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3 entries from June 2012

June 15, 2012

Why Interior Designers Matter: Radford University

"Interior design is about more than just aesthetics. It is about finding creative design solutions for interior environments while supporting the health, safety and well-being of occupants and enhancing their quality of life." IDCA

 

 We love this video because for years now we have been trying to drive home the importance of HVAC  working more closely with the interior design profession - I.D. Matters and this video explains why...here's two additional compelling reasons why HVAC designers cannot exist in isolation from interior design:

  1. Using the National Research Council of Canada's IA-QUEST VOC Emission and Simulation Tool
  2. Using the ASHRAE Design Graph for Sensible Heating and Cooling with Floor and Ceiling Panels

See also:

American Society of Interior Designer (ASID)

Interior Designers of Canada Association (IDCA)

Gail Green, Defining Differences: Decorators, Designers, Architects

 

 

 

Posted by on June 15, 2012 at 04:08 PM in Architecture, Building Enclosures, Consumers on Comfort, Design Tools, Interior Design | | Comments (0)

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June 12, 2012

Vernon S. Broyles Jr. Leadership Center: Transforms Seminary Educational Experience and Provide Campus Visibility

2012-13_21aRelease, Monday, June 11, 2012: While daylight harvesting isn’t new as a strategy for creating energy-saving buildings, it can sometimes be a challenge when the site orientation isn’t optimal and when you want to use the strategy in an AV-enabled classroom. That was the situation for Lord, Aeck & Sargent in designing the Vernon S. Broyles Jr. Leadership Center at Columbia Theological Seminary. The LAS design team wanted to create classrooms that were free of glare without having to use blackout shades or relying on artificial lighting during much of the day. So the team used a combination of innovative daylighting strategies to solve the problem.

The building, which is targeting LEED gold certification, connects a repurposed 1930s dormitory with new “L”-shaped construction to create a contemporary classroom building that’s also sensitive to the historic collegiate gothic architecture on the seminary’s campus. Some other green strategies and products include:

  • a variable refrigerant HVAC system to maximize energy efficiency
  • rain chains and two underground 5,000-gallon cisterns to collect rainwater for irrigation
  • use of recycled, renewable, local and regional materials

Photo credit © Jonathan Hillyer / Atlanta.

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For further details contact: Annie Kohut | Kohut Communications Consulting (tel) 770-913-9747 | (cell) 404-786-6062 (fax) 770-913-3197 | annielk@bellsouth.net www.kohutcommunications.com | Follow me at http://twitter.com/kohutcomm

Lord, Aeck & Sargent is an award-winning architectural firm serving clients in scientific, academic, historic preservation, arts and cultural, and multi-family housing and mixed-use markets.

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RBc: So how important is light? See this excellent Ph.D. Thesis on the hierarchy of comfort considerations.

 

 

Posted by on June 12, 2012 at 01:15 PM in Architecture, Building Enclosures, HVAC, Indoor lighting quality | | Comments (0)

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June 01, 2012

Glass versus glass: Winnipeg’s Manitoba Hydro Office Tower vs. Chicago’s Aqua Tower

Manitoba HydroGlass versus glass: Winnipeg’s Manitoba Hydro Office Tower vs. Chicago’s multi-tenant Aqua Tower

Two very big buildings made of glass one just received a LEED Platinum designation and labelled the most energy efficient building in America (adjacent photo) and the other is becoming fodder for cynical engineers worldwide; building scientist Ted Kesik called it "architectural pornography" – so why the hypocrisy since they’re both made of glass?

We’ve not seen the energy reports on the Aqua Tower (AQT) (we may never see them) but the published results for the Manitoba Hydro building (MHB) are stated here, “The building's target was for a 60 per cent reduction in energy consumption compared to the Canadian Model National Energy Code for Buildings. The goal was to attain LEED Gold certification. It proved to be even more efficient than anticipated, achieving reductions in energy use of over 70 per cent. In May 2012, Manitoba Hydro Place received LEED® Platinum certification, making it the most energy efficient office tower in North America and the only office tower in Canada to receive this prestigious rating.”

So what`s the difference? In the case of MHB it hired indoor climate and energy engineers TransSolar to evaluate the energy and indoor environmental quality of numerous models before the integrated design team selected the one offering the best opportunity to meet the client’s objectives of an energy efficient indoor climate. This process took years of preconstruction planning (started in 2002) ultimately resulting in the double façade building (think a building within a building) having opening windows on all of its office tower floors, conditioned with low temperature radiant heating and high temperature radiant cooling; ventilated with a dedicated outdoor air system (DOAS) with heat recovery - boosted by inline fans in the under floor displacement air system and augment by the solar chimney for pulling draft on the entire structure. The HVAC and domestic plant is a geothermal system powered by hydro and assisted with peaking natural gas boilers. What is so great about this building is the attention given to the mechanical and electrical system and how the architecture flows around it to enable its peak performance – it’s truly ingenious and inspiring and a huge credit to the architectural and engineering teams.

