Engineered Systems - October 2008 - (Page 38)

LIVING Wild Earning LEED® Silver As the first LEED®-certified museum in the State of New York, the Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks expects to save between 20% and 30% of its annual operational costs as a result of multiple sustainable strategies, including: • A three-acre pond at the building’s exterior manages the roof’s storm-water runoff and exhibit water discharge, while also providing a wetland for local birds, amphibians, small mammals, and insects. • As much as 10% of the Museum’s power comes from a 40 kW photovoltaic array on the building’s roof; the rest of the electrical power is generated by Niagara Falls. • Local materials employed in building the Museum include white pine exterior siding that was harvested and milled in Tupper Lake, as well as Red Garnet and Champlain stone from the quarries in the Adirondack Park. The metal roofing, concrete, and structural steel were also supplied and fabricated in local plants. • Energy-efficient lighting and controls interface with a BMS to constantly monitor and improve the Museum’s interior energy use. • A well-insulated building envelope combined with the use of low VOC materials, efficient air filtration, and air quality monitoring contribute to a higher quality of indoor air. At The Wild Center, a variety of plumbing systems were used, including stratetigcally placed pumps used to mimic a river stream, allowing the resident otters to feel as if they are swimming. (Photo courtesy of HOK.) support systems and provide temperature control for the animals, via a chilled water loop which also supports the building’s main AHUs. The Museum’s live exterior exhibit, a man-made pond that lies flush up against the Museum’s building, is complete with a stormwater runoff system, native Adirondack fish, and ground water. Plumbing mechanisms are employed to drain a portion of the pond in the winter, lowering its height to prevent freezing water from expanding and damaging the Museum’s exterior. INDOOR WEATHERMEN In addition to the live animal displays, the Exhibit Hall also presents the Adirondacks through the seasons, clad with fog and wind generation. Simulating an Adirondack Fall morning, fog moves out toward the visitors, covering the bottom portion of Museum’s replica mountains at the Hall’s entrance. In order to limit the extent of the fog to this specific display, Syska employed floor-mounted linear registers at the foot of the exhibit, pulling the fog to the mountain’s edge and confining it within the space. Wind generation in the Exhibit Hall furthers the exploration of the Adirondack seasons for its visitors. Here, museum curators wanted strong winds to blow through a visitor’s hair. Supply air jets were placed within columns to disperse air among the mountains at eye level. MASTERING THE MECHANICAL SYSTEMS Architecturally designed as one large mixed-use space, The Wild Center is made up of three smaller, interconnected buildings. From the Exhibit Hall to the Museum’s theater/administrative offices and the entrance rotunda, each building demands function-specific mechanical systems support. Because of the building’s diverging needs, project design engineers specified both constant air volume (CAV) and VAV systems where appropriate, furthering energy efficiency and enhancing visitor comfort throughout the Museum. Clad with 42-ft.-tall, high-efficiency glass windows, the 7,500sq-ft conical Great Hall, or museum entrance, posed a mechanical challenge to HVAC systems design. With outdoor temperatures ranging from -40°F in the winter to 95° in the summer, the Museum’s heating and cooling systems demand a tremendous amount of flexibility. The solution: Syska specified a number of smaller, modular boilers that enable the HVAC system to respond quickly to the varying 38 En gi neer ed S y stem s October 2008 outside air temperature demands, creating more precise indoor environmental controls. More energy efficient, this design ensures that only the exact amount of heating equipment needed is utilized at each moment. By contrast, large boilers would not have been able to meet the Museum’s seasonal temperature swings within the Museum’s tight time constraints. Because glass doesn’t have the same insulating properties as an exterior wall and inside heat naturally wants to rise, a large mass of air was needed to push heat down the glass walls; so conditioning the space was possible only with a CAV system. Condensation was avoided by blowing air down from the ceiling, running parallel to the glass. The Exhibit Hall also employs a CAV system, but in this case, it was specified to manage humidity and pressurization issues. Duct-mounted reheat coils equipped with thermostat and humidity sensors constantly moderate the Exhibit Hall, including its aque- Floor-mounted linear registers at the foot of the mountain exhibit control the fog used to create an Adirondack fall morning. (Photo courtesy of HOK.)

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Engineered Systems - October 2008 Contents Editor’s Note Letters Back2Basics HVAC Challenge Case in Point Commissioning Building Automation HydroTech HVACR Designer Tips Special Insert: Engineer's Technical Library Fall 2008 Living Wild! Chilled Beams in Chicago Phoenix Convention Center: On The Rise Cold-Climate HVAC Challenges Humidification Strategies For Data Centers & Network Rooms Special Advertising Supplement: Tabb Talk Computers & Software Issues & Events Products Literature & Catalogs Glossary Classifieds Advertiser Index Tomorrow’s Environment

Engineered Systems - October 2008

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