Our project team is working on LEED EBOM certification of an industrial compound, and there is a question we are not so sure about and we believe one of you may be able to help. The company which owns the compound we are working on has plans to install meters in the buildings located inside of it, to earn credit EA 3.2 – Performance Measurement: System-Level Metering. However, there are three buildings within the site, and we are wondering whether we will have to install sub meters for all main energy-consuming systems in each building or we can install general sub meters for the main energy-consuming systems of the compound as a whole (which would be easier). We are asking you this because each facility has its own energy distribution characteristics and we believe it will not be worth installing the 79 meters they calculate, for the costs they will pay. Is there any reasonable solution we can apply to earn this credit?
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Hannah Bronfman
Senior Associate99 thumbs up
February 16, 2012 - 5:28 pm
Hi Paola
This is a great question. While I don't know much about the energy production system at your site, I'm assuming that there is some sort of central plant serving all three buildings. Is this correct?
If so, then you would have to have some sort of metering in place to quantify the percent of energy output of each system is going to each of the three buildings - this would be required to meet the energy benchmarking prerequisite, EAp2.
If this is the case, then you may already be meeting the credit criteria and intent, depending on the types of systems located within the central plant and how much of the overall building consumption these meters are covering.
In this scenario, I would say the safest bet is to submit a CIR for this approach to GBCI prior to submitting your project and see if they view this as an acceptable approach.
Good luck and let me know if you have any other questions!
Hannah