BetterBricks - Bottom Line Thinking on Energy

Know a Great Green Building Pro? BetterBricks Wants to Know

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:47:00 GMT

Nominations are now open for the 2010 BetterBricks Awards!

The BetterBricks Awards salute the individuals leading the way for high performance commercial buildings with an emphasis on energy efficiency. From the building owners who pay for them, to the designers and engineers who design them, to the building operations staff and service professionals who keep them running at peak performance – all have critical roles to play. The annual BetterBricks Awards celebrate the people behind the best projects in the Northwest. The result: a greater number of buildings that offer improved energy efficiency, bottom line benefits and a reduced carbon footprint. The BetterBricks Awards take place in Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Montana. Click here to see our past award winners.

Save the Date for the 2010 Awards

Oregon/SW Washington BetterBricks Awards
Thursday, February 11, 7:30 AM
The Nines Hotel, Portland, OR
Nominations: Due December 18

Puget Sound BetterBricks Awards
Thursday, March 25, 5:15 PM
Olympic Sculpture Park, Seattle, WA
Nominations: Due January 15

Idaho BetterBricks Awards
October 2010
Doubletree Riverside, Boise, ID
Nominations: TBD

Montana BetterBricks Awards
Details Coming Soon

Nominations

Nominations are now open for the Oregon / SW Washington and Puget Sound Awards. To nominate yourself or a colleague, go to the NOMINATIONS page and fill out the questionnaire.

For these Awards, high performance buildings are commercial structures, both existing and newly constructed, that have achieved a substantial level of energy savings and offer other high performance features such as a more productive work environment, water savings and an abundance of natural light, to name a few.

Nominations are due December 18 for the Oregon / SW Washington Awards.
Nominations are due January 15 for the Puget Sound Awards.

If you have questions, please contact Therese Lang at 503.241.1124 or therese@coateskokes.com

Award Categories

The 2010 awards will honor individuals and teams in the following categories:

Architect
Those who design buildings and lead the design team on projects that consistently achieve high levels of energy efficiency in both new construction and major renovations.

Design Engineer
Those who have contributed significant solutions to the energy efficient design of mechanical and/or electrical systems (including passive systems) for new buildings and major renovations.

Integrated Design Team
A team of professionals for a specific high performance building project that includes two or more of the following professionals: an owner representative, architect, engineer (mechanical, electrical, structural), consultants, and building contractor (if involved during design).

Advocate
Those who advocate for and support the design and operation of high performance buildings including consultants, government, non-profit, educators, and others.

Owner/Developer
Those who make decisions about strategic direction regarding investments in high performance buildings. These executives, developers, owners and managers support, authorize and generally enable high performance building to be built and operated.

Facility Manager/Operator
Open to a team or an individual who operates and manages the facilities of a building including facility directors, managers and building operators.

Service Contractor
Those individuals who provide services to the efficient operations of commercial buildings including mechanical contractors, control companies, equipment manufacturers and commissioning agents.

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Service Provider Advice: The Business Case

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 21:02:00 GMT

Recent dramatic changes in the marketplace have resulted in new and growing concerns for building owners:

Soaring energy costs are causing operational costs to climb.
Growing awareness of environmental concerns is putting pressure on building owners.
Attracting good tenants (and talent) is becoming more competitive.
Sustainability is an increasingly important concern for tenants and employees.

If a building owner is not already aware of these issues, the competition certainly is.

This represents a great opportunity for you—their service provider and building expert. If you can help your customers reduce their operating costs and get a jump on their competition, you can improve your own bottom line. Consider these facts:

Energy is the most controllable operational cost.
Most buildings can save between 5% and 30% on energy bills just by improving operation.
Energy efficiency can lead to public recognition through certification in green-building rating systems (such as EnergyStar and LEED).
Sustainable buildings are attractive to both tenants and employees.

You already provide top-notch service—your customers are happy, their tenants are comfortable, and the equipment is running smoothly. By adding energy efficiency to your services, you can help address your clients' emerging concerns without sacrificing comfort or reliability. BetterBricks' Building Performance Services (BPS) are supplemental services you can use to help your clients improve their energy efficiency and building performance. Read more about BPS here:

Building Performance Services
- Building Tune-up
- Enhanced Operations & Maintenance

Learn more about specific business opportunities using BPS for:

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Building Owner Advice: Best Practice O&M Program

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 16:49:00 GMT

Download a PDF of the page

Introduction

Creating a best-practice operation-and-maintenance (O&M) program increases the efficiency of facility staff, improves building operational practices, and reduces utility costs. The O&M process helps sustain a building's profitability by reducing costly equipment failure and maintaining tenant comfort and indoor air quality. Establishing an O&M program is generally straightforward and does not significantly affect budget. It primarily reorganizes and reallocates existing resources to be more efficient and productive. Implementing a best-practice O&M program can reduce facility energy use by 5-20% without significant capital investment. This document discusses the elements essential to creating a best-practice O&M program.

Create the Leadership Team

Convene an O&M leadership team

Members of the leadership team should include representatives from the executive, finance, and engineering branches of the organization. Participation of an upper-level manager is key to sending the message that the program is supported from the top of the organization. Appoint an O&M project manager as the project leader and focal point for accountability. Early participation of line-level engineering staff is essential to the long-term success of the O&M program. As with any initiative, be sure to establish roles, responsibilities, and communication channels.

Assign someone to coordinate with the utilities. Your local utility may be the most important source of outside assistance. They may help fund or provide technical support for establishing an O&M program or a building tune-up.

Maintain the momentum

With the O&M Program up and running, the challenge is to maintain the momentum. Hold quarterly meetings (more frequently at the beginning) of the O&M team to review building energy use and progress toward meeting the goals. It may also be appropriate, in the context of O&M activities, to review building operation protocols, complaints from occupants about comfort, the performance of service contractors, and staff training plans.

Recognize success

Employee recognition will help sustain enthusiasm and interest for achieving energy-use goals. Use recognition, awards, and meaningful incentives to encourage the entire staff to develop ideas for improving building performance. Ultimately, the success or failure of the new O&M Program lies with the line-level staff. Meeting or exceeding building-energy-performance goals should be an occasion for sharing a sense of a job well done by all.

Appoint a Building or System Champion

Many organizations spend tens of thousands of dollars on electricity, but assign no responsibility for managing energy usage. Properly managing any system requires a champion.

What is a champion?

The champion is someone who is responsible for the overall management of a building or system. The champion is knowledgeable of, and an advocate for, the proper design, use, operation, and maintenance of the building or system. The champion understands the details and knows how to meet management's goals and objectives in the safest, and most cost-effective way possible.

What do champions do?

Educate themselves and others on the proper design, use, operation, and maintenance of the system to minimize the life-cycle cost, and maximize the performance of the system.

Participate in all decisions regarding the design, use, operation, and maintenance of the system.

Work with management to establish and track key performance indicators for the system.

Recommend operational or maintenance changes to improve system performance.

What does a system champion need to succeed?

To succeed, a champion must have management support. Management support includes technical training for the champion and others, establishing and managing key performance indicators, and commitment to implementing change to increase performance.

Establish an Energy Accounting System

The information provided by an energy-accounting system provides insight into the O&M fitness of the building. Create a best-practice system for tracking utility information and communicate the results both vertically and laterally in the organization. Evaluate and select an energy-accounting software tool to track energy use and monitor performance goals. Some utilities offer their customers excellent free or low-cost programs with automatic data uploading. Programs are also available from private vendors. With your permission, some private vendors can work directly with your utility to collect consumption data periodically. Energy-accounting programs have a wide variety of features and user interfaces. For instance, the ability to update utility data in a web-based program may be a desirable feature. Carefully evaluate several programs before selecting one. If you buy from a vendor, request a trial period to thoroughly evaluate the product.

When you select a system, establish responsibilities for implementation and maintenance. Broad employee access to energy-consumption data promotes awareness of energy use throughout the organization and collective ownership in reducing energy use. Providing read-only access on your organization's intranet is highly recommended.

Establish Performance Goals and Follow-up Activities

With the energy-accounting system providing a clear picture of building-energy use, establish performance goals. Goals should be realistic and achievable based on established benchmarks.

Establish benchmarks

Benchmarks create a standard for measuring building-energy performance. Energy performance benchmarks may be based on similar buildings in a portfolio or campus, or other standards such as the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Energy Star Portfolio Manager. This web-based program has a benchmarking feature that ranks the energy use of a building among a large database of similar buildings. When comparing buildings in your campus or portfolio, be sure to use a common metric such as energy use per square foot of conditioned space, to create an "apples-to-apples" comparison.

Track performance

The O&M project manager and the leadership team should review and adjust energy-use goals as necessary. The perpetual question should be, "How can we be more energy efficient?" When operational changes (in equipment scheduling or space use, for example) are made, or equipment is added or replaced, it is appropriate to adjust the goals accordingly. Provide monthly feedback to building-operation staff on building-energy use relative to goals and benchmarks. Building-energy-performance data should be easily accessible to all employees.

Identify tune-up candidates

Benchmarking will identify buildings with higher than normal energy use. These are the best targets for a building tune-up. If your organization has more than one building, a strategic approach is to identify one building that most needs improving, conduct the building tune-up at that building, then expand the program to build on that initial success.

The building-tune-up process includes reviewing operating procedures and existing O&M practices, as well as the physical inspection of equipment. The outcome will include a list of low-cost modifications and the follow-up improvements and modifications. A well-executed tune-up will noticeably reduce energy consumption.

