Newsletter

New Buildings Institute is a nonprofit, public benefits corporation
making buildings better for people and the environment

Spring 2008 News from NBI

Mark your calendar for NBI Open House on June 5
Friends of NBI are invited to join us at our new Vancouver office for an open house on Thursday, June 5. Expanding from our White Salmon office, this new location opened late last year as a base for NBI staff living in the Portland/Vancouver area. The open house is planned to coincide with the next NBI Board meeting, and many of our board members will be at the event. Invitations with specific details will be sent to our newsletter subscribers this month.

Dan Harris Adds to NBI’s Technical Expertise
We’re pleased to announce the addition of Daniel Harris to the NBI staff. Dan is a professional engineer and holds an MS in Mechanical Engineering of Control Systems from the University of Washington. His experience is diverse - research and development in PEM fuel cells, building data analysis and energy management systems, wireless sensor networks, utility metering and building asset management. Most recently Dan worked as a consultant in New York City and Research Director for the Association for Energy Affordability developing building metering, monitoring and commodity pricing projects. Dan looks forward to providing services and analysis that result in practical solutions to reduce energy intensity in buildings.

NBI Broadens Focus on Measured Performance
Modeling energy-efficient building designs tells us how a new high performance building should perform, but the only way to really know how well a building operates after construction is to measure. More and more, NBI has been turning its attention to the practice of measured performance—the process of comparing a building's actual energy use with how it should perform given the installed efficiency measures. Our recent efforts:

• LEED Building Performance Study Released. An NBI study on measured energy performance of LEED buildings found that on average LEED buildings are delivering anticipated savings, performing 25-30% better than national average or modeled baselines (see our January 2008 newsletter for more). Individual building results, however, display a high degree of scatter, with some performing much better than average and some much worse. NBI is in the process of conducting follow-on analyses of the study’s best and the worst performing buildings.
  
• Measured Performance Steering Committee Formed. A National Steering Committee on Measured Performance met formally for the first time April 4 in Washington, DC to examine ways to increase the practice. The committee was established at the recommendation of efficiency and building industry leaders who had gathered last December to discuss the barriers to measured performance. NBI is facilitating the committee’s work, in conjunction with the EPA, ASHRAE, AIA and several national labs among others.
  
• EPA Study to Examine Measured Performance Methodologies. NBI is starting a three-year project for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that will focus on ways to gather more meaningful feedback on buildings. Under the project, NBI will evaluate currently available smart meter technologies and develop simplified reporting methodologies that automate advice on priorities for energy improvements. This information is intended to improve the accessibility of basic energy usage information, extract more useful insights from that basic information, and provide more timely and meaningful feedback to owners and operators.

Advanced Buildings Core Performance launches around New England
Efficiency Vermont, a statewide effort to promote more efficient use of electricity, officially kicked off its Advanced Buildings Core Performance program earlier this year at its Better Buildings by Design Conference. The program features standardized financial incentives from $0.60 per square foot and a flat $2500 per project for metering actual performance.

Efficiency Maine will follow suit later this spring. The predecessor to Core Performance, NBI’s Advanced Buildings Benchmark, was previously adopted by Maine’s High Performance Schools Program. Efficiency Maine will use the Core Performance Guide to help building designers and owners achieve their “high performance” goals in both public and private sector financed projects, without the cost burden of modeling.

Other utility sponsors offering Advanced Buildings Core Performance are in the process of transitioning from Benchmark to the new program. NSTAR will likely be the first to launch its new square-foot incentive offering sometime next month.

Heating and Cooling
NBI continues its involvement in several diverse HVAC projects:

• Desert CoolAire Technical Assessment. As follow-up to the CoolAire 2006 Report, NBI published the 2007 addendum, which reports on additional monitoring and equipment status. These reports document NBI’s lab and field technical assessments of eight Desert CoolAire prototype indirect evaporative air conditions on behalf of Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance and the Sacramento Municipal Utility District.
  
• Final FDD Report in Progress, WCEC Installs Diagnostic Tool. The Advanced Automated Commercial HVAC Fault Detection and Diagnostics (FDD) Commercialization program, funded through the California Energy Commission’s PIER (Public Interest Energy Research) effort, has been completed. The final report is currently under review. The project worked to commercialize three FDD products, with NBI managing market connections activities.

As a follow on, NBI Senior Program Manager Mark Cherniack is working with the Western Cooling Efficiency Center in Davis, California, to have fault detection diagnostics equipment installed on its advanced Lennox Strategos rooftop unit. The new web-based reporting tools will allow building owners/managers/HVAC contractors to check on unit performance 24x7 and spot degradation in operating performance efficiency. Cherniack also serves on the Center’s steering committee.

Lighting California’s Future Pushing for New Technologies
Lighting California’s Future (LCF) features nine technical projects and a cross-cutting market connections effort that will create and introduce energy-efficient, advanced lighting technologies in the state by 2009. With $3.7 million in funding from the California Energy Commission’s Public Interest Energy Research (PIER) Program, the initiative is intended to help meet the state’s growing need for energy efficiency and demand response.

LCF is managed by the Architectural Energy Corporation, with New Buildings Institute responsible for the market connections piece. “We are particularly excited about the opportunities presented by the LCF-funded technologies,” said Barb Hamilton, NBI’s lighting manager. “They include integrated lighting and controls systems, improved lighting controls strategies for load shedding [in new and retrofit construction] and a variety of high efficacy LED-based luminaires. We also have an exciting daylighting device that will include an indirect-direct diffuser for better visual comfort indoors,” Hamilton said. As they are developed, NBI will work to introduce the new technology packages to relevant audiences and work to accelerate their adoption. For more information on LCF, visit www.archenergy.com/lcf/ or stop by booth no. 1381 at LightFair 2008 May 28-30 in Las Vegas.

New Projects are Cropping Up at NBI
We have several new efforts underway in various stages of launch:

• Living Building Challenge. NBI will be working with the Cascadia Region Green Building Council to develop a curriculum and identify design tools that assist building owners and the design community to reach the goal of net zero energy buildings as part of Cascadia Region Green Building Council’s Living Building Challenge.
  
• Office of the Future. Southern California Edison is heading up a multi-utility consortium to develop a comprehensive way to reduce energy in new and existing offices. The initial target is a 25% reduction beyond code, with more aggressive targets later. NBI staff will be working to develop the 25% solution, complete market research on “tenant improvement” processes and set the stage for additional development tasks.
  
• AIA Executive Education. The American Institute of Architects, with support from ASHRAE, the American Society of Landscape Architects and the Green Building Institute, has tasked NBI to scope the development of an intensive, multi-discipline executive education program in sustainable design for mid-career professionals. These professionals are positioned to change both their own methods and elements of how their firms practice design to more rapidly move towards low-energy buildings.

To catch up on earlier news, check out our previous newsletters.

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