As noted in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette the American Society of Landscape Architects is promoting a new rating system, the Sustainable Sites Initiative, to measure the sustainability of landscape design projects. The council is lending its support and eventually will adopt the program into its LEED system.

The ASLA is collaborating with the University of Texas at Austin's Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center and the United States Botanic Garden on the initiative. It will be a few years before it's implemented: The rating system will be available in spring 2011; pilot projects testing it will begin in 2010 and evaluations will be made in 2012.