For our next series of Advisory Board member guest posts, we are asking "What are you working on?"  Advisory Board member Sara Sweeney starts off this week with all of the projects that have been keeping her busy lately.  You can find out more about Sara on the B2S team page.

I feel a little bit like this post is a What I Did on my Summer Vacation post, and that’s kind of fun. 

2009 was by no means a stellar year for most of us. And if Raquel and James had asked me to write this post a year ago, it would have been a pretty short post, stating “trying to get work.” Last year at this time, I was teaching and that was it. However, because of that, because of having no work, it forced me to innovate both myself and my business in ways I did not expect I would need to do. It also opened doors to opportunities I never expected –even if the opportunities took months to come to fruition. Today, I can write that I am quite busy on several different fronts. 

I continue to teach part time at Philadelphia University, which I love. I teach a class on building systems and materials to the sophomores in the Department of Architecture. It’s their first introduction to how buildings go together, how they really work. Not only do I love the class and teaching, I also love the energy of the students and learning from them. It is indeed a win-win scenario. 

On the business front, I have a few LEED consulting projects in the works now. One project is with my former firm, Blackney Hayes Architects and is a new 72,000 sf academic building for Ocean County College. It is my first LEED v3 project and I am very excited to be really getting my head into the new rating system. I have also just started two smaller projects, also LEED v3 projects. One is a small Black Box theater for a CDC in the Kensington Section of Philadelphia, with a very talented young and local firm, ISA, Brian Phillips and Daryn Edwards at the healm. The other project is a new mixed use building for PBCIP, a non-profit neighborhood organization in Camden, NJ. PBCIP wants to build a landmark new sustainable office, retail and training facility at a prominent intersection in the Parkside section of Camden. Once a vibrant industrial city, Camden now has the reputation of being one of the worst cities in the United States. To be part of this project is very exciting. Also exciting is the architecture and engineering firm I am working with, DCM Architect + Engineering, a Camden-based firm headed by Eduardo Guzman and Robert Bensen. Eduardo is one of the most talented and forward-thinking architects I have met, and I can only say the same about Robert, who is a P.E.  

I am also working with strategic partner, Scott Chrisner, of Chrisner Group, on the Home Performance with Energy Star residential energy audit program, as well as offering full service green project management. It is part of the New Jersey Clean Energy program, and being a part of this new program here in New Jersey is very exciting.  

Finally, I am being trained by Bedford Cost Segregation, a company dedicated to providing cost segregation services, to help them out with projects. It is essentially a tax planning strategy to accelerate depreciation deductions and improve cash flow. It is a completely different way to look at a building, since its focus is breaking down the building specific to components which depreciate in 39, 15, and 7 years. The faster a component depreciates, the more money is available in deductions up front. I really wasn’t sure if I’d like the work –I was able to test the waters a few weeks ago on one project. I was surprised at how interesting I find it, and now I am taking the next steps to learn more so I can continue consulting with them. 

Looking at this list, I never would have expected a year ago that this is what I would be working on, nor would I have expected I would be this busy. But I knew I needed to keep at it last year, and it has paid off in the end. Now, I need to get back to work!

The NY Times yesterday highlighted Jamestown Properties, a German commercial real estate company that is planning on undertaking sustainable renovations for all of its US properties.  You can read the full article here.  In the article, Matt Bronfman, the managing director and COO, mentions a "European perspective" as a reason why.  I am fairly certain that this perspective is just as conscious of company profits.  Here at Build2Sustain, we dedicated an entire white paper to the business benefits of sustainable renovation.  How long will it take for American companies to see the advantages in making similar investments in their holdings a high priority?

A little over a week ago, we highlighted Caterpillar as an example of what can be achieved with an intelligent retrofit.  The project earned LEED certification and the energy savings were well publicized.  But we weren't satisfied.  We know that the most important part of any business case is ROI and payback.  With that in mind, we reached out to Tom Gerike, Engineering Project Team Leader at Caterpillar to learn more.

1) Reports indicate your retrofit achieved an energy consumption reduction of more than 40% resulting in $800k worth of savings. We're always making the business case for sustainable retrofit and renovation; can you give us a sense of the ROI and payback period associated with the retrofit?

We spent approximately $3,000,000 to get this $800,000 in savings for a payback of 3.75 years.

2) Were there primary building systems you knew you could target when planning the retrofit or did you evaluate everything? What was the design process like?  

Primary building systems that were evaluated were the air handlers and air distribution, the chiller plant, and the lighting.  The design process was based on seeing what current equipment was not performing as it should have been and then looking for further improvement opportunities.  A walk-through audit was performed after maintenance improvements were made to determine what kind of engineering changes were needed for the systems.

3) As a result of your design process, what primary building systems were retrofitted? Were core systems retrofitted (HVAC, Lighting, Windows), was this largely a control-based retrofit, or both?

The major areas of work for this project were to convert the building from a constant volume system into a variable air volume system, controls upgrades to convert pneumatic controllers at terminal devices to direct digital controllers, control upgrades to the chiller plant, and the installation of an automated lighting system to schedule the lights on and off.

4) You achieved LEED Gold-EBOM certification for this project. Was LEED certification a primary goal of the project? How did that impact the way you approached the project?  

Yes, LEED certification was a primary goal.  It impacted the approach of the project in the following way.  To get LEED, you need a minimum score on the Energy Star of 69.  We were well below that value, so the energy improvements became a major focus of the project in order to reach that minimum score.  Also, the savings from the energy improvements went to offset the costs of additional changes need to achieve LEED.

5) How long did the project take from internal proposal to completion?  

We worked 2 years on this project.

6) Given the success of this project, are there future Caterpillar sites slated for similar retrofits?

Yes, we are always looking to make energy efficiency improvements that are in line with our enterprise sustainability goals.

We are so pleased to have Advisory Board Member, Yahya Henry, sharing his thoughts with us today.  You can find out more about Yahya on the B2S team page.

When I was younger, we played a game called “Green Light” (maybe you have as well). In this game, one person would close their eyes and spin around saying “Red Light, Green Light…Go!” and we’d race ahead to freeze in place before the person announcing stopped talking and opened their eyes. The whole goal was to make it to the end before anyone else.  

“Green Light…Go!”

As I was thinking about what I could write about this month that wasn’t boring or something else technical, “Green Light” came to mind. Our industry’s pursuit to achieve "the standard" in green building is very much that way – “Red Light, Green Light…Go!” Organizations like the USGBC are racing ahead to get "there" before anyone else; some businesses are positioning themselves as the "first" in their markets to embrace energy efficiency and so on. 

More and more reports are finding flaws in LEED accreditation and other rating systems. Energy reduction numbers are proving inaccurate, and there is still an ever-present knowledge gap between perceived and actual benefits of green building and sustainable design. 

“Yellow Light”

Playing a game with a flashing yellow caution light isn’t fun, but it is necessary. In playing a game where we rush to innovate this or that, I believe we really should pace ourselves. Our industry needs to fully understand the pros and cons of the products, certifications and perceived benefits we push onto the public.  

Greenwashing isn’t as obvious to consumers as it is to individuals who are in the business of creating and distributing the product or service. What happens when the next report comes out saying "this" doesn’t actually do "that" after a tenant has moved into a space that will allow for perceived workplace productivity gains, energy savings, or attaching their business name to a green building?

It’s too early to say how this game would play out, but I am erring on the side of caution.