reposted here from Safety & Buildings website:
Wisconsin Safety and Buildings Announcement
January 29, 2009
Subject: Reemphasis on commercial buildings general lighting plans and about submittal of emergency lighting plans.
General lighting and emergency lighting will receive more emphasis during commercial buildings plan reviews by Safety and Buildings Division staff effective March 2, 2009. The Wisconsin Commercial Building Code has included requirements for illumination and electrical energy efficiency since 1980.
S&B has been flexible over time about requesting submittal and approval of lighting design plans and calculations. At times division staff have asked for more lighting information than at other times. Whether submitted for review or not, lighting code compliance has been necessary. S&B will renew review of general lighting plans because of concerns that compliance with recent energy efficiency code changes has not been demonstrated.
In March of 2008, substantial emergency lighting and lighting energy efficiency changes occurred; some of the energy efficiency factors have become 30 - 40 percent more stringent. With our nation's and state's focus on building lifetime energy usage, the building lighting designs need to be clearly recognized as consequential.The specific aspect of plan review of emergency lighting plans, important to the safety of occupants and first responders, comes from field observations that some emergency lighting installations are not meeting code requirements. The fact that emergency lighting is often installed late in construction, even after partial occupancy of a building, may have led to less-than-necessary coordination of egress paths and emergency lighting design and installation.
Beginning March 2, 2009, submittal of general lighting plans and emergency lighting plans will be required by the Safety and Buildings Division for plan reviews for: - New buildings; - Additions to buildings;- Initial tenant build-outs within buildings for which initial plans were received on or after March 2.
For plans received on or after March 2, 2009, if S&B commercial building plan reviewers find general lighting and emergency lighting plans have not been submitted for review with the initial building plan review, the reviewers will contact the designer with the option of the designer providing lighting plans as part of the immediate review. If the designer chooses to not do so, the general lighting plan and emergency lighting plan can be submitted later, before installation, for separate plan review.
Fees for the plan reviews are not increased:- For general lighting or emergency lighting plans submitted with building or HVAC plans, there will be no additional fee. (Overall fee calculated per code, Comm 2.31.)
For lighting plans submitted separate from building or HVAC plans, the fee will be the current $75 revision plus the $100 submittal fee, a total of $175. (Per Comm 2.31(1)(f).)
For submittal of plans after construction, the standard late submittal fee of $250 will be assessed, as well as the $100 submittal fee, for a total of $350. (Per Comm 2.31(1)(d)6.)
See the S&B WebSite for general lighting and emergency lighting code and submittal information.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Environmentally Friendly Materials and Practices
A great definition of sustainable construction was presented by Professor David Bohnhoff at this year's Wisconsin Frame Builders Association conference during his discussion of "green" practices:
"Sustainable Construction meets present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs."
Prof. Bohnhoff also pointed out that, in almost every measure, when you look at the factors that go into making a building the most affordable it can be, you are also making the building the most environmentally friendly that it can be. This is a direct result of the fact that much of the cost that goes into a project reflects the recouping the costs of the embodied energy, or the energy required to produce, use, and dispose of the building at the end of its life. The less energy required, the lower the impact on the environment, and less energy also translates to lower cost. Post frame construction is a Win-Win-Win in this regard.
In another point of the discussion, minimizing the life cycle energy costs to condition our occupied spaces leads us to make our spaces as energy efficient as possible to start using less energy per unit of occupied space as soon as possible. This is basically a reason to perform construction sooner than later at any time as improvement in energy efficiency serves as a positive return on investment with constant energy costs, but that return rate would improve in a scenario of increasing energy prices.
So, if you're going to build a structure that uses less energy to condition, you should also look at minimizing the total material usage (embodied energy) that goes into the building. Some types of structures are not particularly efficient, including Timber-frame construction and even full log construction if the logs are harvested, debarked and shpaed on a site away from the buildnig site. The amount of material used can be minimized in our building shapes by looking at regular shaped buildings with good aspect ratios (length to width), not too square (inefficient for natural lighting and structural framing) yet not too narrow (inefficient for energy loss because of high exterior wall area per unit of floor area).
Post Frame construction is just one of many options for energy efficient and environmentally friendly construction although it is obvious that wood material is a replenishable resource (trees, switchgrass, corn: all are "biomass"). But even concrete can be made in more environmentally friendly today when the heat used to produce the concrete is recovered waste heat from other emission systems. This drastically lowers the embodied energy in concrete.
Professor Bohnhoff made some great points about why we should be very wary of mandated green building standards as we've seen over and over again that standards tend to stifle creativity and innovation, which is really what leads us to improvements in all areas of our society. The man-made impact on Global warming should be held in suspicion as many of the promoters of that theory are using more fear and less facts which seems to move towards mandated standards to combat such a large problem, regardless of the cost of implementing those standards.
In so many ways, there are reasons to be optimistic about the future of the built environment as the quality of materials improve, innovative use of energy continues, and intelligent choice of building design continues to get better.
"Sustainable Construction meets present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs."
Prof. Bohnhoff also pointed out that, in almost every measure, when you look at the factors that go into making a building the most affordable it can be, you are also making the building the most environmentally friendly that it can be. This is a direct result of the fact that much of the cost that goes into a project reflects the recouping the costs of the embodied energy, or the energy required to produce, use, and dispose of the building at the end of its life. The less energy required, the lower the impact on the environment, and less energy also translates to lower cost. Post frame construction is a Win-Win-Win in this regard.
In another point of the discussion, minimizing the life cycle energy costs to condition our occupied spaces leads us to make our spaces as energy efficient as possible to start using less energy per unit of occupied space as soon as possible. This is basically a reason to perform construction sooner than later at any time as improvement in energy efficiency serves as a positive return on investment with constant energy costs, but that return rate would improve in a scenario of increasing energy prices.
So, if you're going to build a structure that uses less energy to condition, you should also look at minimizing the total material usage (embodied energy) that goes into the building. Some types of structures are not particularly efficient, including Timber-frame construction and even full log construction if the logs are harvested, debarked and shpaed on a site away from the buildnig site. The amount of material used can be minimized in our building shapes by looking at regular shaped buildings with good aspect ratios (length to width), not too square (inefficient for natural lighting and structural framing) yet not too narrow (inefficient for energy loss because of high exterior wall area per unit of floor area).
Post Frame construction is just one of many options for energy efficient and environmentally friendly construction although it is obvious that wood material is a replenishable resource (trees, switchgrass, corn: all are "biomass"). But even concrete can be made in more environmentally friendly today when the heat used to produce the concrete is recovered waste heat from other emission systems. This drastically lowers the embodied energy in concrete.
Professor Bohnhoff made some great points about why we should be very wary of mandated green building standards as we've seen over and over again that standards tend to stifle creativity and innovation, which is really what leads us to improvements in all areas of our society. The man-made impact on Global warming should be held in suspicion as many of the promoters of that theory are using more fear and less facts which seems to move towards mandated standards to combat such a large problem, regardless of the cost of implementing those standards.
In so many ways, there are reasons to be optimistic about the future of the built environment as the quality of materials improve, innovative use of energy continues, and intelligent choice of building design continues to get better.
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