Case 2 Option 2 -We are doing a LEED feasibility study for an existing 40+ year old automotive engine Plant that is being refurbished and upgraded with new process equipment. The LEED accreditation is to be for Existing Buildings: Operations and Maintenance. The Owner also has a relatively new plant that produces the same product and has achieved LEED New Building Accreditation. The refurbished building will be installing a new lighting system and upgraded energy monitoring systems. It will also be producing the same product as the new plant at approximately the same volume. The refurbished plant is currently producing product at half the expected volume.
We have annual production volumes (number of units built) and yearly utility billings from past years for both plants. The volumes differ year to year.
Can we use the “average energy usage per unit” to normalize these plants for comparisons between legacy energy usage, baseline energy usage and our projected energy usage and production volumes to meet this prerequisite?
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Michael Opitz
Director of SustainabilityIconergy
60 thumbs up
June 10, 2014 - 3:45 pm
Mary, your approach is right on target: LEED wants energy use of this type of building to be normalized for production volume. You might also consider normalizing for floor area and/or number of workers if they differ much for the two buildings.
You're in an area with few LEED rules, so I suggest you have 3-5 years of past energy use history for both facilities available. You'll want to show that the refurbished existing building has improved its performance substantially, and if you can also show that its energy performance is close to that of the newer building then your chances of getting LEED approval will be even better.
I'd suggest submitting your approach to GBCI as a project CIR so you can get guidance early in your process.
Muzammal Abbas LEED AP (BD+C)
LEED Project ManagerSIDEworks
1 thumbs up
August 9, 2016 - 7:58 am
I am working on a industrial project registered in Existing building Operation and maintenance located Out of US , that have its own electricity production of 4 Mw through gas engines and its free from grid electricity and energy consumption of performance year 2015 is greater than baseline from 2012-2014 because in 2015 they increase the number of equipment and output production. my questions are:
1) What we have to do to resolve this issue of increase the number of equipment in performance period:
2) Process load of this project is greater then 60% so how to normalize it per unit basis
3) We have all detail related to energy bills , submitter and quantity of jeans pant (Production quantity) of last three years 2012-2014 and performance period 2015. So is it ok if we normalize by dividing quantity of production (jeans pant ) to total power consumption of each baseline years through this we can find per unit power consumption of each year 2012-2014.
4) After finding per unit power consumption is it write to take baseline production (jeans pant) equal to performance year and multiplying it to per unit power consumption of respective baseline year for normalizing and to show saving through EnergyStar portfolio manager For Case 2 Option 2.