Integrate O&M into related activities

Identify organizational activities that affect O&M and building-energy use, and incorporate a long-range perspective into these related activities. For example, the decision to purchase replacement equipment should consider long-term or life-cycle operating costs. A low-first-cost option may have costly long-term effects. Many utilities offer rebate programs to help offset the higher first cost of high-efficiency equipment. Service contracts are another area where a lowest-first-cost option may have adverse long-term effects.

Apply for a nationally recognized award

Consider applying for a building award or certification that signifies achieving a recognized standard of energy and environmental excellence. These certifications are attractive to building occupants and tenants as well as the building operations' team, and will have positive effects on marketing and staff morale. Two high-profile awards for green buildings are the EPA's Energy Star Labeled Buildings program and the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design - Existing Buildings (LEED-EB) award.

Define a Maintenance Strategy

There are three general approaches to maintenance management: reactive, preventive, and predictive. Evaluate the current approach and adopt a maintenance strategy that best supports the long-term O&M plan.

Reactive: This is the "run it until it breaks" approach. In the short run, this saves staff time and expense but over time it is costly in terms of unplanned equipment downtime, repairs, and shorter equipment life.

Preventive: Preventive maintenance (PM) occurs at time intervals or at run-hour milestones. Because HVAC equipment is capital intensive, this is more cost-effective than reactive maintenance.

Predictive: This approach uses periodic measurements to detect evidence that machinery is deteriorating, with the aim of extending service life by avoiding impending problems. Special diagnostic equipment, which requires additional staff training, is needed, but it will maximize equipment life and efficiency.

Most organizations use a combination of reactive and preventive maintenance with or without maintenance-service contractors. Generally, the most cost-effective solution is a combination of preventive and predictive maintenance that appropriately balances prevention and repair.

Computerized maintenance-management systems

Computerized maintenance-management systems (CMMS) automate and streamline the logistical tasks associated with maintenance programs. CMMS capabilities include generating work orders, tracking work orders, tracking equipment performance, tracking periodic or run-hour-based preventive maintenance, and tracking outside service calls and dispatches, plus many other functions which may be desirable for a particular organization. Overall, a CMMS will eliminate tedious paperwork, increase staff productivity, and streamline maintenance monitoring for management.

While these systems go a long way toward improving the efficiency of maintenance, there are some common pitfalls in adopting them. Chief among these is inadequate training of administrative and maintenance staff, which leads to lack of commitment and integration into existing practices.

A CMMS integrated into daily operation with well-trained personnel and persistent management support will yield considerable benefits in the form of improved maintenance, more efficient use of staff resources, better inventory control, better maintenance of equipment performance, reduced downtime, and extended equipment life.

Maintaining the maintenance program

The long-term success of a best-practice O&M program requires proper documentation and periodic review of the total cost of the maintenance program. For instance, while it may be difficult to show that the new maintenance program was responsible for saving money in the third quarter because the chiller didn't breakdown, there should be a long-term parity or reduction in maintenance costs compared with the previous, less-rigorous program. Some non-monetary benefits, such as reduced comfort complaints and better air quality, can be tracked and factored into the evaluation.

Assess Staff and Training

Define the skills required

Large facilities have a variety of types and complexity of HVAC and process systems. While maintenance can be performed entirely in-house or entirely outsourced, most organizations use a mix of in-house operating engineers and outside service contractors. Typically, specialized and complex equipment such as building-automation systems (BAS) or chillers are serviced by outside contractors, but a well-trained staff may be capable of many specialized maintenance tasks that are typically outsourced. Emergency repair work is often handled by mechanical or service contractors. Each building or organization will have a somewhat unique balance of in-house and outsourced tasks.

Inventorying the skills and licenses of in-house engineering staff will reveal if their skills are being used effectively. Likewise, gaps in training may become apparent. Evaluate how well the employee skills match the complexity of the installed systems and local, state and federal licensing requirements. Assess the level of management and supervisory experience required to provide the leadership needed to execute a best-practice O&M program.

Conducting a building tune-up can provide a snapshot of the level of O&M practiced in the facility. This will inform the future staffing and training needs.

Create and implement individual and group training plans

Developing staff training plans should combine supervisory input and individual interest. Large buildings with modern systems are sufficiently complex to encourage individual staff members to become in-house experts in different areas. A staff with good basic skills and diverse advanced technical skills is invaluable in maintaining and operating a complex building, and will reduce reliance on outside contractors. Regularly update individual and group training plans.

Take advantage of resources such as the Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA), the Refrigeration Service Engineers Society and the Air Conditioning Contractors Association. These organizations provide or sponsor classroom training, on-line training, and training manuals. Additionally, they can provide industry guidelines for staff training and qualifications for maintenance tasks.

Ongoing staff training

Conduct annual training reviews, possibly as part of annual performance reviews. The O&M leadership team should provide input to the supervisory staff on training needs and goals.

Execute Service Contracts

Define the scope

All large facilities use a mixture of maintenance, mechanical, electrical, and lighting service contractors to help perform the many tasks that keep complex building systems operating smoothly. The range of outsourced tasks will vary from building to building. This section offers suggestions for managing contractors with ongoing service contracts:

Within your organization, there should already be a solid understanding of your maintenance strategy and a plan for optimally balancing in-house and outsourced maintenance. Now the challenge is to translate this into a scope of services for a service contract.

Most of the suggestions below apply equally to a building tune-up and to ongoing enhanced O&M.

For information on types of service contracts, see Contract Provisions for Enhanced Operations and Maintenance.

For information on the scope of tune-ups, see Energy Tune-Up Process Scope.

Evaluate providers

There are many types of service contractors. With your maintenance strategy, outsourcing needs, and scope of work in mind, select an appropriate type of service provider.

For information on types of maintenance-service providers, see Contract Provisions for Enhanced Operations and Maintenance.

When you have identified the appropriate type(s) of service providers to bid on the work, consider the selection criteria in the reference below. For a complex building, a pre-bid contractor meeting including a building walkthrough is highly recommended. This will help communicate the organization's requirements and should elicit similarly scoped bids.

For information on screening contractors, see Contract Provisions for Enhanced Operations and Maintenance.

Structure and implement the contract

There are many factors to consider in describing the scope of services in a service contract. The reference below describes contractual details that will serve the owner best over the term of the contract.

For information on structuring service contracts, see Contract Provisions for Enhanced Operations and Maintenance.

Manage a service contract

The reference below provides insight into effectively managing a service contractor.

For information on managing service contracts, see Contract Provisions for Enhanced Operations and Maintenance.

When the contract is executed, establish clear lines of communication and set specific protocols to follow. Set up a feedback system for monitoring contractor performance. Periodically review measurable objectives with the contractor. Use a quarterly report card as part of the feedback system and let them know when they're doing a good job.

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References

Federal Energy Management Program, O&M Best Practices Guide 2.0, July 2004

Princeton Energy Resources International, Powell Energy Associates and Alliance to Save Energy, School Operations and Maintenance: Best Practices for Controlling Energy Costs, August 2004

PECI, Fifteen O&M Best Practices for Energy Efficient Buildings, September 1999

PECI, Operation and Maintenance Service Contracts, December 1997

PECI, Putting the "O" Back in O&M, September 1999

Building Owner Advice: Improving a Building

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 15:44:00 GMT

Introduction

Activities that improve a building’s energy performance fall into four general categories:

enhanced O&M
building tune-up
commissioning
capital projects

Best-Practice O&M Program discusses elements of enhanced operation and maintenance (O&M). This document describes the building tune-up process from the perspective of a building owner or operator. A building tune-up can be performed every 3 to 5 years to identify and diagnose operational problems in a building. A tune-up is less formal, less comprehensive, and less expensive than commissioning, and focuses on identifying low-cost opportunities for energy savings and other benefits. The relationship between enhanced O&M and building tune-up is illustrated below. The tune-up is periodic while enhanced O&M is an ongoing process that sustains performance improvements. Capital projects can also play an important part in building performance.

See the Tools & Resources page in the Hospitals section for guidance on new equipment purchases.

Conducting a Building Tune-Up

In buildings with excessive energy use or other known operational problems, the tune-up will identify the causes of problems with the HVAC and control systems, and improve building operation-and-maintenance (O&M) practices. Most improvements require no investment beyond the tune-up cost. Two primary results of a well-executed tune-up are reduced energy use and improved tenant comfort.

A building tune-up is a periodic activity intended to fix problems and to identify cost-effective operational improvements. In a building with complex systems, a tune-up requires a systematic approach and the broad skill set of an engineering professional.

The steps in a building tune-up are:

Assemble the project team
Complete basic maintenance
Review data
Interview occupants and building engineers
Conduct the initial on-site inspection
Diagnose performance problems
Make an action plan

These are explained below. For a more detailed discussion, see The Energy Tune-Up Process.

Assemble the Project Team

Appoint the internal project team: The manager of the project team is typically the Engineering Manager or Chief Engineer. Internal team members key to the long-term success of the effort are the building operating engineers. Select engineers with recognized expertise with the building’s HVAC equipment and control system.

Hire a contractor: Hiring outside specialists is strongly recommended. They will bring a fresh perspective and objectivity to the process. The in-house project manager should make it clear to the in-house team that the tune-up (or some aspect of it) is outside the scope of normal staff activities and that the contractor is being hired to provide beneficial assistance rather than find fault.

