For an open-plan office space with individual working spaces the project team has used operable windows in order to provide thermal comfort control. Would working spaces located within 20 feet of a window to the inside, and 10 feet from side to side be considered as eligible towards credit requiremnt? Or should the operable windows be provided to ony one indidual working space each instead of the entire adjacent zone of individual spaces?
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Melissa Kelly
Sustainability SpecialistGensler
85 thumbs up
June 24, 2015 - 10:50 am
Hi Charalampos,
I believe it's still the case that you should count all the working spaces within 20 feet of a window and 10 feet from side to side.
Charalampos Giannikopoulos
Senior Sustainability ConsultantDCarbon
84 thumbs up
June 24, 2015 - 11:19 am
Hi Melissa. Since it's been some time after I posted the question and we have proceeded with the project, the reviewer has stated that the operable windows have to be individually operable to be eligible as a means of control, which is different from LEED v3.
Melissa Kelly
Sustainability SpecialistGensler
85 thumbs up
June 25, 2015 - 4:22 pm
Wow, thanks for letting us know! That's a significant change that isn't clear from the way the credit is written.
Steven Burke
Sustainability Manager10 thumbs up
March 15, 2016 - 1:18 pm
I have to say, that is very frustrating. There is nothing that I can find in the reference guide, and nothing in the credit form that indicates that. There are no interpretations to direct that information. How would anyone know until they had already created the design and then found out from the review team that it didn't meet the criteria? (Criteria which only the review team seems to be privy to?)
I hate to say it, but this feels like another item in LEED v4 with good intentions that just makes the process unnecessarily onerous.
Larissa Oaks
Specialist, LEEDUSGBC
LEEDuser Expert
67 thumbs up
January 17, 2017 - 3:04 pm
Hi Charalampos, Melissa, and Steven,
Operable windows are an acceptable thermal comfort control for LEED v4 and are treated the same as they were in LEED 2009- there can be more than one occupant per window. Charalampos, you may have received an incorrect ruling from the review team.
Dylan Connelly
Mechanical EngineerIntegral Group
LEEDuser Expert
472 thumbs up
May 23, 2017 - 3:36 pm
Larissa, Et All,
My understanding has always been 1 operable window = 1 point of control.
What the reviewer under v4 was challenged was counting 1 operable window as 100% controllability for say 6 people in an office near the window (within 20 feet of a window and 10 feet from side to side). I've never known that to the be case.
For example the window is either open, partly open or closed. So if one person wants it open and one person wants closed - you have to compromise. Same as a thermostat. That's why a thermostat only counts as 1 control point for a group of 6 people nearby for example.
Yes as Larissa stated you can have more than one occupant per window. You can have 2. That would equal 50% controllability. Or 4 people with a thermostat and a window equal's 50%.
But if I'm wrong that would make this credit much easier. So let me know so I can change my approach in the future.