In this project, we have one office, two plants signed up for LEED Campus. Cooling & Heating for these plant buildings comes from Chillers & Boilers located in centrally located plant in the campus. This centally located plant also serves cooling/heating to some other buildings in the campus which is not included in the LEED boundary. The office biulding (3rd one in the LEED boundary) is cooled & heated by its own systems located inside the building.
In this situation, does the DES modeling method apply? Can we do all the buildings seperately following 90.1-Appendix G w/o any addendum? Are there any USGBC document which describes the conditions for the DES criteria?
Marcus Sheffer
LEED Fellow7group / Energy Opportunities
LEEDuser Expert
5909 thumbs up
October 15, 2017 - 12:21 pm
The DES guidance is required under LEED v4. It is now contained within the Reference Guide.
Aru Sau
5 thumbs up
October 16, 2017 - 5:26 pm
This project is under LEED-2009 where DES is still an option. In my understanding this project does not qualify for DES option.
There are no cogen plant. These chillers are straight up feeding these buildings & plants. But these chillers, cooling tower & boilers are located in a centralized location.
What do you think should I model this as DES?
Marcus Sheffer
LEED Fellow7group / Energy Opportunities
LEEDuser Expert
5909 thumbs up
October 16, 2017 - 5:46 pm
If a central plant serves multiple buildings and some are outside the LEED project boundary then it is a DES.
Your original post indicates some buildings are served by the central plant and are outside the LEED boundary so that sounds like you have a DES.
Your most recent post says that the central plant only serves these buildings, so I am a bit confused.
If your project includes the central plant building(s) then it is still a DES for the office building but some of the load goes to other buildings.
Aru Sau
5 thumbs up
October 16, 2017 - 7:23 pm
Appreciate your answer very much. Thank you.
3 Buildings in LEED boundary - 2 plants, 1 office. These two Plant buildings are served by 2 Chillers & 2 boilers. These chillers/boilers are located in a centrally located building where there is one more chiller & a boiler. The other Chiller/Boiler serves 2 more plants which is not included in LEED boundary. The office itself large RTUs, not connected with the chillers.
If I model two chillers in these two plants separately - it will show the proper energy usage. But I was confused if I have to model the entire plant as DES, so I asked this?Do you still think it should be a DES?
Sorry for the confusion.
Marcus Sheffer
LEED Fellow7group / Energy Opportunities
LEEDuser Expert
5909 thumbs up
October 17, 2017 - 10:49 am
I can't tell from your description. Usually a central plant is a single building which houses chillers and/or boilers that make hot and/or chilled water and distribute it to multiple buildings.
In your case you seem to have multiple central plant buildings? Do the plant buildings within your LEED boundary house boilers/chillers? It sounds like the office is contains all HVAC for that building within that building. So this issue is just related to the other 2 plant buildings. When you say a plant building I interpret that to mean a building that houses a central plant with boilers/chillers. Maybe that is not what you mean. So provide more information of what is contained within the plant buildings inside the boundary.