ASHRAE Journal - June 2024 - 57

2024 ASHRAE TECHNOLOGY AWARDS CASE STUDY
Cultivating a strong connection to nature with
biophilic design principles, the building provides
occupants with unobstructed views of the surrounding
woodland. It welcomes the outdoors inside with its mass
timber structure and use of indoor trees, water features
and sophisticated lighting controls.
The design team supported Promega in achieving its
goal of constructing a laboratory facility five times larger
than their current laboratory using 60% less kBtu/ft2·yr.
Energy Efficiency
With the priority to design an exceedingly energyefficient
laboratory, an integrated design approach
guided both architectural and engineering decisions.
The design team completed extensive whole-building
energy modeling, complemented by digital twin use,
for the double skin façade and daylighting. Additionally,
the team conducted plug load studies at the existing
buildings to better understand accurate building loads.
For non-laboratory spaces, the double skin façade
with automated exterior and interior windows offers
extended natural ventilation hours for the cold climate
zone (5A). The design team composed detailed control
sequences to automate the interior and exterior
windows of the double façade with timed occupant
overrides. Computational fluid dynamics analysis
projected that the double façade would maintain a
temperature of at least 40°F (4.4°C), even when outside
air temperatures drop as low as -27°F (-32.8°C).
This double skin façade performance has been
confirmed by the building's energy use to date. During
natural ventilation mode, outside air flows through the
double façade, enters the office spaces and exits through
openings into the atrium. The heightened atrium and
operable windows in the clerestory use a stack effect
to induce airflow out of the space. In cases where wind
directions do not allow for this effect, the atrium smoke
exhaust fans provide minimal fan assistance.
Daylight-controlled, automated venetian blinds
within the double skin façade eliminate up to 80% of
the solar radiation that would otherwise penetrate
to the occupied space. Displacement ventilation and
thermally activated ceiling slabs are implemented in
the office spaces. Interior and exterior zoning of the
office slabs provide blended radiant heating and cooling
as required. Similarly, the atrium floor is a thermally
activated slab-contributing to the project's use of more
than 33 miles (53.1 km) of radiant pipe.
The design uses active chilled beams and reduced
airflows in the laboratory spaces-designing open labs
to maintain four air changes per hour (ach) occupied
and 2 ach unoccupied. In contrast, lab support
spaces were designed for 6 ach occupied and 4 ach
unoccupied. All systems can accommodate up to 6 ach,
ensuring flexibility for the future. To match the existing
laboratory building's fume hood density, the Kornberg
Center would have required 120 fume hoods. Instead,
the design team strategically designed centralized
laboratory support spaces featuring shared linear
equipment rooms, where MEP systems are arranged
in a linear configuration, optimizing space, facilitating
efficient operation and enabling easy access for building
system maintenance. Evaluating each department's
chemical use requirements, the team implemented
recirculating biosafety cabinets where possible. In the
end, the Kornberg design successfully fulfilled the users'
requirements with only 16 fume hoods, eliminating
60,000 cfm (28 317 L/s) of exhaust and makeup air.
Natural ventilation could not be incorporated into
the labs as they needed to maintain a negative pressure
relative to the adjacent occupied spaces. However, the
double skin façade was still used to mitigate exterior
thermal swings and prevent infiltration through the lab
windows.
The total energy recovery wheels precondition the
incoming air for the 100% outdoor air systems. Duct
mains were sized with velocities below typical industry
standards, capped at a maximum of 1,200 ft/min
(365.8 m/min). This approach reduces fan energy
consumption that would otherwise be required for a
building of this size and shape.
A geothermal system compromising 56 vertical bores
at 500 ft (152.4 m) deep was designed to pair with a sixpipe
heat recovery chiller and sized to supply the yearround
heating and cooling base loads of the building.
The design prioritizes the geothermal system as the
primary heating and cooling source, using it before
resorting to the central utility plant heat exchangers.
To optimize the geothermal system's efficiency and
performance, the system uses low-temperature heating
hot water at 105°F (40.5°C) and elevated chilled water
at 48°F (8.9°C). Online Figure 1 at https://tinyurl.com/
JournalExtras illustrates the interconnected heating
hot water, geothermal glycol water, chilled water and
J U N E 2024 ashrae.org ASHRAE JOURNAL
57
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ASHRAE Journal - June 2024

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