Performing a building tune-up requires a broad understanding of building control and system dynamics as well as hands-on technical ability. Sometimes a single firm can meet this need, or you can choose to hire a third-party engineering specialist to work with a service team.

See Request for Qualifications to Provide Building Performance Services for guidance in specifying qualifications for your contractor team.

Collaborate with your utility: Energy and water utilities may offer financial incentives or other professional support for conducting a building tune-up.

Complete Basic Maintenance

Before embarking on the tune-up, periodic maintenance—that is, maintenance performed at time intervals or at run-hour milestones—should be up to date. Some tune-up activities cannot be done on equipment that first requires basic periodic maintenance. For example, during the cooling season, the annual maintenance tasks for the cooling plant and systems should be completed before starting the tune-up. Typical deficiencies (dirty filters, broken or cracked belts, etc.) normally taken care of during periodic maintenance should not be left for the building tune-up to identify for repair.

Review Data

The building’s excessive energy use was probably identified by reviewing utility records. As part of the scoping activity, review building performance indicators such as utility-demand-interval data or real-time, direct-digital-control (DDC) data. Set an energy benchmark and identify areas to investigate using monitoring and trend logging of key indicators of system performance.

Additionally, with team members who are not familiar with the building, review building O&M manuals and building plans to familiarize them with the layout and design of the system.

Interview Occupants and Building Engineers

The contractor should informally interview the building occupants and engineering staff. Anecdotal information on building problems and quirks provides valuable leads to pursue in the tune-up.

Conduct the Initial On-site Inspection:

The initial walkthrough by the project team will identify two types of problems:

Problems with quick fixes: easily accomplished corrections or adjustments to equipment or control system that can be done during the scoping process. Beware of “band-aid” solutions that do not address an underlying problem. If you suspect this may be the case, flag the problem for further diagnosis.

Problems with deferrable fixes: problems that require more time or investment than allowed in the walkthrough. For these, look for symptoms or known problems and flag them for further investigation in the diagnosis phase of the tune-up.

Diagnose Performance Problems

Inspect, measure, and analyze: Investigate and analyze the symptoms and problems identified in the walkthrough. The team will have a diagnostic plan for each item flagged for investigation. Some common HVAC problems are listed in the Symptom-Diagnosis Tool which provides a specific diagnostic procedure for each symptom.
Fix Performance Problems

Modify and adjust equipment: The inspections and associated diagnoses will lead to a list of solutions. The budget should allow some time for adjusting equipment, making minor repairs, and reprogramming controls. Other solutions may involve capital projects that fall outside the scope of the building tune-up. Many utilities have energy-efficiency programs that offer financial incentives for capital measures that reliably reduce energy use.

Make an Action Plan

The action plan should succinctly document the following project results:

Summary of equipment modifications: List what was modified or adjusted and the results, including estimates of energy and dollar savings.

Solutions identified but not implemented: List what remains to be done and include estimates of potential costs, benefits, and payback, for decision makers to follow up.

Recommendations for modifying maintenance practices: List improvements in maintenance practices that became evident during the tune-up.

Recommendations for staff training: List suggestions for areas of additional staff training that became evident during the tune-up.

Following Up

Implement the Action Plan

Evaluate action-plan recommendations and select items to implement. These may include operational adjustments, equipment modifications, or additional staff training.

Adjust operational practices. This may involve changing control sequences or equipment scheduling.

Modify maintenance procedures to reflect the best practices required to maintain the building’s “tuned” performance. Change the scope of the maintenance-service contractor as necessary.

Update system documentation to reflect the changes to the O&M program.

Revise energy-performance goals. Utility bills will begin to reflect the changes made during the tune-up. Establish a new benchmark or baseline for energy performance as the new energy-consumption data becomes available.

Select potential capital projects for the organization to evaluate.

Discuss and implement revisions to staff training as indicated in the action plan. Update group and individual training plans.

Communicate the Results

Communicate the project outcome to engineering staff, executives, and the O&M leadership team. If there are more candidate buildings in your campus or portfolio, plan for additional tune-ups to build on the experience and success of this project.

Stay up to date with the latest building facility tips, energy management case studies and expert advice with the BetterBricks E-Newsletter. Sign up Today!

Getting to High Performance Schools

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Fri, 08 May 2009 16:09:00 GMT

High performance schools don't have to cost more. The key is to bring your school's administrators and occupants (students and staff) and your design and construction team together early and create a plan for your high performance school. Please note, the links in this article take you to case studies and tools on the BetterBricks website.

Set Your Goals Early
The earlier you begin to discuss building a high performance school, the greater the opportunity to minimize costs and maximize benefits. Use an "integrated design" process that brings architects, contractors, engineers, staff, students and local community members together to determine your goals for your school. One or more pre-design goal-setting meeting (sometimes called a "charrette") with all stakeholders can be extremely helpful. This group outlines their goals and priorities and communicates those needs to the design-build team. With a sound investment in this kind of design approach, a high performance school will save energy, water, and money spent on operations and maintenance for well beyond the typical service life.

Learn More:

Integrated Design Process

McKim Middle School - Case Study

Get the Right Help
The best architects and engineers for the job are those who are experienced in integrated design, an approach to design that ensures multi-disciplinary contributions and a building that works as a system. BetterBricks connects building professionals with the information, tools, training and consultation needed to design and construct high performance buildings.

Learn More:

Integrated Design Labs

Incorporate Daylighting and Other High Performance Techniques
Many high performance building techniques take advantage of local climate and natural resources (like the sun and prevailing winds) to light, heat, cool and ventilate your building. Other high performance techniques involve using the most efficient equipment and systems (energy saving lighting fixtures and occupancy sensors that turn lights and heat off when a room is not in use, for example). Last, you need to make sure that all high performance features are kept running at peak efficiency throughout the life cycle of your school.

Learn More:

Dena Boer Elementary School Daylighting Initiative

Commission Your Building
Make sure that the systems in your school operate as they were intended by "commissioning" your building. Commissioning is a process that tests, verifies and fine-tunes the performance of a building's systems-including lighting, HVAC and electrical-so that they operate at peak efficiency and provide the greatest level of comfort for occupants. A key part of commissioning is making sure your school's maintenance personnel are trained to keep these systems running well.

Learn More:

Bainbridge Island High School Addition - School Commissioning Project Gets High Grade

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Industry Expert Shares Tips to Reduce Hospital Energy use by 10-40%

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Wed, 06 May 2009 16:16:00 GMT

Download a PDF of this interview

Note: The tools and resources discussed in this interview can be found under the Hospital & Healthcare section of the BetterBricks website.

Mike Hatten is an internationally known engineer, recognized for his expertise in building energy efficiency and is a principal of SOLARC Architecture and Engineering, Inc. He combines a design, analysis and training background in his roles as project manager, educator and project engineer. He has conducted analysis efforts on more than 20 million square feet of residential, commercial and industrial space.

Mike works as a technical advisor for both BetterBricks' building operations and its design and construction efforts. This interview focuses on his work with building operations in healthcare facilities. Mike provides on-site support to customers and their service contractors to help them achieve energy cost savings from tuning-up and improving the operations and maintenance of equipment and systems. Mike has provided support on 20 hospitals for BetterBricks. He has a deep understanding and appreciation for the type, magnitude and low cost of these tune-up and O&M savings opportunities.

BetterBricks: How many and what types of hospitals have you worked with?

Hatten: Through the BetterBricks program, I've worked with nearly 20 hospitals in the

Northwest - half of which are large facilities. Primarily, I review the facility and meet with staff to provide the 50,000-foot-level energy assessment of their energy savings potential and suggest a logical starting point. Of the 20 hospitals I've worked with, three or four have progressed to levels where implementation of opportunities has begun. I've also worked with the Integrated Design Labs (IDL) on the design and construction of about 10 new facilities.

BetterBricks: Is there an example of one project that exemplifies energy efficient practices?

Hatten: St. Luke's Regional Medical Center in Boise is an ideal model for what tune-ups and recommissioning can do for existing hospitals. The energy savings is tremendous. For the first phase of diagnostics, we looked at the 10 largest air handlers and found electric and gas savings potential of well over $250,000 per year. This represents an energy cost reduction of about 5% of the annual energy cost of the facility. We're now in the thick of implementing operational changes to capture those savings.

BetterBricks: What's the typical range of possible energy cost reductions from a tune-up and improved O&M practices that you are seeing in hospitals?

Hatten: We typically see potential for a 10-20 percent cost reduction, especially when strategic energy management (SEM) initiatives have been championed at the executive management levels. A key piece of information to look for is some kind of realistic performance goal and it seems that 20 percent is a very realistic goal.

However, the potential energy savings is much greater in large facilities such as an integrated medical campus with a substantial amount of equipment that operates

continuously serving spaces that have variations on occupancy patterns. There are opportunities to cut energy use in half within certain portions of the facility if it's being operated like a hospital. I look at a clinic space to determine whether it's operating in a way that matches typical acute care occupancy patterns or in a manner that actually syncs up to the clinic occupancy patterns. These two instances always have very discreet occupied and unoccupied periods.

BetterBricks: What's the range if you add in retrofits and capital projects?

Hatten: We typically see total savings potential in the range of 20-40 percent when we add in retrofits and capital projects. That said, it's important to note there's a general lack of knowledge with respect to what's possible with tune-ups and retro-commissioning.

