LEED: NC vs CS

[Misvit]

So, my firm is working for a joint venture between 4 owners, a bank, law firm, land owner, and insurance agency, to build a 4 story office building. 3 of the owners will occupy 3 floors, the land owner is just in it because he owns the land. We are designing the core and shell of the building and each owner after the venture is complete and shell of the building built, will go out and find other architects to fit up their space.

Insert the owner's desire to do LEED. As per LEED: Core and Shell, you can only follow it's requirements if 50% or less of the building is occupied by the "developer/owner" If you assume that the owners "own the building" (a good assumption) that would mean 75% of the building is occupied by them and we have to go LEED: New Construction. If you assume the joint venture owns the building, which doesn't occupy the building (though members of it's interests are occupying it, feels a lot like lieing to me) then 0% of the buliding is occupied by the "owner/developer" and we can do LEED: Core and Shell. Thirdly, we could designate on paper (I like this one the least) one owner as the "Leed" owner and the others as just tenants, of which 25% of the building would be owned by the "developer/owner". Still Leed: Core and Shell.

The reason why I'm asking is because we're already barely able to do LEED:CS, picking up all the freebees about telling the tenants about LEED and etc. The site is on wetlands and we've already demoed the trees to build the thing, so there are a lot of points that are just crossed off immediately. Truthfully, this is a clear example of "last minute" "Let's do LEED" crisis. Any opinions would be helpful. We haven't even registered the building yet, so I can't get onto the CIRs and etc at the usgbc website. I created a log in but all of the good info is "access restricted"

[gleearch]

I believe you just hit it on the nail. The "owners" will occupy more than 50% of the building. You won't qualify for LEED CS. Unless they set up the owner ship in a way that they would qualify as separate entities when leasing the space as tenants. Different corporations etc. Even then I would shoot of a question before registering the project. No point registering it in the wrong category. You can only submit a CIR once you are registered. That would be a bit late for you.
Don't lie or help them with it. You might be a LEED accredited professional but you are still an architecture firm with ethical, and professional conduct regulations. If they want to restructure how their partnership or corporation is seen legally, let them do it. I am sure there are lawyers who can help them with it. Again, it would still fall to how the USGBC views them after all the shuffling around is done.

One other thing, it is a shame that they built on wetlands and destroyed part of the habitat. Fortunately or unfortunately (depending on your viewpoint), those only represent 1 credit (2 if it's preserving open space). There are a ton of other credits they can easily get to hit certified. Actually hitting certified is pretty straight forward and fairly easily done. LEED while it promotes sustainable methods of being green and is a worthwhile endeavor, is not perfect and a building can be LEED certified and not do much more about energy conservation other than meet the prereq for it.
Heck, a building can have tons of west facing glazing and bake the occupants in the summer and still hit certified.
Keep with LEED though. It's better than doing nothing and if you managed to get a platinum or gold building, you should be happy about it. Plus I am sure they will continue to improve it.

[joelmckellar]

I would echo Mr. Lee's thoughts on the your role in helping to make the project LEED CS.

As an architect, I would explain that they are only going to be eligible for LEED CS through less than ethical means, and I would turn this into a golden opportunity to explain why you should be the architect for all of their interiors as well!

If they're going to have to upfit the interiors anyway, it just makes sense to go full bore and do it all in an integrated fashion and go for LEED-NC. Explain that it is pointless to hire additional architects, consultants, and contractors, and that even if you did go with the LEED-CS system, they would ideally want to go into LEED-CI as they upfit their own spaces, thus leading to additional documentation and associated costs.

There will also be scheduling nightmares, especially if one office is under construction while another tenant has already moved in. By having the design all under one roof, you will gain efficiency (and presumably save money) by cooridinating utilities and eliminating learning curves for other designers and consultants.

Finally, I wholeheartedly agree with your complaints about access to information. Though I strongly support the goals of the organization, the USGBC continues to act like a for-profit corporation. As little as a year ago each project recieved two FREE cir's... now there are none, and the fact the CIRs are restricted is ludicrous. There are no "sample" projects to learn from, classes are all in the hundreds of dollars, and when trying to setup a LEED AP class in the area I was warned not to interfere with any official USGBC classes as they are a significant source of revenue for the organization. I hope this will change soon.

[Misvit]

Thank you for all the info! As I am a lowly arch intern assigned to ascertain whether LEED was possible or not, I will pass on your professional opinions to my higher ups. I definitely agree that it seems if the owners are actually interested in LEED instead of just a passing question, they should go full throttle and hire one firm to see it through. Still, my boss seems insistant that she will be able to convince through a CIR that the building is indeed core and shell and therefore can be done as such. Hopefully some professional opinions of people who have dealt with USGBC will sway her. The last thing I want to happen is to be blamed 4 months from now for wasting a ton of time and money for not even being registered under the correct LEED system. I'll keep you all posted as to how things turn out.

[gleearch]

I can guarantee you that if you do not meet the design intent of the credit as it is written out, or fall under the criteria they have listed for registering a project, that no amount of arguments or convincing will get the USGBC to approve it.
Plus it costs about $220 a CIR. It's the client's money but why waste the effort for something everyone for the most knows won't fly?
And if you registered it in the wrong category, you will have to get them to change categories later (CS vs NC). I have never done this, so no idea if it is possible or not.
I agree with Joel, the way your project is going, NC would be a better fit. He is right in that if you went CS and then did CI, it will costs the clients more money (not including all the different registration fees for LEED CI on each fitout). If the building was fit out right from the start, it would end up costing less. Why do the clients think they will save more money this way? They can still use an interiors architect if they want, just bring them in earlier and you will end up with a better integrated design. Than the hash of a typical TI fitout.
Make the case and leave it to the client to figure out which way they would prefer. Normally the argument that it will save them more in design related fees tends to be persuasive.
The money they save not having to register a project and pay the separate registration fees could be better applied to helping a project consider certain credits. Get more points.