Council reviews energy ordinance

By

• Jessica Lee

December 03, 2012

The ordinance would require buildings to report their energy use.

The Minneapolis City Council is reviewing a proposed ordinance that would require large commercial buildings to report energy use.

The proposal, headed by Councilwoman Elizabeth Glidden, follows a trend in major cities to drive down energy emissions and create new green jobs.

“We looked at what other cities were developing around the country, and we recognized that Minneapolis has a role to play in bettering the environment,” Glidden said. “It’s our job to make measures around that.”

The policy would make it mandatory for all owners of commercial buildings larger than 50,000 square feet to submit the building’s energy use, which would be calculated and scored by a government-backed program. The ratings would then be posted online for the public to see.

Building owners in San Francisco, where a similar action was implemented last year, were initially worried that a poor public rating would harm their business, Glidden said, “but they are finding out that isn’t really the case.”

“There are a lot of things building tenants have on their mind,” said project coordinator Brendon Slotterback. “I think energy usage is just one thing on a really long list, and we are pretty confident that this isn’t going to have a dramatic impact on lowering business.”

University of Minnesota aerospace engineering sophomore Thomas Georgiou said building owners should look at “the bigger picture” instead of worrying about whether or not the ratings would hurt their sales.

“Profits in business is important, but even more important is the well-being and future of the planet,” said Georgiou, treasurer for The Green Group, a University student organization that promotes sustainability.

Glidden said that in the cities the council looked at — San Francisco, New York and Chicago — building owners didn’t think negative ratings had a significant impact on their business.

“Even though property owners might be concerned about the ratings being disclosed, I think this is a step for Minnesota moving in a greener direction,” said Devan Grimsrud, journalism sophomore and vice president of The Green Group.

The building’s utility submissions would go through Energy Star, a government-backed program, and the city would publish its ratings on a scale of 1 to 100.

“The ordinance doesn’t require any action after they have benchmarked their use and reported it to the city,” Slotterback said. “We think that just the action of benchmarking, kind of figuring out their usage, will help some business owners understand their energy use a little better, and that might result in some actions.”

Besides looking to improve the environment, the project aims to stimulate the city’s economy by creating jobs in the sustainability field.

Ron Pilkington’s job in San Francisco, for example, is dedicated to ensuring building owners keep up with city ordinances.

“San Francisco certainly encourages green buildings without a question,” said Pilkington, air quality inspector for the Bay Area Air Quality Management District. “I’m from a different perspective, though — it’s my job.”

Glidden said she aggressively promotes sustainability efforts, like the proposed ordinance, so the city can reach its goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions. In 2012, the city set a goal to cut emissions by 15 percent by 2015.

“We know the City of Minneapolis’ large commercial buildings contribute a lot of greenhouse gases and have an impact on the environment,” Glidden said. “There is more that can be done to make those buildings green or energy efficient.”

The ordinance will get its first public hearing in January. The policy, if passed, would apply to 551 commercial buildings larger than 50,000 square feet and all city-owned buildings bigger than 25,000 square feet, Slotterback said.

The official list of the buildings this ordinance would affect is not finalized.

http://www.mndaily.com/2012/12/03/council-reviews-energy-ordinance

Building energy use still takes big part

By Du Juan ( chinadaily.com.cn )

Updated: 2012-12-03

The building construction sector still plays a big role in China's energy consumption mixture as the country continues to make efforts to achieve its urbanization target, said a government official on Monday.

"The energy issues are hard to solve during the country's urbanization process," said Han Aixin, deputy director-general of the buildings department for science and technology and energy saving at the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development during the 2012 China Planning Network Annual Conference.

According to figures from the ministry, at present, building energy consumption accounts for about one-third of the total social energy consumption in the country. The other two big consumers are industry and transportation.

He said the ubiquitos energy network - a network combining energy supply, information communication and electricity trading - will be the way to solve urban energy problems.

ENN Group, a private Hong Kong-listed Chinese energy company, has established an eco-community in Qingdao, Shandong province, applying the ubiquitous energy network.

"The network helps community residents adjust their energy consuming behavior to save energy day by day," said Gan Yongqing, vice-chairman of ENN. "The network can also be applied in the industrial sectors."

However, Han said more should be done to calculate experiences with the network.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/m/qingdao/2012-12/03/content_15980403.htm

Cooper Union so green it's platinum

Newest building at the school that helped give Thomas Edison his engineering chops is a winner in cutting energy use; conservation on a tight budget. 