Once these first few hospitals complete a comprehensive tune-up throughout their facility, we'll be able to analyze the data to determine if energy savings were underestimated. I will not be surprised if we find that our initial estimates of savings were conservative. As these efforts are completed and the savings are documented, it will be important for this information to flow back into the conversation within the hospital community - both through professional organizations as well as incentives that the utilities offer.

BetterBricks: What needs to happen to achieve a higher level of energy savings?

Hatten: We need some model efforts, testimonials and real results. We are all striving to get to a point where facility managers can call on one another as resources and ask the right questions. By the end of 2009, we'll have several of those case studies. This will begin to change the whole conversation internally within the hospital. As more success stories find their way to the ASHE conferences and the state engineering conferences, there's going to be momentum building up among other facility managers to achieve what these model projects have accomplished. They'll think, "if they can do it, why am I not looking at that?" It is going to start a market initiative that can't really kick off until we have a few of those model efforts in place with results documented and verified so that information can start being exchanged.

BetterBricks: What are the top energy cost savings opportunities from tune-up and improved O&M?

Hatten: Every time I walk into a facility, the first place I focus on is occupancy patterns. I want to know how the systems are zoned and scheduled, and if they are operating consistently when people are in the facility - this is true for both HVAC and lighting.

A big opportunity is to address lighting needs for the visual tasks being performed in a given space and understand lighting maintenance practices. Almost every facility has done a lighting retrofit project, so it's not about upgrading your lamp and ballast. Rather, it's about changing the way light levels are tuned and relamping is done. Lighting technology keeps marching on, which allows for group relamping to bump light levels up or down depending on the needs. In general, we're seeing a large potential to reduce lighting energy use.
The other big opportunity areas are on the HVAC side. There are three big categories, which are all different manifestations of set point optimization. The first category is to look at the kinds of pressure conditions the facility is trying to maintain in the air distribution system. Usually, the general report is a shortage of pressure from day one. On the surface, this interpretation of operating conditions seems accurate. However, once you look under the hood, the area turns out to be rife with savings opportunities. In response to a "I'm too hot" complaint, a common response might be to increase the pressure set point to force more air through rather than truly understand what's making that zone hot in the first place. Over time, we end up with a bunch of systems with pressure set point cranked to the max - occasionally at set points higher than what the system can deliver.
The second HVAC set point opportunity is on the temperature side. There're big potential savings here because there's a whole cascading series of interdependent temperature set points. Assess the set points starting at the space level then move to the group of set points that work internally to an air system. Know the temperature of the air being delivered and the temperature of the air as it enters into the air handling system. Finally, take a look at the set points that go back to the central plant - primarily the chiller plant. This also indirectly translates into questioning how much hospitals are running their chiller plants in cold weather conditions. It's not unusual for hospitals to run air conditioning when it's quite cold out. I tend to put this into a big opportunity category for temperature set points changes and optimization.
The last of the big three are the air flow set points. These set points happen at two places - at the outside air intake and at the zone level. At the outside air intake, it's important to know the minimum outside air set point in really cold or hot weather. What people think the set points are and how much is actually being brought in are usually two very different numbers. We aim to restore original design intent to the air flow system. At the zone level, it is important to know the minimum airflow set point on these variable load volume terminal units. Knowing if it is set to the appropriate range can inform the operator if it could it be set lower to save heating and cooling energy.

BetterBricks: In this economy, we imagine that low-cost and no-cost opportunities are of particular interest to customers. Do the opportunities you've described fall in this category and what is a typical return on investment for the hospitals of these activities?

Hatten: Cost dynamics are quite a bit different than what we've historical thought about in respect to energy projects. Typically, it costs more to do the diagnostics and investigation phase than it does to implement the findings. In that respect, these are no-and-low cost opportunities. Paybacks might be as quick as a couple of months or more typically in the 4-8 month range. When we talk about internal rate of return, it becomes ridiculous because it usually is 300-400 percent.

BetterBricks: How do you convince people?

Hatten: Well, a four month payback is usually pretty compelling. The obstacle is rarely the payback, but rather the upfront costs to get started on the diagnostics phase and where that money comes from. Once a facility gets started, the economics for a sustained effort should fall into place. It's kind of like pushing a sled down a hill - once you get started, it is self perpetuating.

We're really not talking about trying to justify an investment in a conventional way. We are talking about what I call "boot-strapping" your way to energy efficiency. The first step is to take a percentage of a hospital's operating budget and invest it in the organization and facility to start getting energy savings. These savings can be thought of as a revenue stream, and that revenue can be used to fund more savings and so on. Each time a subsequent step is completed, the revenue stream becomes bigger.

We are fundamentally changing the way large hospitals maintain their facilities and it's very appropriate to talk about this boot-strapping model.

Ultimately, what they are doing is diverting some of the money they pay utilities to continue to reinvest and upgrade. It's quite a compelling vision, but it does imply some hesitation. Right now, it is still a little disconcerting to many folks who are accustomed to thinking of an energy project as a discreet thing just like building a new patient tower. What we are driving for is a new process, layered into the maintenance culture, that allows more dollars harvested from the existing operations budget to be reinvested in enhanced operations to improve energy efficiency over time.

It's a lifetime proposition, not a discreet project and "we're-done-with-it" kind of proposition. That's probably the biggest cultural shock I've observed in the conversation and the activities that we've had. We are changing a mindset.

BetterBricks: What does this mean for ongoing costs and new positions?

Hatten: Most advanced hospitals are starting to create resource conservation manager positions (RCM). This person is initially responsible for running the tune-up efforts and making sure implementation happens. It's incorrect to perceive this position as a cost at first. After the initial investment of the RCM's first-year salary while he or she establishes tune-up and improved O&M practices, this person then becomes a cost reduction because of the year after year savings. If the RCM leaves their position, the hospital will have to increase their operating budgets within a year because the persistence will be gone and they will be back consuming more energy.

It's more of a challenging concept to understand from the economic side. It is not about finding more operating or capital dollars. Rather, it's simply about reallocating the operating budgets already approved. Once a hospital starts this process, they are on a permanent reduced cost mode. Achieve the initial savings and keep those savings in place. It's that simple.

BetterBricks: How much does it cost for a large hospital to get started?

Hatten: Large hospitals typically need between $40,000 and $60,000 to get started with an acceptable scope of work. In the context of hospitals budget, that number isn't huge, but it has been an issue for some hospitals in the last couple of years. However, they must complete the first diagnostic and investigation phase and invest that money in order to reap the financial rewards down the line.

BetterBricks: What are the steps that need to be taken for the hospital to achieve these savings?

Hatten: This is really the BetterBricks model for energy savings. First, get commitment from the top of the organization down to communicate the organization's motivation to reduce the overall energy bill. This commitment creates a general line of accountability.

Second, assess what role tune-ups and retro-commissioning can play in achieving larger energy performance goals. Do the quick 50,000-foot-level energy assessment and determine how energy use compares to other hospitals. Collect information from facilities staff that has an operating history with the facility. Do a visual inspection and gather all relevant information to determine the opportunity areas.

The third step and most important, is moving from the assessment and scoping level to the first diagnostics effort, finding the funds to complete it and creating the action plan. By the time the action plan is fully implemented, it almost becomes a self-perpetuating program. There is some scope and planning discussion that needs to happen - defining who the team will be, what does the tune-up team look like, who is internal and external to the hospital, etc. The ideal situation is for the same team to work together on multiple efforts throughout the hospital.

Finally, close the loop on the first diagnostics and implementation with tracking and follow up. At the same time as implementation, have tracking, verification and persistence strategies in place. Some of that is education and training. Some of it is direct metering, sub-metering and monitoring. When the director of facilities is asked, "What have you done and how much energy has been saved," that director can very specifically provide data to illustrate the energy savings in each system. This step also sets the stage for the larger sharing of information with other institutions and professional organizations.

From there, simply repeat.

BetterBricks: Are there some aspects of this process that need to be accomplished by an outside service provider rather than internal operations staff?

Hatten: In my experience, I have not seen any tune-up effort that can be done completely internally - both large and small. It doesn't seem practical in the context of the hospital building operations staff time constraits who are maintaining the facilities. Conversely, I cannot conceive of a tune-up taking place without their involvement. The one exception is if the hospital has appointed or is considering hiring an internal resource conservation manager (RCM). That position can take on a larger position in tune-ups.

Ultimately, a diverse skill set is needed to address these operational issues. Usually, the team consists of someone who knows the control systems inside and out and someone who knows energy efficiency and energy engineering. The second person is able to take these observed deficiencies and translate them into energy cost savings. These two skills rarely land in the same organization. Some knowledge and experience on both the design side and the major construction side about general HVAC is also helpful.

BetterBricks: What additional benefits do you think hospitals gain from this kind of approach besides energy cost savings?

Hatten: Often times, a tune-up will uncover long standing problems with HVAC that have an adverse impact on indoor air quality, which is especially important in a hospital. Through this process, the facilities staff may discover that an air intake has been clogged or is bringing in pollutants. A major benefit to hospitals is to address these system problems. In large hospitals, certain systems are neglected and are not operating as they should. A tune-up sleuths out these failures, repairs them and ultimately puts the system back in balance.

Finally, the education and ongoing knowledge the internal maintenance staff gains from this process is profound. It's a safe bet that any maintenance person involved in a retro-commissioning effort will emerge with much more detailed knowledge of the systems than they had going into it. That's because of both the direct hands on experience, but also the supplemental training and educational opportunities that would be part of the BetterBricks model for tune-ups and enhanced O&M.

