Per the USGBC LEED V4 BD+C: New Construction Enhanced Commissioning website "The CxA may be a qualified employee of the owner, an independent consultant, or a disinterested subcontractor of the design team."
Can a commissioning group, within the project design firm, with no interaction with the design team be considered a "disinterested subcontractor of the design team", can the group be hired directly through the owner or architect.
The LEED D+C: Commercial Interiors Enhanced Commissioning website does not list any criteria on who can be the commissioning agent, does the same hold true as above.
Thank you
Michael Feyler
1 thumbs up
October 12, 2017 - 8:42 am
Good morning
To better clarify the question above, if you review the USGBC table, "Who can be a cxa"
https://www.usgbc.org/resources/who-can-be-cxa
Within the table they list 2 senarios
1. An employee of the architecture or engineering firm
Not a member of the design team (e.g., a LEED administrator or energy modeler who is not participating in the design) - Enhanced Cx - NO
2. A subconsultant to the architecture or engineering firm
Not a member of the design team (e.g., a LEED administrator, Cx specialist, energy modeler) - Enhanced Cx - YES
In senario 2 can a commissioning group within the same company as the design team be a sub-consultant to the architect and perform in addition to fundamental Cx, enhanced Cx
Thank you
Scott Bowman
LEED FellowIntegrated Design + Energy Advisors, LLC
LEEDuser Expert
519 thumbs up
November 13, 2017 - 5:13 pm
Short answer, no. This has been asked/answered many times. There are MEP firms that "spun" off a division to do Cx, but they were still owned by the same individuals. No matter the contractual language, there can be a conflict of interest and USGBC has been firm in requiring an independent CxA if you go for enhanced. This covers interiors as well.
Vanessa Nelson
LEEDuser Expert
7 thumbs up
June 7, 2018 - 3:54 pm
In the case of a MEP firm with a Cx Dept, when the Cx Dept doing the Fundamental Cx sub-contracts another company to do the Enhanced Cx, can the contract be between the Fundamental and Enhanced Cx companies, or does the contract need to be between the enhanced Cx company and the owner?