, such as the U.S. Green Building Council’s (USGBC’s) LEED program, for which GBCI also serves as certification body.
“Just as LEED has transformed the building sector to address environmental accountability, WELL will further that vision by focusing deeply on the people in the buildings and providing developers and owners with a new way to account for health and human-occupancy challenges,” Mahesh Ramanujam, president of GBCI, said.
Grounded in medical research exploring the connection between buildings and the health and wellness of the people in them, WELL measures attributes of the built environment by looking at seven concepts and more than 100 features addressing behavior, design, and operations.
“We have made a commitment to improving the environmental performance of buildings and homes, and now we also want to ensure that buildings provide a healthy and productive environment for occupants,” Thomas Mueller, president and chief executive officer of the CaGBC, said. “The WELL Building Standard is a timely addition to CaGBC’s programs, as health and wellness in the workplace is increasingly recognized as an important element in attracting and retaining employees.”
WELL certification allows building owners and employers to know their space is performing as intended to support human health and wellness. WELL can be applied across all building types; it is optimized for commercial and institutional projects.
The CaGBC has a longstanding relationship with both the USGBC and GBCI, partnering to deliver LEED in Canada.
“With this agreement, we see tremendous opportunity for the wellness, sustainability, and real-estate communities in Canada to come together to support human health through the built environment,” IWBI founder Paul Scialla said.
To learn more about the WELL Building Standard, go to WELLcertified.com.