LEED General Conditions

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Author Message Anonymous   Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 10:40 am:    Is there another version of A201 that is used for LEED projects - how is the Contractor bound to building a building that achieves the LEED certification in pursuit. George A. Everding, AIA, CSI, CCS, CCCA Senior Member Username: geverding Post Number: 304 Registered: 11-2004 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 10:54 am:    LEED requirements don't need to go in the General Conditions to bind the contractor to compliance. The Division 01 "Sustainable Design" section for the general requirements aspects of LEED, and information about LEED specific to and included in the individual technincal specification sections bind the contractor as well. Sheldon Wolfe Senior Member Username: sheldon_wolfe Post Number: 257 Registered: 01-2003 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 12:56 pm:    As long as people continue to "specify" goals and policies, rather than specific results, it will be hard to bind anyone to anything. Both the United Facilities Guide Specifications and the Whole Building Design Guide acknowledge the lack of enforceability of goals in user notes. If "sustainable design" criteria are specified in the same manner as other project requirements - as they should be, the contractor has the same responsibility as for all other specified requirements. But when specifications contain phrases such as "The intent is to...", "The Owner wishes to…", or "...the Contractor shall endeavor to...", contractors are free to do whatever they believe is needed. Anne Whitacre, FCSI CCS Senior Member Username: awhitacre Post Number: 530 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 01:55 pm:    because the LEED rating is bestowed by a third party (the USGBC) it would be impossible to "bind" the contractor to achieve a LEED rating. He can "endeavor" but cannot guarantee that rating; which is the same condition that the architect faces. the criteria are constantly changing and the USGBC has no legal authority or responsibility with regard to any building other than their own. George A. Everding, AIA, CSI, CCS, CCCA Senior Member Username: geverding Post Number: 305 Registered: 11-2004 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 02:24 pm:    I may have misunderstood the intent of the original question. If asking how does the owner require that the contractor achieve a LEED rating, I agree that our documents cannot do that. But certainly we can require that the contractor provide certified wood, low VOCs, and other individual elements of the work. We can also, in Division 01, require that the contractor provide specific documentation. The important distinction is that we can specify "requirements" (which bind the contractor), but not "goals" (which don't). Another important thing: many people mistakenly believe the specifications are the determining factor in making a project LEED certified. And certainly there are major green elements in the specs, but specs say nothing about site selection, for example. They only contribute to, but do not determine, the energy efficiency of a building. Thanks to J. Peter Jordan for this insight, part of a seminar he gave to our combined CSI/AIA meeting last night. Peter also made the statement that you could probably get a LEED certification without any specification "green" (meaning the materials), short of the prerequisites. I bet you could. Ralph Liebing, RA, CSI Senior Member Username: rliebing Post Number: 596 Registered: 02-2003 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 02:31 pm:    Any body read, analyzed, disected and care to comment on the intent, content, and use of MasterSpec Section 018113 as the rudimental basis for a green project specification? Appears this could be edited into a Section much as described by Mr. Wolfe, and both made part of the project and enforcible. Anonymous   Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 02:41 pm:    OK, lets say a gold LEED certification is the goal - what if upon completion of construction, USGBC does not agree and awards a silver - who is responsible - does the contractor share in the blame - can the Owner refuse final payment because of this? George A. Everding, AIA, CSI, CCS, CCCA Senior Member Username: geverding Post Number: 306 Registered: 11-2004 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 02:52 pm:    I think there was another thread on here about who is responsible if it fails; that's the thorny part of the question. But regarding the contractor it is more clear cut: if the contract requires specific performance and the contractor does not deliver that performance, then it is non-conforming work and the owner has specific remedies under A201. For example, take the Salvaged and Refurbished Article in the MasterSpec section Ralph mentioned: A. Credit MR 3.1[ and Credit MR 3.2]: Provide salvaged or refurbished materials for [5] [10] percent of building materials (by cost). The following materials may be salvaged or refurbished materials: 1. <Insert list of materials>. If we have done our diligence as designers and given the contractor a sufficient shopping list of materials that may be salvaged or refurbished, and the contractor does not comply with the appropriate % requirement, then I would suggest he has not lived up to his contract and it is non-conforming work. It seems to me that this is a performance requirement, just like making sure the HVAC system delivers the right temperature, volume and pressure. George A. Everding, AIA, CSI, CCS, CCCA Senior Member Username: geverding Post Number: 307 Registered: 11-2004 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 