The end of a sustainable building’s design and construction phase is the beginning of the next – maximizing the building’s energy performance.
Parts
I and II of this three-part series addressed Budgeting
Green Building Construction Costs and Performing
Life Cycle Costing (LCC) of the alternative building system
energy savings.
The following is a case study
outlining Step III of the process – monitoring green building performance.
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| Gettysburg Museum and Visitor Center Gettysburg, PA |
The Gettysburg Museum and Visitor Center has been in operation since 2008. Kinsley Construction, the
Construction Manager for the project, participated in the three-step Building
Green Best Practices.
Step I – The Design/Construction team budgeted the
sustainable systems and determined the LEED Gold initial design &
construction costs added 4% to the budget.
Step II – The team performed energy modeling and
Life Cycle Costing, comparing a central hot water and chilled water system to
an alternative geothermal heat pump system. The analysis determined the
geothermal system yielded a seven year payback.
Step
III – The current building’s energy savings are being generated from
the sustainable geothermal system. The Museum and Visitor Center’s trained
facility operations staff monitors the building’s performance, visitor
occupancy and utility consumption daily. The installation of the Variable
Frequency Drives (VFDs) on the buildings Air Handling Units (AHU) have
generated energy saving paybacks of less than one year. Efficient management of
the building’s lighting systems and connected loads and installing VFDs for
major equipment have yielded an additional 34% annual electrical savings since
2008.
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| Fieldside Commons Office Campus in Aberdeen, MD |
Also, Kinsley has recently
completed Fieldside Commons Office Campus in Aberdeen, MD as an energy
performance prototype. The actual performance of the building’s energy systems,
usage, occupancy and weather will be measured, monitored and compared to the
calibrated energy model to determine if the building is performing according to
the planned return on the investment.
Kinsley offers the expertise
and tools to assist owners in the three-step decision making process by
determining sustainable construction costs, performing Life Cycle Costing of
sustainable alternatives, and monitoring green building performance for the
most cost effective building project.