BetterBricks: Are any of these ideas being taught in engineering school?

Hatten: Good question! I recently met with Joel Loveland and Kevin Van Den Wymelenberg, both BetterBricks Integrated Design Lab directors, to discuss the current higher education infrastructure. Joel mentioned that 20 years ago there were four professors teaching building energy systems within the four major schools of engineering in the Northwest. Today, there's only one professor left and he's close to retirement. Unfortunately, there are no new professors to fill these empty spaces. Higher education has not developed the capability to teach this even in a limited way. In fact, the capability has declined over the last 20 years in the Northwest.

This will be a hot subject in higher education over the next ten years. It starts with funding, but it certainly doesn't end there. Conventional education will be insufficient to meet the growing demand. The first 5-10 years on the job is when people learn the significant skills and knowledge. I tend to look at the entire education process as that whole window, which has historically taken the best and brightest about 10 year and rest of us about 15-20 years. We have to figure out how to take a beginning student entering a program all the way to a practicing professional on the job in half the time. Really, it should be an exciting challenge for energy educators and absolutely paramount to driving market change.

Additional Resources

BetterBricks Building Operations
BetterBricks Hospital
SOLARC Architecture & Engineering, Inc
Kaiser Permanente Case Study

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Best O&M Practices for Major Equipment

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 23:42:00 GMT

Mechanical equipment in buildings, such as boilers, air-handling units, and motors varies greatly in age, size, type, model, fuel used, and condition. Operating and maintaining that equipment properly ensures that it uses energy as efficiently as possible. Our objective is to present the following types of information about the major equipment that accounts for a large fraction of your energy bill:

Key components and operating principles
Safety issues
Best practices for efficient operation
Best practices for maintenance

The material in this post has been compiled from a number of sources. The recommendations for best practices focus on energy-efficient operation and are not a comprehensive guide to equipment operation and maintenance. The operating logs and maintenance schedules provided are not intended to replace activities specifically recommended by your equipment vendors or manufacturers. In most cases, they represent industry-standard best practices for the given equipment and are intended to supplement existing O&M procedures. As a rule, manufacturers' recommendations for operating and maintaining equipment should take precedence.

Actions and activities recommended in this guide should only be attempted by trained and certified personnel. If such personnel are not available, the actions recommended here should not be initiated.

Select one of the equipment types below to learn more about its key components and best practices for its energy-efficient operation and maintenance. Note: the links below take to the BetterBricks website.

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For more information about energy saving building operations practices, please visit the BetterBricks website.

Efficient Grocery Stores Do More Than Save Money

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 19:07:00 GMT

When it comes to energy use, grocery stores have traditionally been the hungriest of energy hogs. How else can you chill the ice cream, bake the bread and light the shopping aisles, you ask? Actually, a growing number of newly constructed supermarkets are emerging leaner and more efficient than ever before.

In Meadville, Pennsylvania near Pittsburgh, brothers Garth and Bob Valesky recently received an Energy Star award and a commendation from Governor Ed Rendell for renovating Valesky’s Market. The 28,000 square foot store’s new high-performance refrigeration units, compressors and lighting mean Valesky’s now consumes about as much energy as the average-sized single family home. “As independent business owners, we have always been very motivated to reduce our costs,” Garth Valesky told the Associated Press recently. “We have been able to take advantage of energy-saving improvements offered by new technology.”

Janesville, Wisconsin’s Pick ‘n Save store also recently took on the issue of refrigeration, which accounts for more than 60% of an average grocery store’s energy use. Pick ‘n Save invested just under $12,000 to install controls on the condensation-controlling heaters that control condensation on refrigerated display cases. The one-time expense is expected to reap annual savings of approximately $16,000 per year.

And it isn’t just the small stores waking up to the opportunity for significant energy savings. North Carolina-based Lowes Foods recently received the Energy Star designation (given to buildings that are among the nation’s top 25% for energy performance) after retrofitting five of its stores. Measures included new heating and cooling systems, refrigeration units, and control systems. The conservation measures will help Lowes foods save enough to power 444 homes for one year and cut carbon dioxide emissions by nearly 10,000 tons each year. No wonder the company has pledged to build its future new stores according to Energy Star criteria, using approximately half the power of its un-renovated older stores.

These investments do more than save money. They also make for better shopping environments. At Vic’s Market in Sacramento, California, for example, new freezer units not only save about $1,600 annually, but also have helped sales by eliminating temperature fluctuations within the store. “People complained that it was too cold in the freezer aisle before,” explains Vic D’Stefani, the owner. “With the new equipment they shop longer.” The store’s initial investment of about $145,000 will be recouped in just three years thanks to annual utility-bill savings of $48,000.

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For more information about energy saving building operations practices, please visit the BetterBricks website.

Your Guide to Uncovering Energy Savings

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 18:27:00 GMT

By Brad Weaver, Northwest Energy Consulting

Occupants in one part of the buildings complain that they are too cold. In another part of the building they are too hot. You, the building engineer get blamed for it all. You know there's a problem, a symptom, but you don't have a clue as to its cause. Maybe you alter set-points or equipment schedules to compensate. Yet you don't have time, staff or budget to thoroughly investigate the situation or hire an outside consultant. The result is to fix the problem for as little time and money as possible and get on with putting out another fire. In the meantime your building is wasting energy and you might never know about it.

Does this sound familiar? I have seen problems like this over and over in all kinds of buildings. In my experience, a building can easily reduce its energy consumption 10 percent or more by looking for common problems such as uncontrolled outside air, failed sensors, equipment running more than needed and simultaneous heating and cooling. That's why we developed this simple Building Symptom Diagnosis Tool.

We aimed to build a "cookbook" for building engineers, as well as design engineers and service contractors, to quickly pinpoint the cause of problems in their facility. The tool currently lists 65 symptoms which can be signs of energy waste. Each symptom has a table of possible underlying causes. Many have been expanded with a guide on how to investigate by physical inspection and the use of Direct Digital Control (DDC) system trend logging capabilities.

This tool doesn't cover all potential problems in all buildings as each building is unique in its construction and HVAC system design and operation. The intent of the tool is to cover the majority of conditions, plus have a feedback mechanism where users can report specific conditions in their facilities that differ from the website content. We will update the tool as more information comes in.

Using the Symptom Diagnosis Tool

Here are some examples of how I've used the tool to help building engineers discover the root causes of building symptoms and achieve energy savings. I discovered these problems during the course of conducting EPA ENERGY STAR certifications, or building audits for specific symptoms. These examples all involve symptoms related to problems with the building envelope. All too often envelope issues only manifest themselves through complaints about the HVAC system, especially during cold weather. The building engineer typically gets the brunt of the blame from the occupants, with the design engineer as a close second. This is especially true in buildings where the potential for thermal stack effect is present.

These two examples demonstrate the most common symptom:
Symptom #3 - Exterior doors are hard to open or don't close securely.

Example 1: A 23-story high-rise in downtown Seattle
This facility has a large lobby with both revolving and standard doors. The standard doors open outward and were very hard to pull, exceeding the minimum pressure required by ADA standards. Occupants could feel cold air over 50 feet away from the doors inside the lobby and building engineers were constantly adjusting the closures to try to maintain uniform operation. During the winter it was necessary to install electric radiant heaters in the lobby for building personnel, who wore overcoats and gloves due to the drafts.

Figure 1 shows the table of possible causes for the symptom. You can find it at BetterBricks.com/operations, then follow these links: > Tools and Technical Advice > Symptom Diagnosis Tool > Air Distribution: Exterior doors are hard to open or don't close securely. The table can be printed out and used as a checklist.

The table first list "explanations" which are conditions that may cause the symptom but are either out of the control of the building engineer or would require a capital project to fix. Next lists the most likely "problems" which can be solved with low-cost repairs or operational adjustments.

Figure 1. Summary Table for Symptom #3

In this case, a combination of the first three problems was uncovered during the physical survey and were quite fixable.

The relief/exhaust air fans, meant to adjust airflow to maintain correct building pressure, were operating off faulty space pressure sensors. They were exhausting ten times more air than needed, which caused the building to experience negative pressure.
The upper floor mechanical rooms have multiple gravity-operated relief air dampers which were not operating properly during cold weather, allowing stack effect pressure to push them open and let heated air escape. Other dampers were stuck open, and there were 6" air gaps between the frames that were never sealed during construction.
Relief air vents at the roof of the stairwells were wide open. The flow of heated air escaping the building through the stairwells was so large that doors in the parking garage 25 stories below, under the facility, would not close on their own.
The freight elevator accessed all mechanical floors with no vestibules installed. Large amounts of air were routinely pulled from the relief air floor to the outside air floor through the elevator shaft. This greatly reduced proper outside air quantities.

Corrections to this facility are currently underway. The energy savings from properly controlling outside air should be substantial.

Example 2: A 5-story office building in downtown Seattle

This building is one of a 3-building complex, all similar in size and design. The facility was benchmarked using EPA's ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager and was found to be consistently 10 points lower than the other two buildings. A walkthrough revealed that the rooftop HVAC unit relief air fans cycled ON every few minutes. The lobby and retail stores were under negative pressure and large amounts of cold outside air would enter the building every time a door was opened. We found that the wind was not a factor.