By Brian Chappatta

Mario Morgado, courtesy of Cooper Union

Cooper Union, in the East Village

In an ironic twist of fate, The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, the school that helped teach Thomas Edison the skills he used to harness and transmit vast amounts of energy more than a century ago, is now officially among the leaders in reducing its use.

The East Village-based school's new building at 41 Cooper Square has become the city's first academic structure to earn the U.S. Green Building Council's highest honor: LEED Platinum certification.

The nine-story, 175,000-square-foot, full-block facility was designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Thom Mayne of Morphosis Architecture and the firm of Gruzen Samton. It is one of three academic buildings in the state to receive platinum status, and one of only 38 LEED Platinum higher education and campus projects worldwide, according to U.S. Green Building Council data.

As part of PlaNYC 2030, announced in 2006, Cooper Union became one of a handful of academic institutions to promise Mayor Michael Bloomberg to reduce its carbon footprint. Cooper Union pledged a 30% decrease by 2017. With seven years to go to that date, Cooper Union President George Campbell said his school currently exceeds that goal by 10%.

“We felt that it was our responsibility to make a building that was friendly to the environment,” said Mr. Campbell, who holds a Ph.D. in theoretical physics. “It reflected our value system.”

In addition to being good for the environment, the new building also will be good for Cooper Union's bottom line, Mr. Campbell said. For openers, he said that the school had been determined to avoid any “outrageous” costs that might be associated with producing a greener building. In the end, he said, only about $1.5 million of the $150 million total development cost of the building went toward extra green features. Those lower costs will mean shorter pay-back periods.

A comprehensive analysis of the Cooper Union's co-generation plant, for instance, showed it would pay for itself in five to seven years by yielding major reductions in energy use.

“When you become 40% more efficient, you reduce energy costs by 40%,” Mr. Campbell said.

Mario Morgado, courtesy of Cooper Union

Interior of Cooper Union, in the East Village.

The LEED ranking is based off of five measures: sustainable sites, water efficiency, energy and atmosphere, materials and resources, and indoor environmental quality. Each structure earns points based on its performance in each of these categories, with platinum-level sites “going above and beyond,” said Ashley Katz, spokeswoman for the U.S. Green Building Council.

The Cooper Union Building excelled in water quality, earning five out of five points, Ms. Katz said. It also netted 39 out of a possible 46 points in the sustainable sites, energy and atmosphere, and indoor environmental quality categories. The main weakness came in materials and resources—the Cooper Union Building got just six of 13 points.

“The rating system is designed to be holistic; it's not based on one category,” Ms. Katz said. “It's looking at the building in a variety of different ways. Some places are going to strategize based on their strengths.”

Among other green features, the building reuses water from its green roof to help fuel its low-flow plumbing devices for a total savings of more than 600,000 gallons of water per year. The deck surface of the roof has a layer of low-maintenance plantings, which acts to help in “rainwater harvesting.”

The building's most visible green feature is its semi-transparent mesh screen that coats its windows, helping to regulate temperatures during the summer and winter and minimize use of air conditioning and heating.

“We've shown that it can be done with effective design and effective use of materials,” Mr. Campbell said. “We hope that others will take heed of this and build their future buildings accordingly.”

http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20101014/REAL_ESTATE/101019929

 

 Back to Article

Mayor introduces ecofriendly bill

John Coté, Michael Cabanatuan, Rachel Gordon

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

San Francisco already has some of the nation's toughest green building standards for new construction. On Tuesday, Mayor Gavin Newsom introduced legislation aimed at making existing commercial buildings as ecofriendly as possible.

The legislation submitted to the Board of Supervisors would require the owners of large commercial buildings to conduct an energy-efficiency audit every five years and to supply annual updates - all of which would be available in a public database.

The audits would include a list of steps that would improve energy efficiency, like installing solar panels or sealing windows better, Newsom said. The reports would also include an estimate of energy savings from those steps, the cost of implementing them and their economic value. Property owners would have to supply that information to tenants.
Newsom likened the audits to fuel-efficiency ratings listed on cars at an auto dealership.

"Not everyone loves it, but I think it will be among the most aggressive standards I know of in any city in America," Newsom said. Similar programs exist in Berkeley, Sonoma County, Palm Desert (Riverside County) and Boulder, Colo.

The local branch of the Building Owners and Managers Association, a commercial real estate industry advocacy group, supports the legislation, though there are still skeptics in the business community, the mayor said.

There are exemptions for buildings less than 5 years old, those with Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design certification and others.

