We have a floor that is vacant in our project building. In performing EQp1 calculations, I assume that # of occupants given for each zone should sum up to the total building occupants for other credits. Is this correct? This is a bit tricky in establishing regular building occupants vs. daily peak occupants vs. hourly peak occupants, ultimately to establish the appropriate input (Pz) for the calculator. Is there any clarification you can provide on this? Also, because one of our floors is vacant, we will only show we are meeting fresh air requirements based on current occupancy. Is that correct?
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Tristan Roberts
RepresentativeVermont House of Representatives
LEEDuser Expert
11475 thumbs up
February 8, 2011 - 8:44 am
I am a bit confused by the wording of your question, but I'll try to answer based on my understanding. The requirements for this prerequisite involve ensuring that the HVAC system can meet the needed ventilation loads of the space. If it is an office space, the HVAC should be able to meet the needs of that space as designed (with occupants), not as it currently stands (vacant). In your case I would come up with reasonable occupancy numbers for the vacant floor based on numbers from other floors.
Dave Madsen
Director of Engineering & SustainabilityQualis Group LLC
21 thumbs up
December 2, 2011 - 8:23 am
I want to make sure I'm understanding this correctly...
Even if we have a vacant space, we should use the default space type density to assume that we have occupants in the space. Then we should calculate our required ventilation based on the default occupant density even though the space is vacant.
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With that being said, since during the performance period we are only required to take one measurement of the outside air, if we are able to show that the AHU for that vacant space can supply sufficient OA, are we able to return the space to "unoccupied (i.e. shutdown OA to vacant space) to save energy? Basically it seems to me that we should be able to demonstrate that the system can supply enough OA if it were occupied, without actually having to do so since the space is vacant.