Our project is a major renovation of a 2-story historic building. The existing window openings can not be changed without significantly altering part of the preservation. Sill heights on the second floor are 49" however the windows are huge (7 feet tall). Our LEED reviewer denied the credit in the preliminary review phase due to sill height exceeding 42". This seems a little unreasonable to me given the nature of this building. Share your thoughts? Is there any precedent that would allow me to pursue this credit? I don't believe that I could argue non-typical space usage however we may be able to demonstrate taller furniture. Either way this is not a new construction project whereby we would have the flexibility to design sill heights. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
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Jill Perry, PE
ConsultantJill Perry, LLC
LEEDuser Expert
440 thumbs up
April 13, 2011 - 6:06 pm
Can you raise the floor?
I'm curious why the windows only went down to 49" in the building in the first place? What will the new occupancy be? What does the occupant see out the windows?
Rick Ferrara
AIA, LEED BD+CGensler
118 thumbs up
April 23, 2011 - 10:13 am
You need to take a different approach. I've successfully (under NC 2.2) gotten a favorable CIR where we had a regularly occupied room with a STANDING population. Much like your space, these people did their task standing. As such, we argued and won that we should be able to increase the sill height from the prescribed distance to the change in eye level from a seated to standing position. Strongly suggest that you file a CIR.