We're designing an office building that the owner wants to provide flexibility in leasing, such that tenants can rent certain spaces in the floor, whole floors, or the whole building. The owner will pay the electricity bill of the building through a main meter provided by electricity company, and then he will let each tenant pay him based on submeters they will install at their spaces. The building has BMS infrastructure available. Can the project apply for this credit? Could it be included in the leasing agreement that each tenant shall install submeters once their spaces are defined?
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Marcus Sheffer
LEED Fellow7group / Energy Opportunities
LEEDuser Expert
5900 thumbs up
September 4, 2015 - 3:17 pm
Sounds like it would be eligible. You need to write a Plan for how the credit requirements will be accomplished. You will need to make sure you have the Reference Guide and follow the instructions for the content of the Plan. I would think that installing their own meters would be in the lease agreement.
Mohammad Haj-Ali
Electrical Design Engineer, LEED AP BD+C, REPDar Al-Handasah
September 13, 2015 - 1:56 am
Thanks for the reply Marcus, however after further discussion with the client, it turns out it would be illegal for the tenants to pay the owner for their electricity bill while he pays the electricity company at medium voltage (high level). So, the question is, if submeters are provided for monitoring purposes ONLY (they wont pay based on the readings but instead will pay a fixed amount based on area of the tenant space), is the project still eligible for this credit? Because on page 322 of the reference guide it states that "In tests of commercial and residential situations, individual tenant responsibility for utility charges has resulted in conservation".
Saud Abdul Rasheed
Sustainability/Energy Engineer, CEM, PMP, LEED AP BD+C, LEED AP O+M, Estidama PQP23 thumbs up
September 14, 2015 - 2:34 am
Dear Mohammad,
If the building is installing submeters for the tenants achieving the credit is easy. The main thing is to provide an M&V plan for tenant submetering. The plan must describe the metering system, procedures on how to connect to the system, how tenants can comply with LEED CI EAc3 and most importantly indicate what will be the corrective actions taken in case energy savings are not met. Usually tenants are asked to pay the bill of their consumed electricity units because this makes them watchful of how much electricity they are consuming. By just paying a "fixed" amount tenants can consume as much electricity as they want without being concerned about the savings. The goal is that tenants should save energy.
Marcus Sheffer
LEED Fellow7group / Energy Opportunities
LEEDuser Expert
5900 thumbs up
September 14, 2015 - 8:59 am
I agree, the whole point of metering is to provide the tenants with an incentive to be energy efficient. Without paying based on usage I don't think you would be able to earn the credit.
Marcus Sheffer
LEED Fellow7group / Energy Opportunities
LEEDuser Expert
5900 thumbs up
September 14, 2015 - 9:06 am
Could the utility install meters for each tenant? That would be eligible.