The purpose of this CIR is to obtain confirmation of what the FTE occupancy of the project will be, relative to this credit and others that are related to the occupants of the building. The project consists of a 120,000 SF existing building, which is part of and connected to other buildings in a corporate campus. The building was recently used for offices, which is the predominate use of the campus. The building is being converted to a large data center. The majority of the space will be occupied by the data center, support mechanical and electrical rooms, and perimeter corridors which are used by numerous persons as circulation between the various campus buildings. Personnel working in the data center have their permanent offices/workstations in other campus buildings. There are two offices provided-for the loading dock supervisor and the mechanical plant engineer. In addition there is a break area and toilet rooms. We request confirmation that the FTE occupancy of the project is two occupants, and that this is enough to permit us to achieve the various Indoor Environmental Quality and other credits that depend on there being building occupants, assuming the other credit requirements are met. In other words, that there is no minimum number of occupants for a LEED certified project.
There is no minimum number of occupants required for a LEED rating. The LEED Reference Guide indicates that a regular occupant would be 1 FTE (Full Time Equivalent = worker hours/8). In this particular case, the regular occupants are considered to be the two people whose offices are located in the building. FTEs also consider the number of transient occupants in a building. The FTEs for transients would be people who work, study or visit the building for less than 7 hours a day. The actual number of FTEs assigned to the transient occupants would be based upon the number of hours each person is in the building. The FTE calculation must include all WORKERS on the site (See SS Credit 4, Equation 1, in the Reference Guide). The transient FTEs would be calculated as a percentage of the number of hours a typical FTE would be. For example; a person who occupied the building 4 hours a day, 5 days a week would be .5 FTEs. There is not enough information here to calculate the correct number of FTEs for this project. However, it does appear that it will be greater than two. When submitting for LEED approval, please use the guidelines above, and those shown in the LEED reference guide, taking into account all transient users of the building, as well as all full time regular occupants in your calculations. Provide clear, logical methodology as to how you arrive at your final number when submitting your project to LEED On-line.