I am working with an owner who is developing a speculative office building under LEED CS 2009. The developer wants to specify a wall insulation above code (that's the good news) - using 6" studs plus a 1.5" foam wrap, that beats ASHRAE required levels by about 25%. However, the owner wants the tenant to be required to install the insulation in the 6" studs. Is this going to fly when EA1 is being reviewed? Do you use an EA1 model based on the tenant build-out specs?
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Marcus Sheffer
LEED Fellow7group / Energy Opportunities
LEEDuser Expert
5906 thumbs up
March 20, 2012 - 12:20 pm
You can claim credit for requirements related to tenant improvements that are in your tenant guidelines. So to the extent that your tenant requirements affect the fit out, yes you can claim credit for them.
Make sure you calculate the overall U-value of the construction assemblies according to ASHRAE 90.1-2007 Appendix A and not as a point calculation in your modeling software. For steel stud walls, for example, use Table A3.3 to determine the overall U-value.
Lawrence Lile
Chief EngineerLile Engineering, LLC
76 thumbs up
March 26, 2012 - 8:50 am
So the Tenant guidelines become a critical item in a core and shell LEED project. This won't be leased space, but actual condos, so each floor will have a different owner. The developer can issue tenant finish-out gudelines, but how are they enforceable? My developer thinks all we can do is issue nonbinding guidelines and hope that the tenants follow them. However LEED seems to imply that binding guidelines are required to use them for credits. Do I have a correct understanding of this issue?
Marcus Sheffer
LEED Fellow7group / Energy Opportunities
LEEDuser Expert
5906 thumbs up
March 27, 2012 - 12:24 pm
Yes they can be critical. In order to count these tenant improvements in your modeling calculations the performance criteria must be included in the lease or sales agreement and be enforceable by the building owner. So they cannot simply be voluntary guidelines, they must be enforceable requirements.