BOMA Canada has announced a more improved and intuitive BOMA BEST certification brand, available to the public beginning September 21, 2015.

Besides reinforcing the environmental mandate of BOMA BEST, which is to create a sustainable environment one building at a time, the new brand will offer a more intuitive five level recognition system to reward the environmental performance of buildings.

After a long engagement process with members and stakeholders in the commercial real estate industry, BOMA Canada has also created a more focused and simplified language to better communicate sustainable achievements.

Each certification level will employ new terminology:

• Platinum (formerly Level 4) is awarded to buildings that have met the BEST Practices and have achieved between 90 and 100 per cent on the questionnaire.
• Gold (formerly Level 3) is awarded to buildings that have met the BEST Practices and have achieved between 80 and 89 per cent on the questionnaire.
• Silver (formerly Level 2) is awarded to buildings that have met the BEST Practices and have achieved between 70 and 79 per cent on the questionnaire.
• Bronze (formerly Level 1) is awarded to buildings that have met the BEST Practices and have achieved between 60 and 69 per cent on the questionnaire.
• Certified (formerly Level 1) is awarded to buildings that have met the BEST Practices.

The Association recently released the BOMA BESt National Green Building Report revealing improved energy and water efficiency, steady waste diversion tallies and continued high implementation of environmental management systems. BOMA Canada says more changes will be made to the underlying program in 2016.