Our project team has a question about the definition of building alteration for LEED-EB certification.
According to the reference guide, the minimum alteration “include construction activity by more than 1 trade specialty, make substantial changes to at least 1 entire room in the building, and require isolation of the work site from regular building occupants for the duration of construction are eligible.”
In order to earn the related credit such as MRC3, MRC9 and IEQC1.5, our client would like to renovate the flooring of the locker room. It is one entire room and will be isolated from regular building occupants during construction, but does it meet the requirement of “including construction activity by more than 1 trade specialty”?
If it is not, then to what extend should we suggest our client to add more construction work to make it be eligible for the application?
Many thanks!!
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Barry Giles
Founder & CEO, LEED Fellow, BREEAM FellowBuildingWise LLC
LEEDuser Expert
338 thumbs up
July 18, 2013 - 1:59 pm
Jorng, You've hit a thorny subject as the reference guide language actually doesn't bear any relationship to what is now required by GBCI. To start with the work proposed in your post WILL NOT achieve the required levels of certification. Somewhere in the wording of credit requirements the word 'substantial' has crept in....with no clear definition of what that means...other than your work in the locker room would clearly NOT be 'substantial'. Neither would it NOW comply with latest requirements that at least TWO specialties are used...where neither painting, nor carpet laying are classed as separate, nor specialized. All in all these three credits are a minefield of ‘try this and see what you get’.
Now, in mitigation to the GBCI why this came about was because ‘some’ LEED teams used the minimum amount of work…absolutely possible, to gain the credit…doing basic painting and changing a few carpet tiles…so GBCI tried to tighten up on what was required.
John McFarland
Director of OperationsWorkingBuildings, LLC
LEEDuser Expert
42 thumbs up
July 18, 2013 - 8:54 pm
Hi Jorng,
You can find my experience on this credit further down in the thread, but in summary GBCI told me the affected area had to encompass at least 5% of the total building area to count as substantial. Of course, that requirement is no where in the LEED credit language. I agree with Barry. I doubt that your locker room renovation will meet GBCI's expectations.
Good luck,
John