Our building is historic, and in Canada. Flush fixtures (toilets and urinals) do not have any indication as to manufacturer, model, OR flush rate. For the purposes of our calculation we've assumed 3.5 GPM for toilets and 1.6 GPM for urinals. Our question is - where does LEED provide guidance as to appropriate measurement of flush rates? We implemented our own methodology, but I want to ensure it's acceptable. In the absence of any guidance in the reference guide or elsewhere, I assume that it is? Also, in lieu of sampling 20% of toilets to test their flush rate, is their a default value that LEED would find acceptable for old pre-1993 toilets? I'm surprised at how meager the reference guide is on this, but perhaps I'm overlooking something. Thanks for any information!
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Jason Franken
Sustainability ProfessionalLEEDuser Expert
608 thumbs up
July 1, 2010 - 9:56 am
Daycia, you're not missing anything - the reference guide does not do a very good job of explaining how to handle this situation. There are a couple of best practices that have been established by capable project teams and GBCI review teams that should be observed:
1) You must sample at least 20% of the fixtures in the building - sorry, there's no way of getting around that one
2) You should test each fixture at least three separate times and use the average flush rate of your three tests for the installed rate in your calculations
3) Depending on the size of your building, you should start your flush rate testing on the ground floor and move up floor-by-floor until you've tested at least 20% of the fixtures. The water pressure in your building will vary with the height of the floor, so it's important to make sure that your sample includes those floors that are expected to have the highest water pressure.
4) Make sure to track all of your testing data in a well-organized spreadsheet and make sure to upload that data, along with a detailed narrative describing your testing methodology, as part of your WEp1 supporting documentation.