ASHRAE Journal - November 2014 - 74

2014 ASHRAE TECHNOLOGY AWARD CASE STUDIES

TABLE 2 Project cost and annual energy cost.
CAN$

Total Cost of the Project

PHOTO CREDIT PAGEAU MOREL

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N OVEM BER 2014

2,228,000

16.0

905,000

6.5

Savings

The building is divided into four blocks: North,
Corner, Center (used for offices) and West. It also has
four stories with a common basement. A mechanical penthouse is located on top of all four square
blocks. Prior to the project, mechanical and electrical

9,573,000

Energy Cost of Renovated Building

Operation and Maintenance

100

Energy Cost of Existing Building

office area air could be transferred over to minimize
the quantity of directly supplied air while still satisfying
the 10 ach required. Also, air supplied to laboratories is
distributed to the perimeter with low-velocity diffusers. Those diffusers allow the air to sweep the room by
displacement ventilation (rather than dilution), offering
higher air quality to the occupants. Many other innovations are integrated in this building:
* Building automation system (BAS) combined with
advance metering (steam, electrical, condensate, airflow, recovery, etc.) is used to control all parameters of
the mechanical and electrical systems of the building,
optimizing efficiency;
* Motion sensors adjust the air changes per hour and
lighting in all areas;
* When a fume hood's sash is open, the airflow of the
lab space has to increase and the control valve of the reheat coil reacts automatically to prevent any cold drafts
from coming in. The valve will then be readjusted slowly
to maintain thermal comfort;
* Laboratory equipment is located in a dedicated
room and cooled by local heat pumps discharging their
heat in the terminal reheat loop; and
* Alerts will be sent if the energy consumption measured deviates from expected values based on climatic
conditions, occupancy and schedules.

14,030,000

Costs Related to Energy Efficiency

PHOTO 2 Mechanical equipment in the renovated space is easily accessible for
routine maintenance.

CAN$/FT 2

1,323,000

9.5

equipment located in the penthouses was hard to get
to, thus being hard to clean, maintain or repair. All
equipment is now easily accessible and routine maintenance can be performed (Photo 2).
To improve research quality and flexibility, laboratories were designed to be more generic and accessible to a broader range of users and research activities. Open labs have been designed in this fashion
compared to the approach of "one need = one room"
of the original construction, which led to multiple
small labs that were not functional for today's needs.
Write-up areas are now separated from laboratory
areas. They are located at each level and in the middle
of the building where they are surrounded by laboratories. This configuration should reduce future renovation needs.
Existing building exhaust used one exhaust fan per
hood. Exhaust in the renovated building is manifolded
to facilitate heat recovery on two main run-around loops
per block, and to reduce maintenance and improve reliability. All of the equipment is connected to the BAS to
easily optimize and track the system operation remotely
and ease diagnosis of problems.

Cost Effectiveness
Costs were controlled by choosing simple systems
that rely on well-established low-cost technologies and
by optimizing equipment selection for dependability, low maintenance and maximum efficiency. Table
2 shows the project costs and the costs related to the
building's energy consumption. Table 2 also shows that
the payback period related to energy efficiency costs is
about seven years. Even without being able to change
anything on the envelope of the building, energy efficiency measures were able to reduce the annual energy
bill by more than CAN$ 1 million. Building energy
consumption, which represented about 13% of the

ASHRAE Journal - November 2014

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