LEED GA Practice Questions: Sustainable Sites

Sustainable Sites is worth 8 of the 100 questions on the LEED Green Associate exam. It covers site assessment and what you do with the land once you have it — controlling erosion, reducing heat island effect, managing rainwater, limiting light pollution, and conserving and restoring habitat.

This domain pairs with Location and Transportation and candidates routinely mix them up. The clean split: Location and Transportation is about choosing where to build. Sustainable Sites is about how you treat the land once chosen. Hold that distinction and several questions become straightforward.

What this domain covers

The exam specification lists two areas: site assessment, including environmental assessment; and site design and development, covering construction site compliance measures, exterior open space, habitat conservation and restoration, heat island reduction, light pollution reduction, rainwater management, resilience, and reducing disturbance of natural areas.

10 Sustainable Sites practice questions

Fill in your details, take all 10 questions, and submit once — we'll grade it and email you the score plus a full explanation for every question.

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Welcome to the LEED Green Associate practice quiz. Enter your details, then work through all 10 questions — we'll email you the score and a full explanation for every question.

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1.What does a site assessment examine?

A. The market value of the site

B. Environmental characteristics such as topography, hydrology, soils, vegetation, climate and hazards

C. The site's planning permissions

D. The condition of existing buildings on the site

None

2.Why does LEED care about soil compaction during construction?

A. Compaction damages drainage, root growth and soil life, and is difficult to reverse

B. Compacted soil is harder to excavate

C. Compacted soil increases the site's solar reflectance

D. It affects the building's foundation design

None

3.What is the urban heat island effect?

A. A developed area being significantly warmer than nearby rural land because of dark, hard surfaces

B. Heat generated by a building's mechanical plant

C. Warm air trapped inside a building

D. Heat radiating from a building's windows

None

4.What does the Solar Reflectance Index measure?

A. How much daylight a window admits

B. The efficiency of a solar photovoltaic panel

C. A material's thermal resistance

D. A surface's ability to stay cool in the sun — higher SRI means more reflection and better heat release

None

5.Which of these does not reduce the heat island effect?

A. Additional exterior lighting for night-time safety

B. A vegetated roof

C. High-SRI paving in the car park

D. Shade trees over hard surfaces

None

6.What is the difference between a pervious and an impervious surface?

A. Pervious surfaces are always vegetated

B. Impervious surfaces are always dark in colour

C. Pervious surfaces cannot be used for vehicle access

D. Pervious surfaces allow water to soak through; impervious surfaces block infiltration

None

7.What is rainwater management trying to achieve?

A. Collecting all rainfall for reuse inside the building

B. Draining water off the site as quickly as possible

C. Capturing and retaining rainfall on site so runoff behaves more like it did before development

D. Preventing rain from reaching the site at all

None

8.What is light pollution?

A. Glare from windows affecting occupants inside the building

B. Excessive or misdirected outdoor lighting that affects people, wildlife and the night sky

C. Poor colour rendering from electric lighting

D. Insufficient daylight in interior spaces

None

9.What is the difference between native, adapted and invasive species?

A. Native species occur naturally in the locality; adapted species are non-native but thrive with minimal irrigation; invasive species spread aggressively and harm ecosystems

B. Native and adapted mean the same thing; invasive means non-native

C. Adapted species are native species that have been bred for drought tolerance

D. Invasive species are any plants not specified by the landscape architect

None

10.A project retains a stand of mature trees and restores a degraded area of the site with native planting. Which principle is it following?

A. Restore first, then conserve what remains

B. Replace all existing vegetation with new planting for consistency

C. Conserve existing habitat first, then restore degraded areas

D. Prioritise ornamental species for visual quality

None

Time's up

Where candidates lose marks in this domain

• Confusing SRI with R-value. SRI is about staying cool in the sun; R-value is about resisting heat conduction.
• Confusing this domain with Location and Transportation. Choosing the site versus treating the site.
• Putting light pollution in Indoor Environmental Quality. Outdoor light is a site issue; glare indoors is not.
• Assuming pervious means planted. Permeable paving and gravel are pervious hard surfaces.
• Reversing conserve and restore. Conserve what exists first.

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