02:53 pm:    Notice the Masterspec language is a requirement, not a goal. Ralph Liebing, RA, CSI Senior Member Username: rliebing Post Number: 597 Registered: 02-2003 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 02:56 pm:    Good questions that I truly have not resolved at this point. Maybe this is why Ross Speigel in the seminar he presented a couple of yeras ago, noted that it can cost $20,000 to $30,000 in added fee to go through a green project to take care of all the admin work-- and he also suggested [as have others] that for a green project, the owner is well advised to engage a firm that concentrates of LEED projects and documetation [in addition to the design and construction contracts] Anne Whitacre, FCSI CCS Senior Member Username: awhitacre Post Number: 531 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 03:14 pm:    Ralph: the basis of the Masterspec section was originally a ZGF section that we generated for our own use. the responsibility for compliance is a General Contractor issue, but on more and more of the projects I worked on, we were putting those requirements also in the spec sections because the general wanted to push the compliance to the subs. the cost for LEED silver at ZGF was typically running an additional 3% of construction cost and a MINIMUM of $35,000 in administrative time. The contractors on our LEED projects estimated a full time staff member for 75% of the project (or 75% FTE) on their side for administrative costs. we were starting to see a number of owners who were opting to not do LEED because the paperwork was a substantial cost and did not directly benefit the project. Many of the LEED projects only paid for themselves because the owner got a grant to cover the additional fees -- in Seattle there is a lot of "encouragement" for building owners to comply with LEED silver. As for enforcing compliance: good luck. the percentage of available salvaged or recycled content is not always under the contractor's control --- since it is entirely dependent on the market conditions. As an example, the use of fly ash in concrete mixes was applauded originally because it was a waste material, there were stacks of it, and it was cheap. Now its being specified so much that availability is sketchy in some markets, and the cost has gone up. Certified wood, for example is in such short supply that owners typically have to pay for and "reserve" the wood a year in advance. I am waiting for the first LEED-related lawsuit regarding inability to achieve a rating. this system was not designed for every building and every owner in the country to comply, its simply not that across the board applicable. I've done a bunch of LEED projects. The contractor can agree to attempt a LEED rating, but I don't know of one who will sign a contract that guarantees that the owner will achieve the rating they desire. (and I know no design office that will guarantee compliance) the best strategy is to overshoot the points (say, if you need 35 points, make sure you have a possible of 45 in your project) and hope for the best. And yes, you can EASILY get a silver rating and never even both with the architectural materials as long as you don't exceed the required preliminary stuff. Site design, mechanical/electrical/ transportation issues will get you a silver for the moment. Keep in mind that USGBC intends that the higher ratings (Gold and platinum) be ever-changing because the intent is to push the envelope. William C. Pegues, FCSI, CCS Senior Member Username: wpegues Post Number: 661 Registered: 10-2002 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 03:14 pm:    Ralph, Though it may well be nice to have a full service firm do this, there are also many well qualified consultants who do nothing but the LEED related work - beginning in design/CDs, commenting on specification requirements (not goals) and then doing all the documentation. Internally, we would prefer not to do all that document collection and refer the Owner to well performing LEED consultants we have worked with. Projects have gone smoothly and met their goals through the specified requirements and other elements of design. An additional point that I also put in my division 1 is related entirely to submittals of LEED related documentation. I specify that the contractor not only create a separate transmittal for the material, but that each transmittal be visually marked as a LEED submittal, and that they also be separately packaged so that if it does not go to the LEED consultant directly but comes to us (or someone else) the material is in a separate package that also is visually marked as a LEED submittal. Even if you are doing the LEED work in-house, the last thing you need is to get it jumbled up so that you have to look at it for a few minutes to figure out if it is a regular submittal or a LEED submittal. And if it is by someone separate, we don't need to consume our CA fees sorting the information for them. We have seen a number of projects go very smoothly using a good consultant for LEED. I think it is a not serving the LEED professionals or the architectural professionals to even suggest that it needs to be a firm that concentrates on LEED in addition to design and construction contracts. Afterall, structural and MEP services are far more important than LEED to the success of a project and there are very many architects that engage consultants in this effort. William Ralph Liebing, RA, CSI Senior Member Username: rliebing Post Number: 598 Registered: 02-2003 Posted on Friday, April 20, 2007 - 03:44 pm:    Thanks, folks-- being the designated lightening rod is getting to be as enjoyable as when I stop beating myself on the head with a hammer! Being dumb used to be an