We are participating in the certification of a building in the Europe Square in L’Hospitalet, Barcelona.
The Europe Square area was previously and industrial area. According to the change of activity, the groundawer level is being increased in all the area.
In order to avoid seepage problems, the City Hall developed a central plant in the Square for capturing, treating and distributing the high groundwater level.
The installation is being placed in the underground of a building located in the Square, but not really adjacent to our site.
The installation works in this way: normally, the water is stored and treated in a group of tanks that is afterwards used in the irrigation of all the sites of the Square; if there is a risk of seepage due to a high level of the groundwater and no irrigation needs, the installation will derive the excess to the general sewage system.
The owner has not got the chance to manage the seepage in-site according to the urban laws. On the other hand, the water used for irrigation comes from this installation.
Even it is not exactly in-site, we consider that the irrigation system comes from the groundwater seepage that is pumped away from the immediate vicinity of the LEED-NC building slabs and foundations. In fact, we see some advantages than doing in-site: there is no the consumption related to the pumping system and it is a centralized system instead of doing it on every site. All the buildings in the Square area supplied by the same system.
In the design review we have been stated that this system does no accomplish with the definition defined in the LEED Guide.
Do you think it can be a matter of explanation or do you consider this would never meet the requirements for LEED?
Thank you for your help.
Inés
Tristan Roberts
RepresentativeVermont House of Representatives
LEEDuser Expert
11477 thumbs up
November 3, 2013 - 1:59 pm
In my opinion this meets the credit requirements. The source of irrigation water does not have to be onsite, and "nuisance" groundwater is a valid source of nonpotable water.