An overwhelming majority of scientists agree that the world is facing a climate change crisis. Americans are deeply divided along mostly partisan political lines. They disagree about how impactful they believe the effects of climate change will be and what to do about it. But one area where there is more agreement is green construction, where tax cuts and energy savings go hand in hand. Generally speaking, green architecture involves the planning, design and construction of environmentally friendly buildings.

One of the key means of adopting a green approach to a building is being classified as Energy Star certified. US buildings are eligible for Energy Star certification by exceeding the minimum scores set by the US Environmental Protection Agency. This score is calculated based on energy usage, mapped against the EPA tool, and must be updated annually. Single-family homes, multi-family homes, and manufactured homes have their own detailed standards.

Civil and landscape engineers also rely on Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED). LEED encourages renewable materials, energy conservation, and biodiversity protection. Each phase of planning and construction has its own LEED rating system and scorecard that allows engineers to evaluate their efforts.

OhmConnect used the Environmental Protection’s Agency’s 2022 ranking to identify the metropolitan areas with the most Energy Star-certified buildings. The EPA identified the top 25 cities with the highest number of certified buildings, the top 10 medium-sized cities and the top 10 small-sized cities. For comparison, here are the number of cities with the highest number of buildings based on number of certified buildings per million population. The EPA only reports the top numbers, so metropolitan areas with a low number of buildings but a high percentage of her per capita may not be listed here.