Rating System

LEED BD+C: Core and Shell

Rating System Version

v2 - LEED 2.0

Inquiry

The Washington Street Office Project\'s original owners, McShane Corporation has been considering pursuing LEED CS certification for some time. As the building was not originally designed with LEED CS intent, modifications are required to meet several of the requirements to receive certification. McShane recently sold the building prior to finalizing the decision to pursue LEED CS. The sale of the property and the timing of the ownership change happened to coincide with the timing of the LEED credit change, now requiring 14% energy optimization as a prerequisite. A decision of whether to pursue LEED certification then rested in the new owner\'s hands. The close of the sale and subsequently the decision to pursue LEED certification was agreed to by the new owner. At initial review, the project budget would need to be increased by at least $850,000 to achieve the 2 credits, significantly impact the schedule due to the redesign of the mechanical systems and governing agency reviews and the new owners are not prepared to increase the budget or schedule by this significant amount. They are willing to increase the budget to achieve many other credits that have much less impact, and are excited about the prospect of a LEED CS certified office building in this high profile location along the new light rail line running through Phoenix. Unfortunately we have been informed that if it is the decision of the USGBC that these credits must be achieved, the owner\'s plan to pursue certification would be stifled. This, in turn, would eliminate most of the environmental elements that we have discussed incorporating into the project to achieve the LEED certification. We have been further informed by our energy modeler has 3 large office buildings (150,000 + sf) in the last two weeks who are in danger of not meeting the USGBC requirement of 2 energy credits. This is largely due to Appendix G HVAC system requirements (Chilled water VAV) as compared to the water-cooled self contained VAV (DX) in the design. We are concerned that for LEED CS especially large buildings, this criteria may be too restrictive as the code itself provides for an extremely efficient design. Please let us know your decision as soon as possible. Thank you