The facility has large amounts of outside air and exhaust ducting passing through it to an adjacent structure, suggesting a problem with an uncontrolled connection. Wall construction and shaft conditions were investigated to determine if these intake ducts were pulling air from the building instead of outside as designed, however the physical inspection showed no leakage. I was completely puzzled until I received a call from the building engineer disclosing that a series of exterior louvers for tenant use were not properly sealed as he had originally thought. They were difficult to physically inspect, and he had taken the original contractor's word that they were sealed during tenant fit-out. Once sealed, energy performance improved.

Reduce Consumption 10% or More

As you can see, with simple observations and some guidance from the Building Symptom Diagnosis Tool, a technically savvy facility professional can find and correct problems that waste energy, with the added benefit of better comfort for the occupants. Building engineers can easily reduce energy consumption in their facilities by 10% or more by looking for common problems such as uncontrolled outside air, failed sensors, equipment running more than needed and simultaneous heating and cooling.

For additional information, check out Common Opportunities: The Top Four, found at BetterBricks.com/operations then follow these links: >Tools and Technical Advice. This article contains links to the Symptom Diagnosis Tool to help you get started.

Getting Started

Finding the cause of a symptom of poor energy performance will involve inspecting your building and collecting and analyzing trend logs from your (DDC) system. For general guidance in getting ready for these two activities, see: Getting Ready to Find Problems by Inspection (PDF) Getting Ready to Find and Confirm Problems by Trend-Logging (PDF) Identifying Problems Now you are ready to tackle specific symptoms and find the underlying cause. This Symptom-Diagnosis Tool helps you identify and better understand what causes a large number of important symptoms. To use the Symptom-Diagnosis Tool: Select the appropriate equipment type to display a list of possible symptoms. Select a candidate symptom from that list. Read specific advice on what might be causing that symptom in that equipment.

Finding the cause of a symptom of poor energy performance will involve inspecting your building and collecting and analyzing trend logs from your (DDC) system. For general guidance in getting ready for these two activities, see:

Identifying Problems
Now you are ready to tackle specific symptoms and find the underlying cause. This Symptom-Diagnosis Tool helps you identify and better understand what causes a large number of important symptoms.

To use the Symptom-Diagnosis Tool:

Select the appropriate equipment type to display a list of possible symptoms.
Select a candidate symptom from that list.
Read specific advice on what might be causing that symptom in that equipment.

Stay up to date with the latest building facility tips, energy management case studies and expert advice with the BetterBricks E-Newsletter. Sign up Today!

For more information about energy saving building operations practices, please visit the BetterBricks website.

School District Strikes it Rich with Commissioning

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 18:08:00 GMT

By Kelly M. Kirkland, CSBA, O'Brien & Company

The fourth grade classrooms are too warm. A motor is broken. The vice principal's office is stuffy. A louver is stuck. What happens when problems like this crop up in most school districts? How do they impact the building's energy use? How does it detract from the quality of the teaching and learning? Can most school districts even begin to answer these questions?

At the Central Kitsap School District, the core team of facilities professionals know exactly what is going on in each school, and how it impacts utility costs district-wide. The ongoing commissioning they undertake improves the indoor environment for both students and teachers, and saves the district hundreds of thousands of dollars each year.

Definition of Commissioning: Commissioning is a systematic process of ensuring that a building is working as it is designed, in accordance with the owner's needs, and at peak efficiency.

Commissioning: Facilities manager as Detective
It may not be as full of drama as CSI, but it's every bit as meticulous. Each month, Central Kitsap School District's crack team of facilities professionals review their utility data for clues to wasted energy, and investigate the problem schools to find the culprit. The commissioning process started with simple metrics. By comparing the Energy Use Index (EUI), which is kBTUs per square foot, against schools across the Puget Sound region and within the District, Central Kitsap identified which of their schools were the biggest energy users.

Richard Best, Director of Capital Projects and Facilities, says, "our maintenance staff understand individual components of their buildings well, but not how the whole system works together." To get the help he needed, he hired an outside firm to help the district in their first attempt at commissioning. "We found enough good information on the first four projects and, in anticipation of additional mechanical/electrical capital projects, we decided that we should hire someone in-house."

Funded in part by Puget Sound Energy's Resource Conservation Manager (RCM) program, Central Kitsap hired an in-house commissioning agent and Facilities Project Manager, George Kevins. George is a mechanical engineer who works hand-in-hand with Becky Asencio, Environmental Resource Coordinator. Kevins worked as a private commissioning agent before moving over to the school district. Asencio, a chemical engineer by training, handles indoor air quality issues, energy tracking, asbestos issues, and materials safety data sheets. "They are a great match" Best says. "George looks to make sure we're getting the best energy savings, and Becky keeps an eye out for the comfort of the students and staff." Asencio manages a database to log the energy data, and creates graphs and charts to bring to their meetings. Best meets with his team monthly so that they can compare current trends to recent history. "When we see energy use beginning to creep up we go back out and take a look. That's why measurement is so important. Given that the degree days were the same, why are we burning more energy? Was it a special event or something that needs to be fixed?" explains Best. (Degree days are a measurement used to determine heating and cooling needs.) The team compares each school against other schools and since the last time it was commissioned.

Their monthly meeting, looking for minor variations, is just part of the picture. They also take an in-depth look at the top three or four worst-performing schools from the previous year. Armed with utility bills, and a full inventory of the types of systems in the building, age and history of the equipment, Kevins and the mechanic assigned to those buildings inspect every piece of equipment and take note of what they find. Is it operating? Is it operating as it was intended? If not, why not?

Control Issues
Besides a dedicated staff, the best thing Central Kitsap has going for them is a robust Direct Digital Control (DDC) program that not only turns equipment on-and-off, but allows staff to view the precise conditions in multiple spots in each school in nearly real-time (within 24 hours). "This data is much more useful than an electric and gas bill every month or two," laughs Best. The DDC doesn't record energy use, but Central Kitsap gets data from their utility, Puget Sound Energy. Best says, "We're a member of their EUI [energy use index] program so we can print out exactly what we use each day by going online. I use that to look at how much we're burning in the middle of the night. We should be using roughly half a Watt per square foot."

Modern DDC systems are a network of equipment controls and sensors, with a software program that talks to and coordinates them all from a central location. When the 4th grade classroom at PineCrest Elementary gets too warm, the DDC can open a louver to increase ventilation. Most schools have some kind of central building control system, but the newer DDCs are superior in that they provide an exceptional level of detail to the building operator. Central Kitsap can see the floor plan for every school in the district, and click on individually-controlled pods to see what's happening with each piece of equipment in that area. "When we look back at the data one day at a time, we can tell what time the kids were in class versus when they were in between classes in the hallways," says Kevins. Sensors can send back information on the temperature, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, relative humidity, and VOCs (volatile organic compounds). "We usually don't care what the exact CO2 level is at any given moment, it's more helpful for us to look at trends." Sometimes, the exact data is critically important. Kevins adds, "if the temperature in the central district server room gets too high I get an urgent email from the DDC which means I don't get a frantic call from our IT staff."

While Best's team looks at the big picture, the mechanics assigned to each school can access the DDC from any computer in the district, set their building to run on whatever schedule is needed, and receive at their discretion email alerts about anything the DDC monitors.

Results
In 2005, Central Kitsap took a closer look at Silver Ridge Elementary. The 50,000 square foot building, constructed in 1990, was using much more energy than the District's other elementary schools, so in 2005 it was targeted for an energy improvement project and retro-commissioning. Silver Ridge utilizes electric heat pumps for heating. The DDC control system for heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) elements was upgraded to allow more control of the heating schedules and locations, as well as better damper controls. The HVAC system and its DDC system were fully commissioned. The combination of the upgrade and commissioning resulted in a 32% reduction in energy use and avoided costs of $22,000 in the first year. The following year, in spite of a colder than normal winter, the school had a 20% reduction in energy as compared to the base year, with additional avoided costs of $6,000.

Since 2001, Central Kitsap has received over $800,000 in grants and rebates for energy efficiency improvements mostly from Puget Sound Energy. Typically awarded for a specific project, they've received money to upgrade everything from programmable thermostats to a new lighting system for the stadium. They figure that the 30 hours they spend annually in planning meetings compared to the $150,000-$200,000 they save each year is a pretty good return on investment.

Central Kitsap's Top Tips For starting a Commissioning Process

1. Start somewhere. If you don't have good historical energy data for some places, start by measuring your Energy Use Index (EUI) and comparing it to schools, both in and out of the district.

2. Make time for it. If you don't have dedicated staff to manage the process, look into getting a Resource Conservation Manager. These positions are often partially funded by utilities.

3. You can't manage what you can't measure. Set up a system that allows you to monitor energy use data on an ongoing basis. If you have the resources, and have a DDC system work with a vendor who will set up floor plan graphics that precisely match your buildings so you really know what you're looking at.

4. Make a plan. Put together an energy program for each building that takes into account the age of the building, its history, and the type and age of its systems. This will help guide your commissioning process and provide a way to track your findings.

5. Get the right help. If you don't have someone one staff who is qualified to do commissioning- and it is a highly skilled profession-consider hiring someone to do it for you.

6. Document everything. Documentation will help you track exactly what you have, where it's located, what it's supposed to do, when it was tested and the results, what needs to be fixed and what needs to be monitored.

7. Listen. Your commissioning agent or DDC system won't tell you the whole story. Listen to the building staff and students to make sure the building is working for them. A successful commissioning process should save energy and reduce indoor environmental quality complaints.

