Western Kentucky University
OP-1: Building Operations and Maintenance

Institution owns and operates buildings that are:

1) Certified under the LEED® for Existing Buildings: Operations & Maintenance (O&M) Green Building Rating System,

and/or

2) Operated and maintained in accordance with sustainable operations and maintenance guidelines and policies that cover the following:

• Impacts on the surrounding site
• Energy consumption
• Usage of environmentally preferable materials
• Indoor environmental quality
• Water consumption

This credit applies to all institutions that have any “Eligible Building Space (Operations and Maintenance)."

Eligible Building Space (Operations and Maintenance) includes all building space that meets the following criteria. 

Eligible Building Space must meet the following “Minimum Program Requirements” of LEED for Existing Buildings: O&M.  An eligible building must:

• “[B]e designed for, constructed on, and operated on a permanent location on already existing land.  No building or space that is designed to move at any point in its lifetime” should be included. 
• “[I]nclude a minimum of 1,000 square feet (93 square meters) of gross floor area.”
• “[B]e in a state of typical physical occupancy, and all building systems must be operating at a capacity necessary to serve the current occupants, for […] at least the 12 continuous months immediately preceding the first submission.”

Buildings that do not meet these requirements and are therefore ineligible for LEED for Existing Buildings: O&M certification should be excluded from this credit. 

In addition, buildings that are not owned by the institution and in which the institution is one of multiple tenants may be excluded.  If the institution chooses to include such buildings, it must include all multi-tenant buildings that are included in the institution’s overall STARS boundary and in which the institution is a tenant; institutions cannot choose to include some leased spaces and omit others.  If an institution chooses to include leased spaces, the institution should count only the square footage of building space it occupies and not the entire building. 

Buildings that the institution leases entirely (i.e., the institution is the only tenant) should be included.   

Buildings that have registered for LEED for Existing Buildings: O&M but are not yet certified should not be counted as certified building space.  Institutions may exclude such buildings from their calculations for up to one year following LEED registration. 

Buildings that have been certified under a LEED Rating System that focuses on design and construction (e.g., LEED for New Construction and Major Renovations, LEED for Core & Shell, LEED for Commercial Interiors) may be excluded from the calculations for this credit for up to 5 years following the date of certification.

Institutions earn the maximum of 7 points for this credit by having all eligible building square footage be LEED for Existing Buildings: O&M Platinum certified.  Incremental points are available based on the percentage of floor area that is certified at each LEED level and/or maintained in accordance with sustainable operations and maintenance policies.  For example, an institution that had 100 percent of its floor area certified at the Certified level would earn 3.5 points for this credit, while an institution that had 50 percent of its floor area certified at the Certified level would earn 1.75 points.

Timeframe

Report on the current certification status of buildings at the time of STARS submission. 

Buildings for which certification has lapsed should not be counted as certified space.  Likewise, buildings for which certification is pending should not be counted as certified space; these buildings may be excluded from the calculations for this credit for up to one year following LEED registration.  Finally, buildings that have been certified under a LEED Rating System that focuses on design and construction (e.g., LEED for New Construction and Major Renovations, LEED for Core & Shell, LEED for Commercial Interiors) may be excluded from the calculations for this credit for up to 5 years following the date of certification.  These buildings should not be counted for this credit unless they have been certified under LEED for Existing Buildings: O&M. 

Sampling and Data Standards

Include all buildings that are part of the institution’s overall STARS institutional boundary when reporting for this credit. Reporting on a sample or subset of buildings is not allowed for this credit.