Does CI fit into BD+C?

Hi Sara,
If you mean a C&S project, then yes the tenant can pursue a CI for their tenant improvement. If you mean a NC project, then no. The tenant requirements are necessary for the whole building to get the certification. The good news is that the future tenant will be part of the building that got certified so they will share in it.

Michelle, I don't know if I agree. The LI that requires the tenant guidelines for non-CS projects (LI 10102) only notes that the guidelines are required and that the base building cannot achieve any ID point for developing the guideline. It specifically notes that the tenant is not bound by the owner's letter of commitment/required to meet the same requirements. While the guidelines are required for the non-CS base building, they are not something that the tenants are required to actually follow.

As such, it would appear to me that tenants could achieve CI (or CI-Retail in this case) in the future provided that they could demonstrate compliance with all of the prerequisites and MPR requirements. Given that the tenant guidelines are supposed to specifically speak to how tenants could achieve CI certification, it just seems counter-intuitive to me that USGBC would not allow those spaces to certify.

Hi Kristina,
You have a good point. We've been doing these so long that despite at least two dozen projects that use tenant guidelines both C&S and NC, I don't remember closely examining this LI. So thanks for the pointer, but I admit I'm more confused now that I've read it closely.

Overall, I think you are right and whether the project is NC or C&S, the tenant build out is able to go for LEED-CI if they so desire. It makes a little less sense to me with an NC project but that appears to be the case. So I retract my statement above.

However, I do not understand at all the idea that a tenant build out is different than an owner build out. Or that a tenant is not required to follow the guidelines. We have always generated our guidelines based on the idea that the whole building cannot claim credit for something that the whole building is not doing. So we have always believed that a tenant is required to fulfill the same obligations that the Owner indicates will be fulfilled by the build out, whoever is performing it ultimately.

Thanks for the correction. I learn something new that I thought I knew in LEED every day.