8. Look for incentives. Contact your local utilities to see what kind of programs are available to help schools with energy upgrades. Many grants are available for specific projects, especially if you can demonstrate that you've done your homework and can show how much energy you'll save.

9. Punch that list. Your documentation will help you fix problems as you find them or delegate tasks across the maintenance department.

10. Be vigilant. At some point you may have trouble reducing your energy use dramatically any further. Congratulations! But unless you continue to monitor there is nothing stopping waste from creeping back.

Additional Resources

Kelly M. Kirkland, CSBA is a Project Associate at O'Brien & Company, a sustainability and green building consulting firm that works with educational facilities to achieve certification under the LEED rating system and the Washington Sustainable Schools Protocol. The firm has been instrumental in bringing sustainability improvements to schools from design and construction to operations and maintenance. Kelly can be reached at kelly@obrienandco.com.

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For more information about energy saving building operations practices, please visit the BetterBricks website.

Symptom-Diagnosis Tools

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 17:08:00 GMT

You may notice possible symptoms of poor energy performance in your building. For example, a chilled-water pump might operate significantly more hours than the chiller. You then face the task of finding and resolving the underlying cause of the symptom. The cause of the symptom may in fact be a problem (for example, incorrect control settings) or it may be a condition that is not a problem or cannot be avoided (for example, setpoints that are based on the needs of a process load and not on occupant comfort). Please note, the hyperlinks in this post link to tools and resources on the BetterBricks website.

Finding the cause of a symptom of poor energy performance will involve inspecting your building and collecting and analyzing trend logs from your Direct Digital Control (DDC) system. For general guidance in getting ready for these two activities, see:

Getting Ready to Find Problems by Inspection (PDF)

Getting Ready to Find and Confirm Problems by Trend-Logging (PDF)

Identifying Problems

Now you are ready to tackle specific symptoms and find the underlying cause. This Symptom-Diagnosis Tool helps you identify and better understand what causes a large number of important symptoms.

To use the Symptom-Diagnosis Tool:

Select the appropriate equipment type below to display a list of possible symptoms.
Select a candidate symptom from that list.
Read specific advice on what might be causing that symptom in that equipment.

To begin, select the appropriate equipment type:

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An Interview with Peter Rumsey of Rumsey Engineers

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 22:16:00 GMT

BetterBricks recently caught up with owner and managing principal of Rumsey Engineers, Peter Rumsey. Peter has worked in engineering and energy consulting since the mid 1980s, and is widely recognized as global player in energy efficiency and a leader in sustainable building design.

BetterBricks: What and/or who has inspired your career path and commitment to sustainable design?

Rumsey: In the late seventies, I was a student at UC Berkley and watched the nation go through this difficult energy crisis due to oil shocks from Arab oil embargos. I remember long lines at gas stations and the escalating national concern regarding energy. This problem really directed my attention to sustainable design and renewable energy. Concurrently, there was controversy surrounding the boom in construction of new power plants. Additionally, tax credits were starting to take off in California within the solar and wind energy industries.

All of these events set the stage for me to start thinking about sustainable design. It was clear that energy efficiency and renewable energy were key parts of the solution, both being cost effective and beneficial to the environment. And they're still part of the solution.

I was also greatly influenced by my mentor, Lee Eng Lock from Singapore, who inspired me to focus on sustainable design. I met him when I was in Southeast Asia working on energy issues. On a more conceptual level, I have also been inspired by people like Amory Lovins.

BetterBricks: For a long time now you've explored the use of integrated design in regard to mechanical and electrical systems. How do you arrive at integrated solutions and how do you convince your clients of these strategies and coordinate with other team members, particularly architects?

Rumsey: Arriving at an integrated design solution can happen many different ways. In low-energy design, it takes a whole team to be fully onboard and the person that's going to rally the team around a common understanding is the person who hired the design team in the first place. Integration happens from all of the team members working together. If we are not all on the same page about making sustainability a priority, then we're not all going to work together to achieve that goal.

Once everybody is on the same page, it becomes a question of what we can do within the budget while looking at affordable solutions for sustainability. As designers, we are very good at solving problems and coming up with solutions within these parameters. We spend a lot of time thinking about not just how to make buildings low-energy, but also how to make them affordable. As a result, we constantly look for strategies to achieve a low-energy building at comparable costs to a standard building. For instance, adding more insulation will not only save energy, but allow for a smaller heating and cooling system. Less money is spent on purchasing this equipment, which compensates for the added cost of insulation. We look for these synergies and interactions in order to keep sustainability affordable.

BetterBricks: I'm sure you are familiar with the AIA's 2030 Challenge. How would you characterize the best approach or strategies to get to net-zero carbon buildings?

Rumsey: The energy efficiency strategies will be, in almost every case, more affordable than a renewable strategy like a photovoltaic system. The tax incentives and rebates offered for photovoltaic systems are not that bad in terms of affordability and pay back, but the energy efficiency strategies are always cheaper. When we work on zero-energy buildings, we typically aim for 50 percent or lower energy use compared to the traditional building code required, which is already beating the current 2030 Challenge target. We build beyond the energy savings, which makes the photovoltaic systems smaller and more affordable.

It is fairly straightforward and easy when you are looking at a single or two-story building, but it gets trickier when we are dealing with multi-story buildings. We have to start thinking about putting photovoltaics on the façade, using open space over parking areas and supplementing photovoltaics a little bit more. We've even worked on seven-story, 700,000 square-foot office building outside of Paris that went beyond net-zero and to net-positive energy. There are examples of larger buildings going for this, but then this kind of effort begins to influence the shape, orientation and other design elements of the building.

BetterBricks: What have you learned from your experience applying Factor 10 concepts to buildings? Any advice for architects or engineers?

Rumsey: There are several steps. The first is to determine the building occupants' needs and requirements and how to reduce the load. We use simple Victorian engineering, as I like to call it, to come up with strategies that will lower energy use. It's a straightforward progression of steps of first lowering the load followed by making sure we are right-sizing and not over-sizing equipment.

We then move on to maximizing the use of natural sources of heating and cooling, such as natural ventilation, passive solar, nighttime purge of buildings in the summer, etc. Next, we select energy efficient equipment that is much smaller and simpler. Last and not least, we apply controls carefully and judiciously, but not excessively.

Conceptually it is very straightforward. If you meticulously follow all of those steps and pay attention to the details, you will get stunning results.

Amory Lovins has talked about the concept of "tumbling through the cost barrier" for many years. Can we get even more savings at a lower cost than what we thought was possible? I like to apply this idea to existing building systems such as Variable Air Volume (VAV) systems that are typical in commercial office buildings. We can take the VAV system and improve it bit-by-bit and get it better or we could just change out the whole design and come up with a better heating and cooling system, which we've done in several buildings. If we start with a new system, we've found that we can indeed get this Factor-10 energy savings at a reasonable cost and often times comparable to the standard system.

In this approach, we are reinventing how we design buildings and are making tremendous changes in the way we view our buildings. In order to arrive at this reinvention, we have to pay very close attention to the details. What we are finding is that architects and engineers have to carefully collaborate from the start. For instance, the type of glazing an architect selects has a huge impact on my success in the project as an engineer. As a result, we're very interactive with architects, whereas in the past it's been much more of a relaxed thing. We could let the architects do what they please and we engineers could do what we want and sort of meet somewhere in the middle. It's not like that anymore, especially if we're trying to achieve this next generation of building.

BetterBricks: What do you see as future trends or new approaches with regards to energy in new construction projects? What about future business opportunities in the sustainable building market?

Rumsey: The trend in residential and commercial buildings is toward zero energy, which will be center stage over the next 10 years. Current legislation in California requires that the majority of new residential and commercial buildings are to be built in a zero energy fashion by 2030. As the price of energy continues to stay high and concerns of climate change continue to grow, we're going to be talking a lot about this issue. There is going to be a huge amount of time, effort and money spent on going back and retrofitting and renovating existing buildings. That is where the majority of energy needs to be saved because that is where the vast majority of energy is being consumed.

The biggest area for business opportunities are with companies that can renovate and improve existing residential and commercial buildings. These strategies are straightforward, make sense and don't necessarily require the invention of new equipment. Over the next 10 years, we'll see government and utility incentives making retrofits very attractive. What's more, renovating and retrofitting buildings is vastly cheaper than drilling new oil wells and building new power plants. It's one of the cheapest sources available in reducing carbon. We'll see a great deal of focus on retrofitting and renovating because it is so affordable and plays a vital role in restoring the environment.

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For more information about energy saving building operations practices, please visit the BetterBricks website.

Can We Achieve 30 percent or Better? Yes we Can (and Have)

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 21:37:00 GMT

By John Jennings, BetterBricks Market Manager, New Construction

The recent press release by NAIOP (now known as the Commercial Real Estate Development Association) attempts to throw cold water on the growing momentum for sustainable energy efficient buildings. They assert that increases of energy efficiency of 30 percent or more relative to ASHRAE 90.1-2004 aren’t economically feasible.

Those who have been designing, building and promoting high performance buildings for a long time are finding the study very difficult to swallow. But let’s all use it as a learning opportunity. Energy efficiency advocates now can see where the commercial real estate mainstream is in their thinking and efficiency experts can take this opportunity to inform NAIOP and others that these buildings are being achieved today - and they are financially feasible.