If approved, the legislation would set a staggered, three-year schedule for compliance, starting in April.
- John Coté

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/08/11/BA5I1ES12J.DTL

Wall Street Journal

16 August 2010

Empire State Building Goes Green, One Window at a Time

Maya Pope-Chappell for The Wall Street Journal

A fifth floor space inside the Empire State Building has been transformed into a cramped window-making workshop.

By David Roth

How does a Depression-era skyscraper go green? For the Empire State Building, which is in the middle of $550 million renovation that includes about $100 million in energy-efficient upgrades, all 6,514 windows must be replaced. And that’s no easy task.

As The Journal’s Anton Troianovski reports, the greening of the iconic 79-year-old tower has become a platform for Anthony Malkin, the real-estate scion who runs the building, to criticize as insufficient popular programs for assessing the environmental sustainability of buildings. If the world follows the U.S. lead on energy use, he told the audience at a real-estate panel earlier this summer, “We’re all going to die and we’ll go to war along the way.”

For the Empire State Building’s windows, Malkin brought in Serious Materials to handle a pane-by-pane upgrade. The Silicon Valley-based building materials company is transforming the old, inefficient windows into “super-insulating” units, a sort of glass sandwich that combines the existing panes with a mixture of inert gases and film. The finished product is a window anywhere from 250% to 400% more efficient than the windows they replace, according to the company.

“Dirty little secret: double-pane windows aren’t all that efficient,” says Serious Materials CEO Kevin Surace.

The replacement windows, which use what Surace calls a “suspended film system,” break up the convection current between the inside and outside of a building. That means less heat sneaks in through the windows on hot days when the air-conditioning is running, and warm air from inside has a harder time leaking out when it’s cold outside.

The team of workers tasked with the window upgrade spend their days removing, cleaning and re-fabricating the building’s 12-year-old double-pane windows. The process, which began in March and is expected to run until October, is projected to reduce solar heat gain by more than half and save $400,000 each year in energy costs.

The window work is being done on site, in an office-turned-workshop on the Empire State Building’s fifth floor. Malkin estimates that keeping the process in-house saves $2,300 per window. The Serious Materials workspace buzzes between 7 a.m. and 2 a.m., processing 75 windows per day in a space roughly the size of a Manhattan apartment. The room is so snug that engineers for the project had to shrink some of their equipment to fit in the space.

Keeping the workshop on site ensures the windows are out of their frames for just about 20 hours before the upgraded window is ready. The process is designed to keep waste at a minimum: just 4% of the building’s existing windows are being discarded, and only the gasket surrounding the original windows winds up in the trash.

Workers remove the windows from office spaces at night and bring them downstairs to the workshop. Once there, the windows are removed from their frames and peeled apart like Oreo cookies before being cleaned. The first cleaning is manual, using razor blades and pumices, followed by a wash with a chemical solution and finally water.

The deconstructed windows are then fitted with new steel spacers, treated with a metallized film and baked flat in an oven at 205 degrees. The windows are then sealed with a mixture of Kyrpton and Argon gas. Finally, the upgraded windows are put back — with the help of careful but firm malleting — into their original aluminum frames.

The on-site re-use and refabrication of the Empire State Building’s windows is unprecedented on a project of this size. But Paul Rode, the project executive from Johnson Controls Inc. who is overseeing the retrofit, believes it could become a popular model in the industry. “I’m never waiting for product. If a problem ever comes up, we don’t have to call someplace that’s 500 miles away,” he says. “Logistically, that’s just what you want in the construction business.”

Regional Study of Green Buildings First of Its Kind to Study Post Occupancy
Results of LEED Buildings in Illinois



CHICAGO, Oct. 26 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Illinois has been an early leader
in green building construction, currently ranking sixth in the number of
Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) buildings built, with the
City of Chicago itself having more LEED(R) certified buildings than any other
city in the country. This leadership continues with release of a report from
the U.S. Green Building Council - Chicago Chapter (USGBC - Chicago) that
provides a first look at post-occupancy performance of LEED buildings on a
local scale.

The Regional Green Building Case Study Project: a Post-Occupancy Study of LEED
Projects in Illinois report summarizes the first year of a multi-year study to
analyze the post-occupancy benefits of 25 LEED(R) certified projects in
Illinois related to: energy use, greenhouse gas emissions, water use,
construction and operating costs, cost of building green, health and
productivity impacts, and occupant comfort. The study was funded by the Grand
Victoria Foundation and is a collaborative endeavor between the USGBC?Chicago,
U.S. EPA Region 5, the City of Chicago, Delta Institute, and the Center for
Neighborhood Technology, which was the lead researcher for the project.

