Dear all,
As we all know it is possible to get ‘Exemplary-Performance-Points’ by double the appropriate credit requirements. Considering what we believe that in this case it is not absolutely necessary that the ‘Exemplary-Performance-Option’ must refers to the previously determined option. For example it would make sense that, if the project team pursues the on-site restoration (Option 1), the team nevertheless can get an extra point by an additional financial support equivalent to at least $0.40 per square foot (Option 2). The financial donation just embodied an allocation of protecting or restoring a habitat and should therefore always be possible.

In Germany the (property) owner has to arrange inquiries regarding the soil pollution and burden by weapons, explosive ordnance and combat equipment (military hazardous waste).
The project site that is to be built has been identified as area suspected to be contaminated with unexplodes ordnance. Therefore the next steps will be:
- Technical exploration and risk assessment
- Implementation of an explosive ordnance clearance by the state authority (sounding, locating, uncovering, identifying, salvage and transportation of contamination)

Question:
Does areas suspected to be contaminated with unexplodes ordnance like described above count as soil or groundwater contamination within the meaning of the LEED definition?

What do you think?

Many thanks in advance for your help.

We have an upcoming international new construction project of a multi-family residential building. Due to its numbers of stories LEED NC v4 is the most appropriate rating system to use.

To achieve the prerequisite "environmental tobacco smoke control" we would appreciate it if you could give us some detailed information about its implementation. It is intended that we meet all requirements by prohibiting smoking in all common areas of the building and by compartmentalization of the private residential units.

But what about the private balconies? Do we have to prohibit smoking on all private balconies or are we allowed to designate balconies as “private” smoking areas, where smoking is permitted, if the balcony is at least 25 feet (7.5 meters) away from entries, outdoor air intakes, and operable windows opening to common areas?

What would you recommend?
Kind regards,
Andreas

We have a project in Gallin, a small town with almost no public transport facilities. The project is located in a growing business park, the infrastructure will develop and the public transportation will be build up.
The builder and employer of the project will implement a bus shuttle in the meantime to connect the new location with the old location in Glinde which is close to Hamburg and has Access to some bus lines and a subway line to Hamburg. The distance between Gallin and Glinde by bus is 34 minutes and the shuttle busses will drive at the most frequent times. All employees from Glinde or Glinde region (approx. 47%) can walk, take the bike or the car to get to the shuttle, like they did before. Employees from Hamburg (approx. 25%) can come by car or can take a public bus - as well as before. Without this shuttle the new location will cause 100% more cars, with this shuttle we can reduce the number of cars to approx. 28%.
We are aware that this doesn´t correpond to the LEED requirements. But the builder and employer wants to do whatever is possible to reduce individual traffic. This is the only economic and meaningful way for the employees in relation to driving time and corresponds to the basic thoughts of this credit. Please verify if this feasible approach on the current conditions can be accepted in the meaning of LEED.

Hello all,
We have a LEED v2009 C&S project in Germany now. LEED asks for energy simulation according to ASHRAE Standard for the Prerequisite Minimum Energy Performance and Credit Optimized Energy Performance. Considering that the project is located in Germany, can the Standard DIN V18599 be an acceptable alternative for LEED? The detailed name of DIN V18599 is Energetic evaluation of buildings - Calculation of the net, final and primary energy demand for heating, cooling, ventilation, domestic hot water and lighting. (https://www.beuth.de/en/pre-standard/din-v-18599-11/142651548)
The calculations are made for examining compliance with the german national Energy Saving Law. After the simulation and calculation, each project will get a Energy Saving Law Certificate, so called "EnEV Nachweis" in german, which shows the percentage in which the designed building is better than the reference building. Information about primary energy consumption, end energy and energy sources are also available.
Since our engineers have few ideas about the ASHRAE standard, I would like to know if we can use DIN V18599 instead of ASHRAE, and provide the Energy Saving Law Certificate as the submittal.

Thank you in advance.

Hello all,

we are going to use ASHRAE 90.1-2010 for our LEED v2009 project in Germany. One problem pops up recently. The cooling system we will use in the project is a split cooling system which uses a compressor to distribute the refrigerant through a piping network to multiple indoor units. You can find the chiller here if you are interested:

http://www.emersonnetworkpower.com/en-CALA/Products/PrecisionCooling/Dat...

The problem is in ASHRAE 90.1-2007, the efficiency of VRF cooling system was not covered in the mandatory provisions for LEED minimum energy performance, but in ASHRAE 2010 the minimum efficiency for VRF air cooled air conditioner of our size is 11.6. The ESEER value of our chiller mentioned above is 3.99. I guess there must be something wrong but I can't figure out where. I did some research, and found out that in Germany the efficiency (ESEER) of this kind of chiller is always around 4 to 6. How can it be that their efficiencies are all much lower than the minimum efficiency required in ASHRAE. Or is this kind of cooling actually not exactly the same as what ASHRAE describes, which means there is no requirement on the efficiency of our cooling system?

Thanks a lot.

We are pursuing LEED credits for a Workshop/Office Building in Munich Germany. The projekt site is located less than a 1/2 mile walking distance from a railway station, so requirement ist fulfilled. Is ist possible to get 6 points for this credit like in US?

HI, I am working on a store with two lighting types: furniture lighting and ambiant lighting. Only a part of the ambiant lighting is controlled depending on daylight illumination (40%). If we consider the whole power installed, lighting controlled represents 17.5%.
Question: Should we consider the furniture lighting in our calculations, knowing that LEED says:

"In sales areas, provide controls that can reduce the ambient light levels to a midlevel (30% to 70% of the maximum illumination level not including daylight contributions). "

Hi, I am working on a store located on the groung floor of a mall. This store has a room on the first floor (accessible by stairway) with a sufficient area to store two bicyle, can we consider this room as a long-term bicycle storage?

About the bicycle maintenance program for employees, does anyone have an idea of what content is intented?

For Option 1, Path 2 using the daylight and views calculator we are trying to a factor that meets the requirement. The building has exterior automated horizontal louvers (not perforated), which do close completely if there is too much direct sunlight, but they can be operated with a switch to preserve views. The question is, if these are considered to be view-preserving even though they are not perforated, but can be adjusted to a horizontal position?