[Equest-users] FW: LEED Review Comment - Exhaust Fans

Magda Lelek magda at andelmanlelek.com
Fri Jun 17 13:47:03 PDT 2011


Dear Pasha,

 

Regarding you criticism of the reviewer's comments about the electric heat
use in case of your project  - please note that he/she was correct.   Please
note that according to G3.1.3.2 (ASHRAE Appendix G) boilers shall be
"natural draft".  Your boiler type (forced draft) was incorrect.  Contrary
to your assertion the reviewer was correct and possibly merely trying to
enforce consistent standard and I actually applaud him/her for that.

 

Sincerely,

 

M. Magda Lelek, P.E., CEM

LEED Accredited Professional

Andelman and Lelek Engineering, Inc.

1408 Providence Highway

Norwood, MA 02062

781-769-8773 tel.

781-769-8944 fax

www.andelmanlelek.com

 

 

From: equest-users-bounces at lists.onebuilding.org
[mailto:equest-users-bounces at lists.onebuilding.org] On Behalf Of Pasha
Korber-Gonzalez
Sent: Friday, June 17, 2011 3:12 PM
To: Ömer Moltay
Cc: equest-users at lists.onebuilding.org
Subject: Re: [Equest-users] LEED Review Comment - Exhaust Fans

 

Omer---I have your reviewer also on one of my projects...I literally just
finished the 33 comments back to the reviwer only 6 hours ago.  I'm
exhausted and frustrated (hopefully I'm not alone in these feelings after
fighting with LEED & GBCI...)

 

I had the exact same comment, but I already had the exhaust fans in both the
baseline and proposed.   I was also told to break-out the fan energy which
was annoying to have to back-track on these tedious things, add an extra
meter, etc....  I also ran into the same issue of mis-match output results
and I could not track what was the cause of it.   I ended up explaining how
the discrepancy in energy is literally negligible in the whole building
picture of annual energy use.   Exhaust fans and motors are small--in the
sense of the ones they are refering too and to spend a whole hour fixing,
revising, and rewriting explanations in the hopes that I appease this
reviewer is EXHAUSTING and FRUSTRATING....also this change made virtually no
change or difference in my overall results comparison as my reviewer pointed
out that these fans are considered process loads and therefore are held
equal in both cases...UGH.    

 

Further more, it ultimately feels that GBCI and the LEED Reviwers are always
"out to get us"....What's going on with the LEED Comment discussion on
Assembly U-values being unacceptable???!!!    I have never had a LEED
reviewer comment about this modeling approach and I've completed LEED sims
from LEED version 1.0.     This is really starting to get to be tooo much of
a double standard for inconsistencies within the GBCI EAc1/EAp2 reviewers.
The amount of work that is required for the reporting is ridiculous.  Why do
the new forms make us simulators take time to transpose the Appendix D
climate characteristic data from 90.1 into the LEED template....

 

There doesn't seem to be much support or comfort when "working for" a LEED
reviewer and to TAKE THE CAKE....several comments in my LEED review were
unprofessional on thier part AND they are incorrect!   For example my LEED
reviewer takes the liberty to state:  "...  Table G3.1.1B indicates that the
heating type for system type 7 is hot water fossil fuel boiler only, so
there must not be any energy consumption for electric space heating. "...

 

The following was my response back to them where based on my 10+ yrs of
simulation & HVAC design experience warranted thier statement ignorant and
unprofessional in my opinion.   Statements like this from GBCI Reviewers are
insulting to experienced simulators (maybe to inexperienced simulators too?)
and only make the LEED Reviewers look inexperienced and
unknowledgable---which makes me question thier ability to adequately review
my energy models:

 

Response:   First off it is incorrect to state, "so there must not be any
energy consumption for electric space heating."  The order of magnitude is
small enough (equalling 0.4% of the total energy use in the whole building),
that the impact of this energy is more than negligible.  Thus indicating
that this electric energy usage is coming from something very small in
comparison to the over all building systems.  Second, looking at the output
summary document for the simulation tool the screen shot below shows that
"boiler draft fan electric use is included under SPACE HEATING, not PUMPS &
AUXILLARY EQUIPMENT."  Therefore the small amount of electric space heating
that is being reported is being accounted from the hot water boiler draft
fans.  