The study found that sustainability does not stop with building design and
construction. While a building may be
designed to be sustainable, it is often ongoing operational issues that affect
the amount of energy, water, and other resources it consumes. Accordingly,
ongoing performance evaluation is a key component of long-term sustainability.

"Sustainability must be integrated into ongoing operations and maintenance
practices," says Kathy Tholin, CEO of the Center for Neighborhood Technology,
whose Chicago LEED Platinum building was a part of the study. "Constructing to
LEED(R) Platinum was a natural choice given CNT's long-standing commitment to
sustainable development," explains Tholin. "But our job is far from complete.
Now that we're utilizing the space, sustainability means focusing on ongoing
operations and maintenance. We're striving for continuous improvement."

The U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental
Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System is the nationally accepted
benchmark for the design, construction, and operation of high performance
green buildings. LEED provides a roadmap for measuring and documenting success
for every building type and phase of a building lifecycle.

Doug Widener, Executive Director of the U.S. Green Building Council - Chicago
Chapter emphasizes that "with an understanding of operational issues, tenant
behavior, and maintenance practices, building owners and managers can
implement ongoing changes that lead to increased building performance and
sustainability over time." Mr. Widener adds that "this report is an important
step towards achieving our mission of leading the regional transformation of
the built environment to become ecologically sustainable, profitable, and
healthy."

The report compliments the U.S. Green Building Council's recently launched
Building Performance Initiative. Beginning this fall, it will analyze energy
and other resource use data from LEED buildings and provide this data back to
building owners to allow for ongoing sustainability improvements over time. 

The study also found that resource use varies in LEED buildings. Many
participating projects performed better than conventional commercial interiors
and buildings, with projects that focused on energy conservation as a part of
their LEED strategy performing better in relation to energy use and
conservation than projects that focused on other areas of sustainability.
Given that LEED is a multifaceted system that rates a building's
sustainability on a variety of factors (including site, water efficiency,
energy efficiency, materials and resources, and indoor environmental quality),
projects that focused on energy conservation performed better in this area
than projects that did not. All buildings in the first year of the study were
certified under older versions of LEED. Newer versions of the rating system
mandate, as well as incent, higher levels of energy efficiency. 

The results of occupant comfort in surveyed projects were very high,
especially related to indoor air quality and lighting. The study also found
that construction costs varied greatly, as do construction costs of
conventional buildings, and that these are largely driven by programmatic
issues. The average premium reported for building green was 3.8 percent; in
line with the national average.

For the second year of the study, 25 additional Illinois LEED projects will be
added to its sample for a total of 50. "We are excited by this initial year of
the study, but are even more excited for the second year when we will add
buildings certified under newer versions of LEED to see if these newer LEED
buildings perform better," notes Widener. "We are also collecting a second
year of data for our first year projects. It will be interesting to see if
operational changes made as a result of the study will result in improved
efficiencies in these buildings."

For the full report and case studies please visit the Chapter web site at:
www.usgbc-chicago.org.

http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS171154+26-Oct-2009+PRN20091026

prweb.com

New York City's New Green Workforce Duo

Envirolution's Win-Win Campaign and CleanEdison Announce Partnership for NYC's Emerging Green Economy. Two New York City Agencies, Manhattan Borough President's Office and New York Department of Small Business Services, Deliver Big Apple Green Collar Jobs Training Programs.

New York, NY (PRWEB) August 13, 2009 -- Two city-endorsed leaders in green workforce training - Envirolution, a New York-based sustainability consulting and green workforce training non-profit and CleanEdison, a national green building consulting and education provider, - today announced a partnership to produce the most qualified green collar jobs candidates in New York City, those who possess both field experience and training for accredited certifications.

The combination of mentored field experience and formal certification training provides a huge advantage to green job hunters

With CleanEdison's comprehensive training in LEED and BPI certifications, we're giving our interns every chance at a leg up in New York's emerging green economy.

Right now, I can't just train the best and the brightest, I need to hire them too. Green industry jobs are playing a crucial role in our nation's economic recovery

I'm eager to review Win-Win's latest grads. They have a great track record with us, as well as with the city.

"The combination of mentored field experience and formal certification training provides a huge advantage to green job hunters," said Janna Olson, executive director of Envirolution's Win-Win Campaign. "With CleanEdison's comprehensive training in LEED and BPI certifications, we're giving our interns every chance at a leg up in New York's emerging green economy."

On August 10, the highest ranking interns among Enivrolution's young adult-led energy efficiency campaign kick-off the CleanEdison partnership by taking sponsored seats in the nationwide green certification trainers three-day course.