advantage-- in some cases! Or was I vindicated by Ms. Whitacre and Mr. Peuges? Jerome J. Lazar, RA, CCS, CSI, SCIP Senior Member Username: lazarcitec Post Number: 367 Registered: 05-2003 Posted on Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 02:44 pm:    William, if the Architect is not supposed to review MSDS submittals, what happens in the case of LEED submittals - does not Leed submittals include MSDS? James M. Sandoz, RA, CSI, CDT, LEED AP Senior Member Username: jsandoz Post Number: 10 Registered: 06-2005 Posted on Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 04:39 pm:    Jerome, that is exactly why LEED submittals should be sent to the LEED consultant. The architect wants to stay as far away as possible from MSDS (unless he or she has a PhD in chemistry ;-). There is too much liability in "reviewing" information that may indicate a hazardous condition, potential or real. I understand that USGBC is moving away from requiring submittal of MSDS anyway. David Axt, AIA, CCS, CSI Senior Member Username: david_axt Post Number: 853 Registered: 03-2002 Posted on Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 05:17 pm:    James, Agreed. Unless you are a licensed industrial hygienist, you should not be reviewing MSDS sheets. James M. Sandoz, RA, CSI, CDT, LEED AP Senior Member Username: jsandoz Post Number: 11 Registered: 06-2005 Posted on Friday, April 27, 2007 - 01:43 pm:    David, thank you for stating it more accurately. I was, of course, being facetious when I wrote "PhD in chemistry." A licensed industrial hygienist is the one best qualified to review material safety data sheets. By the way, thanks also for spelling "hygienist" correctly. Dan Georgescu, CSI, CDT (Unregistered Guest) Unregistered guest Posted on Tuesday, May 22, 2007 - 12:08 pm:    What about the Supplementary Conditions? I did not see any comment on this section of the specs. Some language could be added to the this section that would constitute a requirement specific to this project. The Owner has to review these additions and be comfortable with the content. Anne Whitacre, FCSI CCS Senior Member Username: awhitacre Post Number: 554 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Tuesday, May 22, 2007 - 12:38 pm:    we have language in our supplementary conditions that the Contractor must "endeavor" to achieve the LEED rating as desired by the Owner. You simply can't "require" that the contractor meet a LEED rating. its out of your (and the owner's ) control, ultimately. in response to the other comment about the MSDS sheets -- when my former office was the LEED consultant, we required the contractor to compile the MSDS sheets as part of the LEED submittal and asked for a listing of them to verify completeness, but did not review the sheets themselves for all the reasons given above. Chris Grimm, CSI, CCS, MAI, RLA Senior Member Username: tsugaguy Post Number: 77 Registered: 06-2005 Posted on Tuesday, May 22, 2007 - 01:17 pm:    The problem is there are a million and one different combinations of sustainable design strategies, products, and practices which can contribute to achieving one of the various levels of LEED certification. Each strategy has its own unique costs and benefits, and they need to be carefully weighed out for each unique project. And neither party to the construction Contract has control over all of them, nor does the Architect. This cannot be fully resolved by using a "sustainable" version of the General Conditions, nor by amending one using a carefully written Supplementary Conditions. Even with a perfectly written 018113 and all the LEED submittals you can think of in each of the technical Sections, it is still not possible to know that everything will go as planned. There are still so many blanks that only the Contractor's methods & means (e.g. construction waste management), or in some cases the Owner (e.g. commissioning), have actual day-to-day control over, that from the standpoint of the Architect's services it is unadvisable to call it anything more than a goal to achieve a certain level of LEED certification. It does not seem realistic either to put the entire burden of achieving a certain LEED certification level on the Contractor. Design using a well-planned strategy, coordinated with all your consultants (especially mechanical); make sure Owner knows to do the independent commissioning review sooner than they'd think, and do it for each phase of design; use the checklist and plan for all the LEED points you need for the level sought, plus several more; require documentation on a frequent basis; have plenty of CA budgeted, check it thoroughly and monitor the progress; but don't ever promise the Owner a certification level, and be careful to avoid marketing that could be construed as an implied warranty. Sustainable projects can be so unique that the requirements really need to be addressed throughout the documents rather than a catch-all somewhere around the A201. And the Owner really ought to review more than just the Supplementary Conditions, especially for a LEED project. All of Division 01 would be good as well, and why stop there, the products Part of every Section is great reading material. After all, it is really their building, and sustainable design ought not to be business as usual, for the Owner or anyone. That is the whole premise of doing a LEED project, doing things differently to reverse the negative environmental impact of doing things the way it has always been done. Anonymous   Posted on Tuesday, May 22, 2007 - 05:30 pm:    The AIA B214 covers LEED services, but it does not replace the A201. It is in addition to it. It is representative of how the AIA views what an architects responsibility should be in the delivery of a LEED rating.