On the other hand, “The Aqua was named the Emporis Skyscraper Award 2009 skyscraper of the year and was shortlisted in 2010 for the biannual International Highrise Award”, perhaps a result of the architectural focus that left the mechanical and electrical engineering teams the responsibility of making the building work – this classic approach is repeatedly demonstrated as being flawed in a world concerned about sustainability.

As we have said over and over again in this journal and in industry publications – first let the engineers and interior designers create the DNA for the building and then use architecture to enable these systems to operate at peak performance.

This inverted process is the DNA of our upcoming cross Canada Tour hosted by Uponor – who by the way supplied the radiant heating and cooling system for the LEED Platinum Manitoba Hydro Building and the radiant heating and cooling system for the LEED Platinum NREL Research Facility and many other high performance buildings.

You’ll not want to miss this course – it will change how you do buildings.

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Complete listing of credits for the Manitoba Hydro Building: Project Team, Project Facts and Credits

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Suggested reading:

Radiant cooled Manitoba Hydro Office Building

The Facts on Manitoba Hydro Office Building

NREL Research Support Facility

The Facts on NREL Research Support Facility

Begin With the End in Mind: A Model for Sustainability

Why Do Architects Focus on Art More than Building Science?

 

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Sign up soon for our five city Canadian Tour hosted by the Uponor Academy:

Sept. 17-19 Edmonton, AB
Oct. 29-31 Halifax, NS
Nov. 19-21 Vancouver, BC
Nov. 26-28 Toronto, ON
Dec. 3-5 Montreal, QC

Topic: 

How to establish low energy allowances for delivering thermal comfort and indoor air quality in modern buildings

If you want to know more about this course call us at 403.278.8481

Posted by on June 01, 2012 at 12:24 PM in Architecture, Building Enclosures, Building science, Consumers on Comfort, Design Tools, Educational, Environmental Ergonomics, Ergonomics, Exergy, Fenestration, Heat Recovery Ventilators, Human Factors, HVAC, Hydronic heating, Insulation, Interior Design, LEED and Green, Radiant Cooling, Radiant heating, Ventilation, What makes a good architect?, What makes a good contractor?, What makes a good engineer?, Windows and Doors | | Comments (0)

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Our Purpose

  • Established in 2004, The Journal of Indoor Environmental Quality (JIEQ) in conjunction with Healthy Heating serves as a technical interpreter and consolidator of academic research demonstrating the building and health sciences are inclusive elements. It provides professional development programs based on its analysis to application professionals such as architects, engineers, interior designers and related technicians.

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Quotes

  • “The quality of housing conditions plays a decisive role in the health status of the residents, because many health problems are either directly or indirectly related to the building itself, the construction materials that were used, and the equipment or the size or structure of the individual dwellings.” The World Health Organization
  • "Indoor environmental quality is in part a result of materials and methods of construction which has an influence on occupant health. For this reason, policies around health and construction cannot be treated separately and must be linked together." Source: Bean, R., IAQ Webinar Presentation, 2009
  • The HVAC system consumes 50-60% of the building energy cost and generates 80-85% of tenant complaints. Source: U.S. General Services Administration, Public Buildings Service, Office of the Chief Architect

Good Design

  • “Industrial designers determine the form and interaction qualities of manufactured products...They study people at work, at home and in motion to create satisfying experiences with products from the kitchen and the office to the hospital and the warehouse…” Excerpt from the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA).
  • In our opinion, industrial design has been overlooked by the HVAC industry – illustrated by consumers facing difficulties selling homes with HVAC systems which have “beast in the boiler room.”
  • Be reminded by S. Claire Conroy from Residential Architecture, "It's time architects of every discipline understand residential architecture for what it really is: everyone's most intimate connection with architecture. It's not simply a “test bed”—it's a vessel for our lives on their most personal level. That makes the stakes very high indeed. No one is more discriminating and demanding than a residential client.”
  • "A lot of it has to do with how we are responding at a physiological level to what we see as we walk in through the door." Sarah Susanka, Architect
  • “Industrial designers determine the form and interaction qualities of manufactured products...They study people at work, at home and in motion to create satisfying experiences with products from the kitchen and the office to the hospital and the warehouse…” Excerpt from the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA).
  • "In any industry, one of the most important and difficult tasks is to explain a nuanced process to someone unfamiliar with the field. At its grass roots, design is a process like many others; it has theories, strategies and examples that can be explained on a general level. It’s not a matter of what type of information is given, but rather how it is presented and to what type of audience." Speaking Design to Non-Designers, IDSA