The 12 Win-Win Campaign interns are concluding a summer of hands-on energy efficiency analysis provided to New York City's local small business communities. Their CleanEdison-sponsored workshops in Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) and Building Performance Institute (BPI) training and test preparation will help prepare them to enter the workforce armed with the appropriate credentials.

"Right now, I can't just train the best and the brightest, I need to hire them too. Green industry jobs are playing a crucial role in our nation's economic recovery," Avi Yashchin, CEO and founder of CleanEdison said. "I'm eager to review Win-Win's latest grads. They have a great track record with us, as well as with the city."

With its city council poised to adopt mandatory energy efficiency benchmarking in the form of four local building code laws called the Greener, Greater Buildings legislation, New York will follow the new benchmarking trend already passed into law in Washington D.C. and the state of California. The city's goal is to get commercial buildings on an "energy diet" by making their monitored energy consumption data publicly available, as a driver in the real estate leasing market.

Win-Win's Spring 2009 pilot semester recruited 15 students as green workforce trainees ranging in age from 17 to26. These selected interns engaged in the energy mapping of 1,160 businesses in a 55 square block assessment zone in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Of those businesses, 126 were selected for outreach and 36 of the small business owners elected to receive Energy Efficiency Assessments from Win-Win.

Through reporting submitted by Con Edison's Targeted Demand Side Management program, Win-Win removed 25.68 metric tons of carbon per year as a direct result of energy efficiency upgrades undertaken through the program's recommended statewide incentive. Of the 36 small businesses assessed, the total potential carbon-reduction is 597.4 metric tons. And Win-Win's ongoing project management training will provide assistance to those businesses eager to engage incentive upgrade programs with the Fall campaign session.

The Manhattan Borough President's Office endorsed the Win-Win Campaign upon completion of its pilot session and includes Envirolution as a partner in Scott Stinger's Go Green initiative.

In July of 2009, CleanEdison was awarded a significant grant from the NYC Department of Small Business Services to implement green training in the corporate sector. CleanEdison's success in hiring experienced Win-Win graduates for its growing business was the impetus for the partnership between these two organizations. Additionally, all of CleanEdison's courses are approved by many CEU organizations including American Institute of Architects (AIA), Building Owners & Managers Institute International (BOMI), Building Performance Institute (BPI), International Facilities Managers Association (IFMA), and National Council of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying (NCEES).

As part of their training, Envirolution's Win-Win community energy analysts have already attained experience in administering energy audits and providing project management of cost-saving solution programs for small businesses in the Lower East Side. Emerging to compete in the job market prepared by CleanEdison's certification training will provide the accreditation these interns need to build a professional green workforce in New York City.

Envirolution (envirolution.org) - the managing non-profit of the Win-Win Campaign - is a 501 (c)(3) Sustainability think & do tank located on New York's Lower East Side. The organization is dedicated to providing young adults from diverse communities with green career development opportunities through sustainability education, civic engagement and job training programs. Envirolution was founded in 2007 by recent Yale graduates, Alex Gamboa, Executive Director, and Antuan Cannon, Developmental Director, to provide sustainability consulting and to build programs that have positive environmental, economic, and social impacts.

Win-Win Campaign (winwin.envirolution.org [winwin.envirolution.org) is a green workforce and small business economic development initiative that empowers young adults to be the drivers of sustainable change in their communities while gaining the real world, new economy skills necessary to obtain green jobs in the future. Through training, mentoring and fieldwork, participants become Community Energy Analysts (CEAs) who provide access to affordable, measurable environmental and financial benefits, through energy efficiency assessments for small businesses and other institutions in their neighborhoods. Win-Win is endorsed by the Manhattan Borough President's LES Go Green Initiative, Lower East Side Business Improvement District, Consortium for Worker Education, Manhattan Chamber of Commerce, Fourth Arts Block Cultural District, Asian American/Asian Research Institute, Green Depot, and Con Edison.

CleanEdison (cleanedison.com) is the nation's largest provider of LEED Training and BPI Certification. CleanEdison offers everything in the green space from Commercial Energy Audit Services to LEED Consulting to help identify energy-saving opportunities in commercial buildings. CleanEdison's energy auditors are experts in evaluating new ways to reduce your operating costs and increase your building's performance, focusing on improvements and incentives which bring CleanEdison's clients' ROI inside of 3 years.

chicagotribune.com

eptember 01, 2009

Power play: architects help turn old Sears power plant in Chicago into new charter school

Architects pull different power plays than politicians.

In London nine years ago, Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron took a mighty, decommissioned power station on the Thames River and transformed it into Tate Modern (left), an acclaimed showcase for the Tate Gallery's collection of modern art.