 

 

I tested the model where this energy was coming from and found that in the
boiler input window the efficiency is represented as an HIR value, and there
was a small default input for the EIR input associated with the equipment.
To appease the confusion of this small amount of electric energy that was
being reported I have zeroed-out the EIR input value that was causing the
results to be unacceptable to the LEED Reviwer.

---end of response comment----

 

 

I don't really want to use the term "enemy" but with these types of stupid
comments from LEED EAc1 reviewers they certainly feel like the enemy who's
goal is to work against the Simulation crusade to better our design industry
with these integrated design tools and skills.

 

HOW CAN WE REGARD GBCI & USGBC AS INDUSTRY 'GURUS' AND EXPERTS WHEN IDIOT
COMMENTS ARE COMING FROM THE SIMULATION REVIEWERS.    I certainly have lost
any amount of respect or comfort in the "expertise" of the GBCI & USGBC
organizations with regards to energy simulation for real life and for
compliance purposes.

 

 

Note to GBCI---you cannot apply a cookie-cutter approach to energy
simulation reviews, where there is literally NO cooking-cutter approach to
creating energy simulations.   The EAc1 review process needes to become more
dynamic and interactive, so at the very least you can let me educate your
reviewers since it is obvious they are not getting the proper training nor
does it seem they even have any simulation experience at all to do a
minimally adequate review of an energy model.   

 

It is my professional opinion that GBCI EAc1 Review Team is losing face
quickly amongst the greater populus of LEED simulators.   At this point in
time I'd sooner start consulting to my clients that doing the formal LEED
process will do nothing for them but waste more money and cause more stress
and headaches in the long run.   I'll certainly suggest that they apply the
"principals" and strategies of LEED but without the 'marketing-monopoly
hype' spewing from USGBC/GBCI lackies.

 

Furthermore as a LEED simulator and an Engineering Consultant there is ZERO
support from USGBC/GBCI in support of what reasonable simulation fees and
costs should be to comply with all of the ridiculous requirements that are
being mandated to be completed for EAc1.  Over the years of new LEED
versions, the amount of information detail being "required" by the reviewers
has increased at least 3-fold, however I've observed that energy simulation
fees have been at a stale-mate for the past 10 years and have had no
opportunity for growth--in fact it is more likely that simulation fees have
been continuously decreasing over the years while the LEED work reqirements
continue to increase.

 

The only thing that I get out of this LEED phenomena is more headaches...all
of my LEED projects are at a profit loss due to the amount of extra work
imposed on us by the LEED Comments and requirements of the reviewer (i.e. my
comment example above).   I spent an extra 45 minutes composing that
response and verifying that I WAS CORRECT, to prove to the LEED reviewer
that thier comment was completely false in how it applied to my project.  At
an average hourly simulation rate of $125/hour, this LEED comment cost me an
extra $94 of time that could have been legitimately spent working on another
model that will be useful for the client to use and help impose an industry
shift towards sustainable building design standards.

 

...Instead, this comment cost me an extra $94 out of my pocket to "argue"
with the LEED reviwer who virtually isn't even there or listening to
me....so in a sense I am also throwing more money towards USGBC inclusive of
the multi-thousand dollars that my client has already paid them.   DEAR
USGBC---please stop raping the industry for the money monopoly that you have
created.  The sense of GREED is oozing from everything that comes out of
USGBC/GBCI with a price tag on it or a cost associated with it.

 

(my profit loss is due to extra unforseen time expended to fulfull LEED
comment requirements beyond the fee that I had estimated to my client.) 

 

Pasha Korber-Gonzalez

Korber Energy Consultants

 <http://www.korberenergy.com/> www.korberenergy.com

 <mailto:pasha at korberenergy.com> pasha at korberenergy.com

Direct Ph:  308-763-1593

 

 

 

2011/6/16 Ömer Moltay <omoltay at mimtarch.com>

Dear Crina,

Thanks for the reply. I just added these exhaust fans to my baseline model.
The reviewer is also asking for a separate energy consumption calculation
for the exhaust fans. While trying to capture this through separate meters,
I just realized that the air volume exhausted through some of these
independent fans is variable in hourly reports even if I define them to be
constant volume. I am afraid that this will result in mismatching values for
energy consumption between the baseline and the proposed models.

