In a Core and Shell project Office Tower that is over 50 stories, the rule is still measure all regularly occupied spaces in the building? That could mean over 50 floors of measurements? Or is that in Core and Shell, we only measure the lux for regularly occupied Core spaces. But again, this could be a huge quantity. Is it allowed to do a representational number of floors, say 5 or 10? The same question applies if this was a complete BD+C Office tower that is 50 plus stories. To measure all regularly occupied spaces in an office tower could take weeks to do! What is allowable for maximum number of lux measurements? Thank you.
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Summer Minchew
Managing PartnerEcoimpact Consulting
LEEDuser Expert
170 thumbs up
May 8, 2020 - 9:27 am
I have asked this same question of GBCI, here was their response: "Note that measurements are unable to be taken on just a representative floor and used for other floors because daylight levels on each floor may not be exactly the same due to the difference in height, neighboring site features, etc." I recognize that this could make daylight measurement impractical on very large projects.
emily reese moody
Sustainability Director, Certifications & ComplianceJacobs
LEEDuser Expert
476 thumbs up
May 8, 2020 - 11:14 am
This is another case where people get frustrated with the documentation requirements with LEED and the disproportionate amount of time it takes to prove compliance.
They'll probably come back with the same response, but I would still email LEED Coach with a proposed approach that makes sense based on the buildings around yours and what impact those may have on daylight. Maybe you could do ground level, the first 5 floors, and then one floor every 3-4 after that? I dunno...worth an attempt, anyway.
Daniel Glaser
PrincipalLightStanza
LEEDuser Expert
18 thumbs up
May 8, 2020 - 12:09 pm
Can you still use simulation for this? This can make the problem more tractable.
Also, the analytics for Option 1 simulation approach are a lot more robust than measurements so you can be more certain your daylight works all year. E.g. Option 1 analyzes a full year of what your site will be like, whereas measurements check the quality only at 2 points in time (one can largely choose the date and sky conditions to your favor, also a sign of being less robust). Also Option 1 has a more sophisticated treatment of glare-- e.g. it specifies when shades will be closed to give a more realistic accounting of daylight.
On the other hand, measurements give ground truth and there is a lot to be said for that. If you use a validated simulation program that can help minimize discreptancies.
Summer I agree with the gist of GBCI since for example, the ground reflects a significant amount of light into a building. I agree Emily that measuring FL1 is important relative to other floors and sampling up to the top will be a good approximation of light levels throughout (but watch for exterior obstructions and other nuances, which can be many).
This tedious work still begs the question of can simulation be used to simplify your documentation.