Now in Chicago, a team of architects, foundation leaders and consultants has turned a handsome but derelict old power plant that once served Sears, Roebuck & Co.'s massive West Side headquarters into an inspired (and likely, inspiring) public charter high school.

Named the Charles H. Shaw Technology and Learning Center, in memory of the late Chicago developer who had a passion for revitalizing the beleaguered North Lawndale neighborhood, the building houses Power House High (below), which will welcome its first students Tuesday.

The $40 million project, aided by $17 million in federal tax credits, has recovered the architectural glory of the old power plant, especially in a soaring turbine room with glistening white brick walls and tall, arched windows.

Throughout are energy-saving features, from retrofitted historic windows to geothermal wells, that are expected to earn the center a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) gold rating from the U.S. Green Building Council.

Located at 931 S. Homan Ave., just south of the Eisenhower Expressway, the 104-year-old structure is among the remnants of Sears' once-vibrant West Side catalog operation. Chicago architects Nimmons & Fellows melded Chicago School efficiency and classical decoration in the complex, which at its height mailed thousands of orders every day to customers across America.

Sears left in 1973 for the 110-story Sears (now Willis) Tower. More than 30 years later, the power plant appeared to be a white elephant. Its arched windows were either broken or boarded up. Birds flew inside. And oversize rodents lived there.

"We thought they were cats -- they turned out to be rats," said Kristen Dean, president of the Homan Arthington Foundation. The foundation worked with Shaw, who died in 2006, to develop more than 300 homes and a community center in North Lawndale.

The wisdom of the foundation's decision to reuse the power plant is now fully apparent, thanks to Chicago architects Farr Associates, who worked with the Midwest office of MacRostie Historic Advisors.

A palace of steam is now a palace of learning, even if some details, like the steel entrance staircases, are disappointingly mundane. Yet old arched windows (left, at rear of building, with new fire escapes) have been sensitively replaced with double-glazed, energy-efficient glass. And the building's 185-foot-tall, brick chimney has been handsomely restored.

To their credit, the architects didn't strip the building of its grit. On the north facade, for example, smudgy lines formed by old lean-to buildings haven't been erased. Round terra cotta decoration enlivens the brown brick exterior with details like bolts of electricity..

Inside, Farr Associates followed the broad outlines of the Tate Modern, making the three-story turbine room a dramatic great hall and turning the boiler room into smaller but no less compelling spaces -- in this case, classrooms and meeting rooms instead of galleries.

The results are particularly impressive in the turbine room (left), which will be used for school assemblies, a cafeteria, exercise activities and community events. Instead of large sculptural projects, as at the Tate, the room is populated by huge industrial objects, including a big blue chilling machine and a 40-ton gantry crane.

"Every room in this building has a story," said Farr Associates' principal designer on the project, Jonathan Boyer.

The story and spaces are equally good in the building's other half, where giant boilers once turned water into steam. There, the architects supervised the removal of a junglelike thicket of machinery and carefully threaded new floors, walls, corridors and stairwells amid historic features they retained as artifacts.

Windows in some classrooms offer views to the the building's chimney. A coal ash conveyor belt is displayed behind glass.

The school's leaders -- Principal Kothyn Evans-Alexander and executive Chris Reynolds, who works for the school's partner, the Henry Ford Learning Institute of Dearborn, Mich. -- predict that the architecture and artifacts will inspire curiosity and help drive home lessons that books alone would not.

It remains to be seen, though, whether the design will help or hinder teaching. Will boisterous kids turn the hard-surfaced turbine room into an echo chamber?

Even if the Shaw Center lacks the Tate Modern's bracing contrasts of old and new, it is still likely to emerge as a model for recycling historic buildings -- and for harnessing architecture's aesthetic power to a broader social purpose.

http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/theskyline/2009/09/power-play-architects-help-turn-old-sears-power-plant-in-chicago-to-new-charter-school-.html

chiefengineer.org

Chicago Climate Action Plan: Is Your Building Ready

By Colleen Kramer, President, Evergreen Supply Company

For engineers, helping reduce their building’s energy consumption and carbon footprint has become not just a luxury but a necessity.

Pressures from building owners, a return on investment for many energy conservation measures, and the need to attract tenants who increasingly want space that is “green,” make energy efficiency critical.

The city of Chicago also requires a certain degree of compliance. In April 2009, the Chicago City Council approved an updated Energy Conservation Code for energy-efficient new and existing buildings: compliance is mandatory.

