The Builders Association of the Twin Cities rolled out details Thursday of a new green building certification program. The announcement took place at a certified home in Plymouth.

The association developed the program, called MN Green Path (www.mngreenpath.org), as a way to encourage energy efficiency and transparency for green homes, or those built to use less energy. That certification will be available for homes in all price ranges and will include a home energy rating score assigned by an independent third-party rater trained by the Residential Energy Services Network.

The association began pursuing its own certification program after parting ways in late 2010 with Minnesota GreenStar (www.mngreenstar.org), a nonprofit that it helped create. Minnesota GreenStar is run mostly by volunteers and continues to work with builders and remodelers.

Already, 24 new houses have received the Green Path certification and will be featured in the Spring Parade of Homes that starts today and runs through April 1.