LEED commissioning

From CxA to CxP: what version 5 really changes

LEED is the only common certification scheme to place commissioning in a prerequisite, which means it cannot be traded away at any level. Version 5, ratified in March 2025, does more than rename the role: it removes exemptions that small projects and data centres relied on, brings the enclosure and the ongoing commissioning plan into the prerequisite, and extends post-occupancy monitoring to three years.

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The prerequisite

Fundamental Commissioning and Verification.

In versions 4 and 4.1 the prerequisite carries the code EAp1. It is anchored to the ASHRAE guidelines — Guideline 0 for the process, Guideline 1.1 for HVAC and refrigeration systems — and requires a commissioning authority to be appointed, the owner's project requirements and basis of design to be reviewed, and the installed systems to be verified.

Because it is a prerequisite rather than a credit, no LEED certification is issued without it, from Certified through to Platinum. That is the structural difference with French schemes, where commissioning is generally traded against points and can therefore be arbitrated away.

What version 5 adds to the prerequisite

The change summary published by the USGBC in April 2025 is explicit, item by item. Five additions genuinely change the content of an assignment:

  • The small-project and data-centre exemption disappears. Version 4 allowed a project below twenty thousand square feet — roughly 1,860 m² — or a data centre to assign the role to a qualified member of the design or construction team. That option is removed. It is the change with the heaviest budget consequences for mid-sized projects.
  • The provider contributes rather than attends. They now take part in developing, reviewing and updating the owner's project requirements, attend at least one design meeting devoted to review comments on the mechanical, electrical and enclosure scope, and review submittals and substitutions against design deviations.
  • Site presence is scheduled. Milestone meetings at 50 % and 100 % construction completion, and a sample review of at least 10 % of completed contractor documentation.
  • The enclosure enters the prerequisite. The envelope provider must include testing in the commissioning documents and witness a sample of those tests. This does not apply to the Core and Shell scheme.
  • The ongoing commissioning plan moves up from the credit. It is no longer an optional enhancement but a condition of certification — exactly the logic described on our page on ongoing commissioning.

Two requirements were removed in exchange: the current facilities requirements and the development of the operations and maintenance plan. The scheme tightens on verification and relaxes on operational documentation.

Terminology

Three letters that date a document.

The acronym CxA, commissioning authority, has disappeared from the version 5 text in favour of CxP, commissioning professional. This is not a translation detail: it is an immediately legible version marker.

A three-second document review

Open the specification of a project targeting LEED v5 and search for "CxA". If it is there, the document was copied from a v4 project without being reread — and what holds for the acronym generally holds for the rest of the clauses. We use this as the first signal when auditing tender documents.

The change of word accompanies a change of status. An authority verifies; a professional is a project participant, appointed early, present at meetings, a contributor to documents. Version 5 draws the consequence in the programme: for the Enhanced Commissioning credit, the provider must be appointed during pre-design or very early in design. On a French project that means before the design team is contracted, or at the latest alongside it — a point developed on our page on the scope and phases of the assignment.

The credit

Enhanced Commissioning: two paths, and a new standard.

Above the prerequisite, the Enhanced Commissioning credit rewards the extent of the process. In versions 4 and 4.1 it opens up to six points in BD+C, and those six points are only reached by combining the systems path and the enclosure path: a project treating only the mechanical and electrical scope leaves half the credit unclaimed.

Version 5 reorganises both paths and changes their technical references:

  • Systems path. Renamed Enhanced Commissioning for MEP systems for new construction, now anchored to ANSI/ASHRAE/IES 202-2024, replacing the earlier standards. At least two coordination or design meetings must be devoted to review comments.
  • Enclosure path. The former Envelope Commissioning becomes Enhanced Commissioning for Building Enclosure, anchored to ASTM E2947-21a, with explicit field testing: whole-building air leakage, water penetration and infrared imaging. This is a notable shift for French teams, where thermography is generally a diagnostic tool rather than a contractual deliverable.

We do not quote a scoring table for version 5. The figures reported in the trade press diverge, and we do not publish point counts we have not read in the reference document itself. On a project, the version of registration governs, and that is the document we read with the client.

MBCx

Monitoring moves to three years, and leaves the credit.

Monitoring-based commissioning is the most extensively reworked part. Three changes matter for structuring a project.

  • It no longer depends on Enhanced Commissioning. Version 4 made it an internal prerequisite; version 5 removes that.
  • Implementation runs for a minimum of three years. This is an operational commitment rather than a construction deliverable: it survives transfer of ownership, changes of operator and letting-up. It must therefore be carried by a contract that lasts as long.
  • Two software paths appear for new construction, a Basic Software path and an Enhanced Software path, with the monitoring platform required to support visualisation and reporting down to hourly resolution.

Content requirements follow: an annual summary of trends, benchmarks, faults, savings opportunities and corrective actions taken or planned; two reviews of systems, equipment and controls; and a measurement scope extended to lifts, escalators and moving walkways, as well as commercial kitchen and process equipment above 10 kW of installed capacity in a space. That last list is worth reading before choosing a building management system, since many French installations leave those loads unmetered.

Timetable

Which version should a project register under?

Version 5 was ratified in March 2025 and becomes the only registrable version from 1 July 2027. Until then, projects in v4, v4.1 and v5 coexist, and a project is assessed under the version it registered in.

Our position is straightforward, and we state it before being asked: we do not advise registering under version 4 in order to escape version 5. The requirements added in version 5 are precisely those that produce performance in use. Avoiding them means paying for a certification for what it displays rather than for what it evidences — and that calculation reverses at the first purchaser's technical audit.

Data centres lose their derogatory regime in version 5, and the Core and Shell scheme gains its own combinations of options. Both changes are set out in the comparison of certification requirements across schemes.

FAQ

Questions on LEED projects in France.

No. It is the only common scheme placing commissioning in a prerequisite, so no certification is issued without it at any level, from Certified to Platinum. That is a structural difference with French schemes, where the process is generally traded against points and can therefore be arbitrated away. The separate Enhanced Commissioning credit then rewards its extent.
In version 5, yes. Version 4 allowed the role to be held by a qualified member of the design or construction team on projects below twenty thousand square feet — roughly 1,860 m² — and on data centres. Version 5 removes that. It is the change with the heaviest budget consequences for mid-sized projects, and the one that most often surprises owners familiar with version 4.
CxA, commissioning authority, is the version 4 acronym. Version 5 replaces it entirely with CxP, commissioning professional. The change of word accompanies a change of status: the provider is no longer an external verifier but a project participant, appointed during pre-design or very early design for the Enhanced Commissioning credit. In practice, finding “CxA” in a specification targeting version 5 signals a document that was never reread.
At both levels in version 5. In the prerequisite, the envelope provider must include testing in the commissioning documents and witness a sample of those tests — a requirement that does not apply to Core and Shell. In the credit, the enclosure path is anchored to ASTM E2947-21a and requires field testing: whole-building air leakage, water penetration and infrared imaging.
Three years minimum in version 5, against one in version 4, for implementation of monitoring-based commissioning. It is an operational commitment that survives handover, changes of operator and letting-up, so it must be carried by a contract of matching duration — which a design appointment almost never is. An annual summary and two systems reviews are required over the period.

Go further

The rest of the commissioning material.

A project targeting LEED v5 in France?

We read your tender documents against the version of registration, identify what is still written for version 4, and scope the CxP appointment at the right point in the programme.

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