Climate change is a huge challenge worldwide but it also presents a huge opportunity, according to Karen Hobbs, first deputy commissioner of Chicago’s Department of Environment, who spoke at a recent meeting of the U.S. Green Building Council-Chicago Chapter. “The goal in Chicago is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase energy efficient buildings,” she said.

Older buildings, such as the office building at 550 W. Washington in Chicago, must be retrofitted to comply with Chicago's Energy Conservation Code to reduce its overall energy consumption and carbon footprint.

David O’Donnell, the Department’s deputy commissioner, echoes the goal, noting that the problem cannot be resolved without an aggressive improvement in energy efficiency.

O’Donnell says Chicago has approximately 300 large commercial and industrial buildings which account for 23 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions. Furthermore, 90 percent of Chicago’s power consumption is from commercial buildings. “That sector is particularly important because it can have a significant impact on reaching our energy reduction goals,” he says.

To address the issue, the city developed the Chicago Climate Action Plan (www.chicagoclimateactionplan.org), an aggressive plan that outlines 26 actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and nine actions to prepare for climate change. Chicago’s goal is an 80 percent reduction below 1990 emissions by the year 2050 and a mid-term goal of a 25 percent reduction by 2020.

The Chicago Christian Industrial League building.

As part of its plan, the city has developed numerous initiatives to help “green” local businesses, including the Green Office Challenge, Green Chicago Restaurant Co-op, Green Hotels Initiative, and the Green Museum Initiative.

“ I don’t know of another city except perhaps Aspen, Colorado, that has done the level of analysis we have done on reducing our carbon footprint,” O’Donnell says. Aspen, which is committed to a 30 percent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 and an 80 percent reduction by 2050, cut its emissions by 10.5 percent in only 18 months.

Even the nation’s largest city, New York, has developed a plan, announced in April 2009, to reduce energy consumption by upgrading everything from boilers to bulbs in existing buildings. The program is set to begin in 2013 with 2,200 buildings performing energy audits and a certain number of building upgrades each year for a decade.

Anil Ahuja, president of CCJM Engineers, Ltd., headquartered in Washington, DC, with offices in Chicago, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Michigan, and the author of the book “Integrated ME Design, Building Systems Engineering,” believes that most building engineers are aware of what they need to do to conserve energy in the interior of their buildings. Where they fall short is in understanding how to reduce their building’s overall carbon footprint as well as how to address changing the exterior or “skin” of the building.

“ The skin of the building is difficult to address because there is only so much surgery you can do on it,” he states. “A landmark building is almost untouchable when it comes to changing the exterior.”

Cost to change the exterior is another major consideration. For example, placing window film on a building’s windows will block energy from the sun and save on cooling costs in summer and heat retention in winter. But they are expensive. Most large commercial buildings are not yet able to use solar panels but the city reduced the cost of heating water in about 20 buildings by utilizing solar technology. Rooftop gardens, which have sprouted up on a number of buildings from Chicago’s City Hall to residential structures, have proven to save about 20 percent in a building’s energy costs.

Before engineers and building owners can plan their energy conservation “trip,” they must determine a starting point, according to Ahuja. They need to ask questions such as how your building emissions rate compares to other buildings and whether your building has the potential for a rapid return on your energy conservation measures and investment.

Ahuja encourages engineers to invest in “carbon benchmarking” to measure the building’s carbon footprint, then develop a plan to address the issue. This benchmarking measurement covers the building itself but may also include energy consumption outside the building. “If 100 people work in a certain building and all drive SUVs 40 miles to get to work, how does that impact the building’s carbon footprint?” he asks rhetorically.

Ideally, building owners will set aside funds to provide energy-conserving improvements at certain intervals. The improvements are especially important for buildings that were built in the 60s and 70s and are in need of renovation.

These buildings are great targets for a sustainability plan, says Ahuja. When the building is renovated, retrofits can be incorporated to reduce energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. It’s natural for a building’s mechanical and electrical systems to become inefficient due to obsolescence, equipment and control failures, and deferred maintenance, Ahuja explains. The result is that comfort and energy efficiency suffer. But, significant savings may be realized with relatively little expense. For example, buildings can be updated with heating and cooling systems, modernized water and lighting systems or new windows. The aesthetic upgrades and energy savings that can be realized in lighting alone has made major advances in the last few years.

“ Any building with ten-year-old lighting can realize significant and quick returns on lighting retrofits, installing, for example, compact fluorescent bulbs or LED lighting,” he said.