First of all, just in the Northwest - where electricity rates are lower than those used in the study - there are a lot of buildings that have achieved significant levels of energy efficiency. These buildings range from high rise office buildings, to schools, to university buildings and even healthcare facilities. In a recent meeting of the BetterBricks Integrated Design Lab Network, lab directors presented a list of over 50 buildings that they have been involved with that have achieved levels better than 30 percent over Washington or Oregon code (which are slightly better than the corresponding levels of ASHRAE 90.1).

A recent study of 121 LEED buildings by the New Building Institute (NBI), found that on average these buildings were achieving savings of 28 percent with one-quarter above 50% and some as high as 75 percent. NBI’s Getting to Fifty program also contains a register of buildings achieving close to, or better than, 50 percent savings. For anyone needing more evidence, there is the USDOE High Performance Building Database and the magazine High Perfomance Buildings, that presents detailed case studies every month.

Several Northwest buildings further illustrate what is achievable. These include the Idaho Central Credit Union office in Chubbuck, Idaho; Banner Bank in Boise, Idaho; OHSU Center for Health and Healing in Portland, Oregon. The Idaho Central Credit Union office is a typical small city bank branch with 68,000 square feet built in 2007. It achieved energy savings of 35 percent. The 180,000 square foot Banner Bank building built in 2006 appears on the outside to be a fairly conventional mid-height office building. Yet it has received LEED Platinum certification and measured energy savings have been around 48 percent. According to the developer, Gary Christiansen, these savings were achieved at no incremental cost.

The OHSU project is much more complex. It is essentially a 15-story, 401,000 square foot “bedless hospital” with surgery suites, labs, diagnostic facilities, pharmacy, doctors offices, pool and spa. A recent post occupancy evaluation has found the building savings to be close to 45 percent over ASHRAE 90.1-2004, with an incremental cost for energy efficiency measures of less than 1 percent of total cost.

What bothers me the most though is the approach NAIOP took to the analysis and the way the results were disseminated. Rather than research the state of the market, they base their claims on energy simulation modeling of one existing building design. As a result, they lock out many of the key elements designers can manipulate to improve performance. No consideration was given to building orientation, massing, daylighting, shading, natural ventilation, etc.

The study simply adds a number of conventional efficiency measures to a generally inefficient base building. This obviously has limitations. It is understood by most building scientists and efficiency experts that there is an economic limit for simple additive efficiency measures. Estimates range from savings of 25 percent to 40 percent. To achieve higher levels of savings cost effectively requires an integrated design approach where cost efficiencies result from down-sizing or eliminating mechanical and electrical equipment due to synergies between systems (i.e. taking advantage of the interactive effects between heating and cooling and lighting).

The NAIOP press release discounts integrated design by saying it “was impractical in the study’s building prototype.” A number of advanced strategies were “not included in the study due to lack of modeling capability, sufficient data or project scope.” Instead, the study just increased the efficiency of the HVAC equipment for the same size load instead of a reduced load and smaller sized equipment. The study then concluded that to get to 30 percent or beyond would require adding photovoltaic (PV) panels, driving the cost sky high. They are correct that adding on-site renewable energy-based generation should come at the end, but only after all feasible efficiency is achieved, when the costs of the renewable systems can be reduced to meet the lower load. To meet the 2030 Challenge targets will require first maximizing the efficiency of the design (using climate resources, adjusting schedules and space or use programming, lowest possible loads, most efficient systems, etc.) then adding renewable energy.

Another important consideration is the method used to determine economic feasibility. While simple payback (used in the NAIOP study) is certainly one limited measure of financial performance it leaves out of the analysis the long-term financial benefit from energy savings over the building's lifetime. A better measure is life cycle cost analysis. Astute developers who deftly balance leasing terms so that tenants and building owners both benefit from these savings can increase the property’s finances and marketability. A simple payback analysis is just that – simple. It paints an incomplete picture of the project economics.

The press release uses the study findings to take a stab at policies seeking to set building energy codes to higher levels. Codes set the legal minimum and thus level the playing field. Codes do not set one method for all as stated by the press release. Instead, codes set prescriptive requirements for each climate zone and also provide an optional performance path target to allow designers to find innovative ways to meet those targets.

Ironically, in June 2008, NAIOP came out with a policy on energy efficiency that seems to contradict recent statements by its Executive Director in the press release. The policy states that “NAIOP commits to:

Encourage the real estate development industry to employ every technically feasible, cost-effective, sustainable strategy available to increase energy efficiency of new and existing buildings, and to employ cleaner, low carbon energy alternatives (including onsite energy), wherever possible.
Advance public policies that accelerate ongoing energy efficiency and sustainability gains; support cleaner (including onsite) energy alternatives; and promote, wherever practical, less carbon intensive transportation options to and from buildings.
Engage in educational programs, seminars and conferences to help employ best practices for energy efficient development.”

There are simply too many examples of buildings achieving energy savings of 30 percent or higher – with owners and occupants readily willing to expound their benefits – for the NAIOP study to have any credence.

Now we need to begin working together to figure out how to best achieve the 2030 Challenge targets for all new construction over the next 20 years. This process is beginning with numerous “Net-Zero Building” conferences and articles. We need to broaden the dialogue to include the real estate and development community.

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What are Your Building's Performance Indicators?

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 00:57:00 GMT

Performance indicators help you evaluate the energy efficiency of your building. For example, you can see if your building uses more energy per square foot than similar buildings, or you can spot suspicious seasonal or daily spikes in energy use. Please note that the links below take you to specific tools on the BetterBricks website. Three types of tools will help you develop performance indicators and analyze your building's performance:

Tracking Utility Bills
Benchmarking
Trend Logging

The links below take you to pages that explain each type of tool, explain best practices for using the tools, show you how to collect the data required by these tools, and help you select the best tool(s) for each of your buildings.

Tracking Utility Bills

This helps evaluate your building's energy use over time to provide clues to hidden problems such as unusually high consumption during a particular season of the year.

Benchmarking

This helps compare the energy performance of your building with its performance during a previous time period, or with the performance of other buildings in your management portfolio, or with the average performance of similar buildings in a broad regional or national database such as that provided by EPA's Energy Star Portfolio Manager.

Trend Logging

This helps you to use data measured over time as a diagnostic tool. This may include data from utility interval demand meters, DDC, and electrical submeters installed on building equipment.

Several software tools offered by utilities and public and private groups can help you track utility bills, benchmark your building, and trend-log data.

Get information about available tracking, benchmarking, and trend-logging tools.

Stay up to date with the latest building facility tips, energy management case studies and expert advice with the BetterBricks E-Newsletter. Sign up Today!

For more information about energy saving building operations practices, please visit the BetterBricks website.

Rethinking Design

NEEA's BetterBricks Initiative — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 00:51:00 GMT

Written by Jeff Cole, Konstrukt, Inc. for BetterBricks

Using Integrated Design for Achieving Highly Energy Efficient Buildings

Integrated Design is a process that can be widely applied across many elements important to building development. It is this wide applicability which makes it attractive to designers interested in sustainable or environmentally sound design, where multiple elements are considered interactively, and where sustainability and energy efficiency goals place additional constraints.

Many designers use some elements of Integrated Design. In general the integrated design approach is more holistic and inclusive. More players are involved early and more options considered.

What Makes it Integrated Design

Early and regular collaboration of entire D&C team with the owner in an iterative process
Performance goals set during programming
Interactive analysis of site, climate, facility use and loads yields synthesis: integrated solutions
Analysis of alternatives based on all costs over measure life
Commissioning with post-occupancy assessment and feedback
Front loading the design effort identifies risk issues and mitigations early
Using a “whole project” iterative process can yield emergent features and synergies which mitigate risks and enhance benefits
Using a life cycle approach to costs and benefits, with post-occupancy validation, reduces exposure
Commissioning validates performance

The Core Process

At the heart of the process from programming through Schematic Design is the search for synergies: i.e. strategies with resultant benefits greater than the sum of individual design decisions.

Integrated design synthesizes climate, use,
loads and systems resulting in a more
comfortable and productive environment,
and a building that is more energy-efficient
than current best practices.

The key mechanism of the systems integration process is a highly iterative, open ended analysis of all of the major components and options…in effect, a search engine for synergies. This is the key practice that differentiates integrated design.

Here we see schematically the cross-optimization thinking process, where the interplay of all four elements contributes to a final solution.

Looking for synergistic opportunities:

The climate can both create and serve loads
Occupancy schedules may be malleable
Thermal and visual comfort standards relate to people, not spaces
Building and site design as opportunities to reduce or eliminate HVAC system loads

By implementing a whole building, integrated design approach, the team may be able to realize significant savings in lighting, heating, ventilating, and air conditioning systems, or in some cases even eliminating systems, allowing funds to be invested in mechanical upgrades and/or enhancements to other parts of the building.

This is a two step process. First, starting not with systems but with loads, we use resources, such as daylight and site orientation, to reduce loads by half.

The result is a need for smaller systems that use less energy. In addition, smaller heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems mean lower construction costs.

Next we apply system efficiency to reduce energy use even further. By combining the two approaches, we achieve even greater operational savings at a lower first cost.

Integrated design provides the potential for creating buildings with lower first costs and large energy savings. In this example, reducing HVAC and lighting loads—created by the interaction of climate, use and design—should precede the sizing of HVAC and electric lighting systems. Installing efficient systems may be cost effective at the scale of "parts," but masks the much larger benefits that might be obtained from an integrated design systems approach.