By Bob Laurence, Manager of Energy Efficiency, Eversource
Northeastern University’s new Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Complex (ISEC) features 234,000 square feet of space that houses a vibrant interdisciplinary research community. The six-story complex is mixed with labs and classrooms organized around one central atrium.
It’s also a really cool building. And, you don’t need a microscope to see the state-of-the-art design and energy-efficient technologies.
The university worked collaboratively with Eversource and the design team to identify energy-saving measures and technical expertise to jump start the project. Then, they explored financial resources available through the Mass Save program. Armed with energy-efficient recommendations, architecture firm Payette, engineering firm Arup, and general contractor Suffolk Construction then worked together to bring this stunning building to life.
In fact, ISEC is designed to use 75 percent less energy than a typical intensive research building. Let’s uncover the science of this innovative lab design and its technologies.
• Climate responsive building envelope – The complex is equipped with triple-glazed windows, which reduce glass condensation and prevent heat loss. ISEC also features sun-shading aluminum “fins” to maximize daylight penetration while minimizing heat gain. This basically means a huge comfort boost for students and faculty inside the building—while the university saves on energy costs.
• Variable Air Volume (VAV) fume hoods – While a fume hood may be the most important safety feature in a lab, it’s also a big energy user. Labs use tremendous volumes of exhaust to flush out potentially hazardous fumes. Northeastern added high-performance VAV hoods, which exhaust the amount of air required to maintain a safe velocity setpoint. They also reduce the hood’s supply fan speed and maintain the desired temperature and humidity. Simply put, VAVs maximize safety while minimizing energy consumption.
• Enhanced airside systems – Many labs have a dedicated HVAC system, which can often be expensive to operate. ISEC boasts a cascade system that recovers conditioned air from its offices and atrium, then transfers the air to the labs to save energy and costs. In fact, an approximate 50 percent reduction in energy use over baseline building standards is expected, thanks to this highefficiency cascade approach to recirculating warm and cooled air.
• Occupancy-based airflow controls – Many older labs with low fume-hood counts operate at 10 air changes per hour (ACH) or above, 24 hours a day. Northeastern’s new VAV fume hoods and added airflow controls will reduce its lab ventilation rates from 6 ACH to 4 ACH whenever labs and equipment room spaces are detected to be unoccupied.
As an added bonus, ISEC is also on track for LEED Gold Certification. Visit www.northeastern.edu/isec to learn more about the building.
At our Chapter we love to celebrate and share the wonderful work our members and partners are consistently doing. It is their hard work and dedication to sustainability in what they do which makes our Chapter such an amazing group of people. Our sponsoring partner ICF International certainly exemplifies this.
ICF's mission is to maximize beneficial impact—for people, businesses, and governments—in areas that matter. As trusted partners, they advise, execute, and innovate to provide lasting solutions to their clients' and society's most challenging issues. Their approach is comprised of three components: Passion—They have a passionate commitment to their work and to helping their clients achieve their objectives, Expertise—They bring together technical expertise, including deep program and industry knowledge, with world-class analytics, and Results—They have the capability to support their clients through the entire program lifecycle, from research and analysis through implementation and improvement, thereby helping their clients achieve compelling results.
Mass Save is just one of the programs that ICF implements. Mass Save® is an initiative sponsored by Massachusetts’ gas and electric utilities and energy efficiency service providers, including Columbia Gas of Massachusetts, The Berkshire Gas Company, Cape Light Compact, Eversource, National Grid, Liberty Utilities and Unitil. The Sponsors of Mass Save work closely with the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources to provide a wide range of services, incentives, trainings, and information promoting energy efficiency that help residents and businesses manage energy use and related costs.
Over the next few months Mass Save is providing Energy Code Training sessions for code officials, builders, subcontractors, and design professionals to learn more specifics about Massachusetts residential and commercial Energy Codes. The Code topics that will be included are Envelope and Building Science, HVAC and Indoor Air Quality, and Mechanical Provisions.
The Trotter Innovation School in Boston said hello to the fall and the autumn harvest on one of the last warm evenings of the season. On Oct. 7, nearly 150 members of the Trotter family attended the Green Apple event making it one of the best turnouts the school has had for a community event in many years!
Together parents, students and staff helped plant more than 200 plants in the outdoor classroom that purchased in part thanks to funding made possible by MassSave. Mary Smoyer, a retired teacher and steward of the school’s Outdoor Classroom was onsite to work with families and educate them on how to plant bulbs. Mary and her husband also led tours through the Outdoor Classroom and anyone who wanted too was encouraged to help weed, break up sticks and beautify the space. The Outdoor Classroom is a beautiful oasis of nature in the back of the school that helps manage stormwater runoff, is a habitat for animals and birds, and is an important educational space for all Trotter students.
Once the fall darkness fell, attendees moved inside to the cafeteria to enjoy their healthy dinner feast of burritos and salsa which was provided by Slow Food and Chipotle. Children decorated small pumpkins with their friends and family and the Trotter community continued to connect around an important topic- being sustainable in our actions and being sustainable in how we maintain our school.
The school was proud of how successful the Fall Harvest Garden Festival was this year and looks forward to working with USGBC MA Chapter and local partners next year to make this event even bigger and more impactful.
All seventy-five 6th grade students participated in the Green Apple Day of Service, which focused on composting. The project was made possible by MassSave, who are eager to support sustainablity education in today's youth. The funding was part of the Green Apple Mini Grant program of the USGBC MA Chapter, based in Boston.
The middle school has been piloting composting in the lunch room for the last month, and this day of service was created to: 1) educate the students on why we compost, 2) educate the rest of the school about the awesome middle school composting pilot, and 3) reward the 6th grade for their efforts.
The day started off with students broken into their learning cohorts. They discussed the meaning of Community Service and then reflected on what the Green Apple Day of Service meant. The students then rotated through 3 different activities:
1. Compost Education & Worm Bins: Students participated in several hands-on, interactive activities that taught them the importance ofcompost (including saving energy!) and then helped reinforce what we can and can’t compost at Boston Green Academy. These activities included a game where students looked at a pie chart detailing total waste from 2014 and discussed ways to reduce it. Students honed in on the fact that 15% was food waste, and were thrilled to learn that we were helping to change that statistic at Boston Green Academy by composting! The activity ended with students observing Red Wigglers and making 2 worm bins, 1 for their class and 1 for a 7th grade class.
2. Art Activity: This activity created signs that will educate the rest of the student body about our Compost Pilot in the middle school. The final product spelled out BGA COMPOSTS in large letters. The top of each letter was a collage of things we CAN compost at BGA (like beans, bread and napkins) and the bottom was a collage of things we CAN’T compost yet at BGA (like meat and cheese). We made three of these signs to spread around the school. It was a great way to reinforce composting and get the students excited about sharing what they are learning and doing everyday in lunch with the rest of the student body.
3. Cooking: This activity helped the students learn how to cook nutritious food all while creating a healthy celebration meal to culminate the Green Apple Day of Service. One group made kale salad, another group hummus dip and the final group green salsa made with green tomatoes and peppers from our garden. It was a great way to talk to about the compost cycle, as the tomatoes had been grown with compost from our worm bins last year.
The Green Apple Day of Service ended with a celebration by eating the food the different groups made. It was a great way to have personal discussions about what they enjoyed and what they learned. All in all it was a wonderful way to introduce our 6th graders to meaningful, green community service!
