LEED Certification Tips
Do you think that getting LEED certification for your new senior facility is difficult and expensive? Well, with the new LEED for Homes category, it just got a great deal easier. At Pope Architects, we are currently working on a forty unit, low income, senior housing facility in the twin cities area. The initial contractor pricing bids came in below budget so the client wanted to look at LEED certification for the building. We have done an initial review of the building using the new Homes category of LEED version 3.0. This new category is directed at single family homes and low-rise multi-family buildings (three stories or less).
Our initial review placed us in the LEED Silver rating. Many of the points we obtained during this review are part of good building procedures that you may not see in a single family home but are standard practice in multi-family buildings. Examples would be storm water runoff management, material efficient framing (as in panelization) and proper outdoor air venting. We obtained several points by optimizing these methods which actually does not notably increase the construction cost. Points are also obtained by keeping individual living units smaller. Since this project is a HUD project, we already had smaller units so we didn’t need to make any changes to take advantage of those points.
We also made changes for LEED purposes. We gained several points by limiting sod and irrigation on the site. Most of the site will be planted in native prairie grasses. Points were also gained by using energy efficient windows, water heaters and appliances as well as water efficient plumbing fixtures. These products do increase the construction cost but also provide a return on investment by lowering energy costs. The two biggest construction cost increases came from using a concrete parking lot instead of asphalt and a geothermal heat pump system for heating and cooling. Both of these have returns on investment as the parking lot will be more durable and the energy use will be decreased by the heat pump system.
There are two caveats to the LEED for Homes category when it comes to senior facilities though. One is that it is limited to a maximum of three stories and the other is that you need to have a LEED Provider on the design team which will add to the design fees. Construction costs will go up for a LEED Platinum rating, but for lower ratings the increase would be minimal. In the case of the project above, we have added about ten percent to the construction cost but if we are awarded all the points that we anticipate, this project will receive a LEED Platinum rating. Any rating would be an excellent marketing tool for the client, but Platinum would certainly make this project stand out from the crowd.
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