1. What could be causing the air volume to be variable?
2. Is it a must that both the baseline and the proposed cases should display
exactly the same amount of energy consumption for these independant fan
systems?

Thank you, 



Omer Moltay, LEED AP BD+C, BREEAM Assessor Mimta Ltd.
Hekimsuyu Cad. 559. Sk. No:39
34255 Kucukkoy Istanbul Turkey
Tel: 90-212-617-2296
Fax: 90-212-617-2297
www.mimtarch.com <http://www.mimtarch.com/> 
www.mimtasolar.com <http://www.mimtasolar.com/> 
www.eko-yapi.net <http://www.eko-yapi.net/> 

Sürdürülebilir Binalar Blog
http://surdurulebilirbina.blogspot.com
<http://surdurulebilirbina.blogspot.com/> 

Green Building in Turkey on LinkedIn
http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=2278249




14.06.2011 00:04, Bosch, Crina yazmış:

Omer,

They are talking about independent fans like toilet exhaust or kitchen
exhaust. Those values that you have under EF-1 thru EF-9 need to be equal
between baseline and proposed model. So, if you have EF-1 at 300 cfm and 2KW
for that fan, you need to input the same values in baseline model. Those
fans are separate than the Exhaust from the AHU. I usually input them at
space level and the kw/cfm for those fans.
Hope this helps.

Crina Bosch
Engineer, Mechanical

karpinski
ENGINEERING
3135 Euclid Avenue
Cleveland, OH  44115
P  216.391.3700 ext 3087 <tel:216.391.3700%20ext%203087> 
F  216.391.0108
E  cbosch at karpinskieng.com
W www.karpinskieng.com <http://www.karpinskieng.com/>  





-----Original Message-----
From: Ömer Moltay [mailto:omoltay at mimtarch.com]
Sent: Monday, June 13, 2011 9:16 AM
To: equest-users at lists.onebuilding.org
Subject: [Equest-users] LEED Review Comment - Exhaust Fans

Dear All,

We have received the following from GBCI regarding the energy modelling
review:

"Table1.4.2 indicates that exhaust fan systems are reflected in the Proposed
model; however, the equipment capacities are inconsistent with the exhaust
fan systems (EF-1 through EF-9) as indicated in the mechanical schedules
provided for PI Form 4: Schedule and Overview Documents. In addition, the
independent fan systems of the HVAC systems in the actual design must be
modeled identically between the Proposed and Baseline models at actual
equipment capacities (fan volume and fan power) as required by Table G3.1.10
in the Proposed building column, since the fan design air flow rates and fan
power per Sections G3.1.2.8 and G3.1.2.9, respectively, only applies to
system types 1 through 8 in Table G3.1.1A.
Revise the
Proposed and Baseline models so all independentfan systems of the HVAC
systems are modeled identically between the Proposed and Baseline models. In
addition, separate the energy consumption and peak demand energy for
independent#fans in Table EAp2-4 and Table EAp2-5 of the prerequisite form.
Further,provide revised SV-A reports reflecting the changes"

Our proposed model has supply and exhaust fans (Supply: AHU, FCU -
Exhaust: AHU, independant exhaust fans). Our baseline model has supply and
relief fans (VAV System).

Please look at Section 6 of the attached Table 1.4.2. Are we expected to
additionally model exhaust fans in the baseline case? Do they mean exhaust
fans when they say "independent fan systems of the HVAC systems?".

Thanks for all replies,

Omer Moltay, LEED AP BD+C, BREEAM Assessor Mimta Ltd.
Hekimsuyu Cad. 559. Sk. No:39
34255 Kucukkoy Istanbul Turkey
Tel: 90-212-617-2296
Fax: 90-212-617-2297
www.mimtarch.com <http://www.mimtarch.com/> 
www.mimtasolar.com <http://www.mimtasolar.com/> 
www.eko-yapi.net <http://www.eko-yapi.net/> 

Sürdürülebilir Binalar Blog
http://surdurulebilirbina.blogspot.com
<http://surdurulebilirbina.blogspot.com/> 

Green Building in Turkey on LinkedIn
http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=2278249


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