Dear LEEDers,
during heavy thunderstorms, the municipal combined sewer overflowed and flooded the underground garage at our LEED project site. Unfortunately, building materials that were stored there to keep them save from the weather were destroyed. As a result, of the water damages not only the stored materials, but also previously newly installed building materials need to be replaced. Our question is what materials need to be taken into account for our calculations. Do we have to add the already installed materials, which will need replacing? Can we leave out the damaged stored building materials?
Kind Regards
Emily Purcell
Sustainable Design LeadCannonDesign
LEEDuser Expert
318 thumbs up
June 15, 2018 - 1:56 pm
It sounds like all the materials are going into the waste stream, so they would all need to be tracked for whether they were landfilled or diverted. If the volume of damaged material that you have to send to landfill is going to be high enough to potentially affect your LEED achievement, you might want to contact GBCI and ask about a possible exception - as a reviewer I spoke with a couple project teams that had materials stolen from a dumpster and we figured out a workaround. Just document the weight/volume as well as possible so you have a number to work with.
RETIRED
LEEDuser Expert
623 thumbs up
June 19, 2018 - 3:10 pm
While I think that Emily's answer follows the LEED letter of the law and might be the black-and-white response, I also think that this is a bit of a grey area due to the special circumstances of the flooding.
It would be easiest and the most straightforward to just include both the stored and replacement materials in your waste calculations. Yet I understand this could be detrimental to your diverted rate as I suspect there is not much that can be recycled/salvaged (as Emily noted). If the credit achievement comes into jeopardy because of these materials, you might want to use the Special Circumstances box on the credit form and explain your situation - stating what you included and did not include for example and why. Using Special Circumstances is a tool that you can never go wrong by using.
Kay - It would be great if you could share the final outcome of your experience so we can all learn from it.
Emily Purcell
Sustainable Design LeadCannonDesign
LEEDuser Expert
318 thumbs up
June 19, 2018 - 4:00 pm
Totally agreed on the special circumstances narrative - use it anytime your project doesn't fit neatly into the LEED boxes! I do think this waste should be acceptable to exclude from your total as there simply is no reuse opportunity due to contamination beyond your control - just document what was damaged and disposed of the same way you've been tracking other waste streams.
Nicole Isk
Senior ConsultantES EnviroSustain GmbH
22 thumbs up
June 21, 2018 - 12:26 pm
Thanks a lot for your input! We thought along the same lines. We will give it a go and come back with the final outcome.