Applying the ICC 700 National Green Building Standard to Green Home Remodeling Projects

The ICC 700 National Green Building Standard™ (NGBS) is the only residential green building rating system approved by ANSI, the American National Standards Institute, as an American National Standard. The NGBS provides practices for the design, construction, and certification of new single-family homes and renovations.

Under the NGBS, green building practices are assigned point values. A home can attain one of four performance levels — Bronze, Silver, Gold, or Emerald. For a building to attain any certification level, all of the applicable mandatory provisions must be correctly implemented. In addition to the mandatory provisions, the NGBS requires the home include sufficient green building practices in each of the six categories to meet the category minimums for each green certification level.

As an ANSI-approved green building rating system, the NGBS provides builders and consumers with a credible definition of green building. Since it provides a flexible, expansive point-based system for certification, it also offers home builders an affordable process to build green homes that meets their goals, are appropriate for their specific climate, and meet the needs of their particular market and home buyers.