Recycled Content

Items or products made with recycled content contain materials that have been recovered. Materials with recycled content are more sustainable because they prevent used materials from going to a landfill, giving them an extended purpose or second life.

This reduces the demand for virgin materials and decreases the material's embodied energy, since materials with recycled content typically require less manufacturing power than producing a new identical product. LEED rewards green building projects that use materials with recycled content.

Why this Credit is Important

Specifying high-recycled content materials reduces the demand on raw materials while at the same time reducing the waste stream. On LEED projects, specifying recycled content materials is the easy part; tracking and documenting the pre and post consumer recycled content of each product can be a challenge.

As part of our project team, you will be assisting the contractor with calculating the recycled content dollar value that will be applied toward the project for the concrete mix, one of the higher-cost materials on the project. Upon completion, you will have an understanding of how to document the various materials purchasing credits on any type of LEED project.