Making the reductions and changes won’t be easy, but it is critical. As Hobbs put it: the mantra should be “reduce, reuse and recycle.”

http://www.chiefengineer.org/content/content_display.cfm/seqnumber_content/3961.htm

reuters.com

Energy-gulping U.S. buildings ripe for savings

Wed Sep 2, 2009 7:26pm EDT

By Andrew Stern

CHICAGO (Reuters) - New York's Empire State Building is doing it, Chicago's Willis Tower is about to start and many more landlords and companies are expected to undertake building retrofits to reduce energy costs.

Spurred by steadily rising utility bills, the need to rein in costs in the recession, a host of government tax incentives and increasing awareness of carbon footprints, energy-saving building renovations are in vogue.

"Things are thriving," said Terry Singer, executive director of the National Association of Energy Service Companies. "There have been a lot of drivers to increased investment," among them new government funding, volatile energy prices and new technology that can reduce energy consumption.

Energy conservation is an unsung hero in the global effort to burn less fossil fuels and buildings account for roughly half of global energy consumption.

Several successive U.S. presidents have championed conservation which is at the center of the Obama administration's proposals to combat climate change.

The energy services industry has grown by at least 22 percent a year since 2004. Additionally, billions of dollars were allocated in the federal stimulus package to retrofit and weatherize government buildings.

"There's this huge untapped potential," said Maria Vargas, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's decade-old "Energy Star" program. The agency had put its energy-efficient tag on 6,300 U.S. buildings by the end of 2008, which was 57 percent more than a year earlier.

"More will start doing it, as they realize their competitors are doing it and they realize it makes good business sense," said Branko Terzic of consultant Deloitte's Energy & Resources Group.

The energy services industry, which has a myriad of large and small players, is expected to triple in size by 2013 and there is a reservoir of untapped projects valued by a Pike Research report at $400 billion, he said.

The number of "green" jobs is growing, with the sector one of the few to add positions during the recession, said employment expert John Challenger.

The Empire State Building undertook a renovation designed to save $4.4 million, or 38 percent, on its yearly energy bill. Those savings will repay the cost within a few years.

In June, the owners of Chicago's Sears Tower, since renamed the Willis Tower, unveiled a $350 million retrofit that included replacing the 110-story tower's 16,000 single-pane windows.

INVESTMENT CAN BE OFF-PUTTING

The high cost of energy-efficient heating and cooling systems, improved and automated lighting, high-quality windows, and variable speed motors on equipment may deter executives aiming to preserve capital during an economic slump.

For others, conservation may lack the cachet of tapping into renewable power sources such as solar and wind.

But experts said investment in energy conservation can often be recouped fairly quickly in lower utility bills -- usually in five years or less. Retrofits also allow building owners to attract tenants by marketing them as "green," a designation known to reap higher rents.

Of about 70 billion square feet (6.5 billion sq meters) of U.S. office space, as little as 1 billion square feet (93 million sq meters) have been retrofitted, Terzic said.

To illustrate the potential, McKinsey & Co projected that U.S. investments of $520 billion in building efficiency through 2020 would yield $1.2 trillion in energy savings and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 1.1 gigatons annually -- the amount emitted by the entire current fleet of U.S. vehicles.

Existing players in the field of energy conservation are Honeywell International Inc, Johnson Controls Inc, Siemens AG, Ingersoll-Rand Plc, and United Technologies Corp. Recent entrants are Chevron Corp, Cisco Systems Inc, IBM Corp, and Lockheed Martin Corp.

Massachusetts-based Bluestone Energy Services Ltd is among dozens of expanding privately-held companies tapping into the demand, having doubled in size last year and again this year.

"Our forte is we work with the utility companies to qualify those solutions for incentive money. We also bundle tax incentives," said Bluestone Vice President Adam Fairbanks.

Future energy savings can collateralize the financing for the retrofit, and utility grants and government tax credits can help defray the initial cost, he said.

A growing number of utilities add a fee to customer bills and then issue grants to businesses for energy-saving projects. Customers who install solar, wind, geothermal or other power-saving systems and appliances can also get rebates.

Vying for the Willis Tower windows contract is Serious Windows, a Sunnyvale, California-based manufacturer of high-quality windows that have insulating capabilities that can rival a building's exterior walls.

CEO Kevin Surace said his windows are the most cost-effective retrofit available, offering up to 50 percent energy savings in buildings in which cheaper windows were installed to save on construction costs.

"Every building I can see from this vantage point needs new windows, every single one," Surace said in an interview conducted next to the Willis Tower. "They could save $1 million a year. As energy costs go up, it becomes $2 million a year."

http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-GreenBusiness/idUSTRE5817EA20090902