Vacant Building - Minimal Occupants to Survey

Trista, LEED Coach has responded as follows: "The 'Getting Started' section of the LEED Reference Guide for Building Operations and Maintenance LEED v4 (August 2017 edition) notes that buildings with spaces dedicated for tenancy may face 'particular challenges' in earning credits. The 'Variable Occupancy' section provides some guidance, stating, 'When occupancy rates vary over the performance period, that variation should be reflected in credit calculations via a time-weighted average.' In that section, specific guidance for EQ credit Occupant Comfort Survey is provided, requiring use of either actual occupancy, or a time-weighted average if the occupancy varies during the performance period, in order to determine the number of occupants that must be surveyed. However, in a case where the building will be untenanted or minimally occupied during the performance period, the team may want to pursue credits that are not tied to occupancy." Furthermore: "LTc Alternative Transportation: Step 5 on page 44 of the reference guide (August 2017 edition) requires that the survey must reflect typical usage patterns. If the building occupancy is not normally limited to 2 people, and the performance period occurs during a time of atypical occupancy, then the intent of Option 2 will not be met. As an alternative, the team could pursue this credit for the project using Option 1 or Option 3, surveying the 2 occupants. As stated above, the project would not be able to earn additional points under Option 2." That being said, we can NOT survey the only occupants in the building, and are in fact going to have to struggle through achieving points, not just for this one credit, but for others as well. Thinking about the implications for the custodial effectiveness assessment, waste audit, occupant comfort survey and task lighting, make having no people in a building far more complicated than it would superficially seem. The available points have been compromised almost beyond our ability to achieve LEED Silver Certification. We could potentially spend more money on costly audits and such, but to what benefit? Why would we do an IAQ Management Program and audit in a building where there are no people and future construction planned? Why would we do an education innovation when there is no one to educate? Tricky, but we will get there.