Certification Benefits

Offering a Suite of Green Certifications

Whether you’re interested in a sustainably built new home or remodel, a sustainable community or commercial office, Earth Advantage Institute has a certification program that can meet your needs. The organization’s certification programs are designed to provide homeowners and developers with the assurance that their home, community or office is performing at the highest levels of energy efficiency while offering both families and commercial building tenants the comfort and confidence of a healthy environment and wise resource use.

Moving Towards Market Transformation

Extreme Makeover: Home Edition house, Corvallis, OR.  Built by Legend Homes Certified Earth Advantage

Earth Advantage Institute certification standards were developed to help reduce carbon emissions associated with our homes, communities and commercial structures, which are responsible for more than 75% of the consumption of energy from our power plants. The organization’s Carbon Advantage consulting program works with numerous organizations to investigate the greenhouse gas effects of the built environment and suggests techniques to reduce those emissions.

Earth Advantage Institute makes it a priority to look at the full scope of the green building chain, from design to sales, appraisal and lending, in an effort to remove obstacles and create natural market mechanisms that can spark more widespread sustainable construction. Three such programs, Sustainable Finance, the Energy Performance Score, and the Certification Licensing program, have already made strides in creating more funding opportunities.

The Sustainable Finance group partners with lenders and insurers to create preferred loan and premiums for green homeowners, while the Energy Performance Score, a miles-per-gallon-style rating system for your home, offers a means to compare energy use and related carbon use between two homes. The licensing program has successfully spread Earth Advantage^® New Home certification to additional regions in the Northwest and California.