7. June 2011 by gleearch.

In today’s hyped up LEED market, we see a plethora of products being pushed as being green products.  Everything including the kitchen sink is now “green” or are the very least able to get you LEED credits.

I was recently part of a team for a design build public bid project as the LEED administration consultant.  Needless to say it was a lot of work on the part of the entire team putting the proposal together and I came away very impressed by the builder who was the prime/ lead on the proposal.

However as part of the process we had to dissect the bridging documents put together by the original design team and in order to ensure a proposal that was buildable and met the project costs estimate it required doing extensive work including value engineering and design revisions.  There were some code issues not properly addressed in the original design and some LEED credits proposed which did not make sense.

The one thing many people forget in their pursuit of LEED, is that sustainability isn’t about glossing up the building and stuffing it full of building systems.  That does not make it green.  Ensuring the design is both climate and site responsive does wonders for a building.  Not tarting it up with large HVAC systems claiming super high efficiency because it’s needed to counteract all that glass facing west.

Nor should it be about placing green roofs on a building in one little corner so that you can claim a point for storm water treatment when the site itself can do that at grade.  While green roofs can be a good thing, as with many other “green” building systems, prudence should be used when judging when to use them.  Adding costs to a project with very little gain but making a big show of it when selling the idea to the client doesn’t help the environment.  Anyone remember Al Gore’s house?

Slapping on lots of bells and whistles on a building that was not designed to work with the environment isn’t going to be green no matter how many LEED points you score.  Fortunately the team I was on, understood this and the innovative ideas developed made for a better design.  Convincing the client already sold on the original idea would be a different story.  Sometimes doing the right thing can be an uphill battle.

Sustainability is about simplicity. Doing less in many ways means doing more for the environment.

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27. February 2009 by gleearch.

Getting a project LEED certified is difficult enough but having a contractor who does not want to be on board will make it near nigh impossible. The situation is compounded if it happens to be a public bid project where the contractor is not part of the process from the onset. The public low bid atmosphere typically results in potentially adversarial relationships since the contractor needs to find ways to “gain” back profits left on the table via a lowball bid. Why on earth in a situation like that will they want to take on the added costs and overhead generated by the LEED process?

That said, I want to talk about my recent experience working as a LEED administrator consultant on a 42,000sf office building development in the Bay Area (not a public bid project). I’m not the architect but was brought on as the LEED admin. The contractor was on board from the beginning. The client, design team and contractor were all for LEED which made my life as the LEED admin far easier. This project fell neatly into the LEED CS (core & shell) category and we developed the LEED project vision and distributed the credit responsibilities to the appropriate team members.

The initial target had been LEED certified but as the project progressed and the team got even more fired up, the client pushed it to silver as the target. We have enough credits for Gold but we take into account that most times, a project tends to get denied a few credits and so it is more realistic to shoot for a higher level but assume you will hit the level below.

In the design phase we went after 19 credits and earned 18. Only one credit was denied.  Which we suspected we probably would not get it but tried anyway. Maybe one day I’ll talk about that particular credit.

Initially for the construction credits we pursued 15 credits but through the contractor’s efforts added two separate credits. This is why having a good contractor on board is essential. They have to work with their subcontractors and their vendors to ensure that we actually get the credits.

The contractor found a waste management facility that recycles at a rate close to 95-99% and therefore off hauled everything to the facility and diverted 100% of construction waste from the landfill. All wood procured for the job was FSC certified. We helped them develop a “green” construction job-site guide for their employees and the same with the IAQ plan. It was collaborative from the start which is far more enjoyable and rewarding than butting heads continuously.

Recycled and regional material credits all hit the 2 point mark because of their efforts. I worked closely with their project admin on completing the letter templates. Most people have no idea how much work goes into getting those done. Right now we are waiting word to see what we will need to clarify and what we will have earned outright. While we don’t have the final decision yet, it still made life a lot easier to work with a great contractor.

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24. February 2009 by admin.

Why a separate category for LEED related postings?

Personally I feel that a sustainable building  is a building that is designed to work with the environment/ site it is in.  A site and climate responsive building.  It utilizes daylighting, passive cooling, thermal mass or other such strategies to reduce the need for mechanical systems to achieve thermal comfort.  In other words, it works with the sun, wind, topography and other elements on the site.

Throw in other related building systems like the structure, materials, water efficiency, building footprint, etc that are designed to work together holistically and there you have it.  There were green buildings long before LEED came along and there will continue to be green buildings long after.

LEED is very succesful and I don’t kid myself about that.  After all I took the trouble to get accredited as a LEED accredited professional too.  Just like the other tens of thousands who did so.  I have worked on a number of LEED projects and currently am a LEED administrator on a LEED CS (Core & shell) office building which we hope to achieve at least a LEED silver rating (theoretically it’s at Gold but I prefer to be conservative in the predicted outcome).

I actually think that LEED coming along was a good thing because it made everyone in the building trades a little more aware about sustainability.  It is far better to do something that supports a sustainable method of construction then the conventional way which encouraged waste.

With that said, there is no program or standard in the world that can hope for perfection.  If you tell people that achieving your highest rating let’s the world know you have the greenest building in the world without any caveats, then you are going to find some projects that are going to shoot for points for the sake of it.

Yes, I know that the new version of LEED attempts to address regionality in its standards.  I’ll wait till the refrence manuals are published and readily available before I make any comments.   Truth of the matter is that everyone on the project needs to be well educated about these systems that they will be employing in their projects because of LEED.  A building still needs to function properly and not leak regardless of its LEED rating.  A LEED administrator on a project should be able to advise the building team and owner why some credits need to be avoided due to possible negative effects.  I’m not saying that there are bad credits or requirements in LEED.  I’m saying that because the climate is always key, you need to utilize the right credits to ensure that your building is climate responsive.  Doing the wrong thing can get you some points but actually hurt the building.

I have read “LEED reviews” by other consultants on various projects over the years that are supposed to guide the owner as to the LEED worthiness of their project.  Most times it’s just somebody ticking off credits and saying, your project can achieve these points.  Right.  And what basis did you derive that from? The design drawings or specifications? The project budget? The professional engineers design statement?  What?

There are plenty of LEED APs out there but only a few who know how a building goes together and even fewer who actually generate sustainable designs or research on it.  You are supposed to implement LEED at the start of the project to ensure an intergrated project.  Reality normally means a project owner deciding to pursue LEED well into the design phases.  It’s not impossible to achieve LEED in that scenario but it’s going to result in additional costs.

So a “review” done after the fact needs to address the possibility that the project may not be able to achieve LEED because of the design.  It’s not the design team’s fault since that was not their directive from the get go.  Reports that just tick of possible credits without really investigating the design are going to be the bane of the sustainability industry.  It reduces its credibility.

So let’s talk LEED in these postings as we move forward.

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