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Commonly pursued credit—widely relevant
This credit encourages environmental best practices for building exterior maintenance. It’s among the most commonly pursued credits because of minimal cost impacts, and it’s relevant to all building sites, even those with zero lot lines.
Provided that key best practices are thoroughly incorporated into vendor contracts and standard operating procedure (SOPA standard operating procedure (SOP) manual can be used to document routine operations and maintenance practices, and to encourage use of standardized best practices.) language, this credit is not difficult to achieve. Many project teams already employ at least some compliant practices and can focus their...
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13 Comments
Maintenance equipment powered by natural gas
Would equipment powered by natural gas qualify in lieu of electric-powered equipment, given emissions reduction over conventional gas powered equipment?
Shira Norman replied YRG sustainability Feb 15 2010
To meet the credit requirements, you must demonstrate that environmental best practices, such as the use of electric equipment or manual maintenance practices, are in place for at least 20% of the maintenance activities at the project building (and were implemented at least 20% of the time during the performance period).
If there is a specific type of equipment used at the project building that is not available with electric power, quantify the environmental benefits of using natural gas and demonstrate that other environmental best practices (including manual labor and low-decibal equipment) are in place at the project building. To see how to document such incremental adoption, you can check out the table on page 3 of the Building Exterior and Hardscape Management Plan Template in the Documentation Toolkit.
20% Adoption as a Minimum
I can't find anywhere that the USGBC stipulates 20% adoption as a minimum. Would you direct me to your source so that I can add such language to our Plan if it indeed is a USGBC mandate?
Shira Norman replied YRG sustainability Feb 15 2010
Incremental improvement (i.e., a minimum 20% adoption of environmental best practices) is discussed on pages 11-12 of the LEED Reference Guide for Green Buildings Operations & Maintenance. Make sure to add language around the extent to which best management practices are used at the project building and how implementation will be measured.
I think the confusion here
I think the confusion here comes from the version of LEED. EB OM '08 (v2) does not have that 20% threshold where GB OM '09 (v3) does.....(unless I have missed that in the v2 Ref. Guide..!)
Another question on 20% min
Lauren, thanks for your comments above on the 20% adoption criteria. That said, it still seems that achieving and documenting anything less than complete adoption quickly gets into a big grey area. Let’s say my landscape crew is using some equipment that is low-impact and some that is not. To meet the 20% min criteria, do I consider every piece of equipment the crew uses? Do rakes, brooms, shovels and manual clippers all count toward low impact, while the gas-powered blower does not? Do I count up all the equipment in their vehicle to show that more than 20% of it satisfies the criteria?
The ref manual lists “maintenance equipment” as one of the five operational elements to consider in the plan. But other vendors use equipment besides the landscape crew. Do I evaluate each vendor individually to ensure they meet the 20% criteria or do I aggregate them? Landscape vendor: 5 pieces yes, 1 no; Building exterior cleaner: 1 piece yes, 3 no; and so on? Could one vendor, not meeting the 20% min for maintenance equipment, throw the whole effort into the bin? Or could the good work of my landscape crew make up for the fact that the building exterior cleaner is just plain dirty?
Tristan Roberts replied Editor – LEEDuser, BuildingGreen, LLC May 05 2010
Although the credit language and some of the discussion around this credit references equipment, I think the key point to answer your question, Matt, is that it's really about "best management practices," in the words of the credit language.
Even in places where the credit requirements suggest a focus on equipment or certain products or chemicals, it's doing this as a proxy for the extent to which those products were implemented in practice.
Focus on the percentage of time or instances that best practices were implemented. Use equipment or product inventories as a way to gauge that, but not as a substitute. I would agree with you that documenting a specific percentage improvement is tricky, and that complete compliance would be a good goal, or at least complying beyond 20%, and by a big threshold, to remove issues of vagueness or error.
Rachael McClain replied Jun 28 2010
Could you explain how to use the performance metric for the maintenance equipment. It would be helpful if you could give an example. Thank you.
Shira Norman replied YRG sustainability Jul 01 2010
Rachel,
For maintenance equipment, at least 20% of the associated practices should qualify as best management practices. For example, if you can demonstrate that out of 5 pieces of powered maintenance equipment (mowers, trimmers, leaf blowers, etc.) at least 1 is environmentally preferable (e.g., low decibal and electric), your equipment program complies with the credit requirements. Alternatively, if you do not have access to environmentally preferable equipment, you can demonstrate compliance by showing that at least 20% of the activities (e.g., hedge and tree pruning) that were taken care of using powered equipment are now done manually.
What should be shown and
What should be shown and highlighted in the site plan that needs to be posted for this credit? Can and should the same site plan be used for all sustainable sites credits?
Jason Franken replied LEED Consultant, YRG sustainability Aug 10 2010
Kevin, this is one of those situations where the submittal requirement doesn't have a whole lot of bearing on the actual level of operational performance at the project building. This requirement to upload a site plan was added in v2009 to create continuity between the SS credits, but isn't really relevant to the key criteria for SSc2. If you are using a site plan to highlight features for other SS credits (SSc5, SSc6, SSc7, or SSc8), feel free to use the same file here. However, you may also provide separate versions of the site plan for those individual credits in order to clearly show the information that is appropriate for the corresponding credit. For example, landscaping strategies may be clearly highlighted for SSc5, but a different version of the file might be used to clearly illustrate location of parking structures for SSc7.1.
CUTSHEETS FOR PRODUCTS
For all the equipment or products which qualify as best management practices (paints ,cleaning equipment etc) and are highlighted in the plan,do we need to provide cut sheets for the submission?
Jason Franken replied LEED Consultant, YRG sustainability Aug 17 2010
No, you are not required to provide any manufacturer documentation along with the finished Plan for SSc2, although you may do so if you would like to highlight that you are using compliant products at least 20% of the time.
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