The M Files

Let’s use the sun to naturally heat the building in the cold winter months, and then find ways to shield it during the hot summer. What sounds like a common sense approach to commercial green building design is actually outside the industry norm. Passive solar elements, which absorb and redistribute the sun’s energy without the use of mechanical or electrical devices, can be difficult to find in our modern building environment. So when Chip Cargas, President of Cargas Systems, Inc. wanted to incorporate passive solar Trombe walls* in his company’s new facility, he had no idea that he was on the leading edge of the green building movement.

Thanks to a decades-long run of cheap electricity, natural gas, and oil we’ve been able to arbitrarily orient new buildings onto project sites, regardless of the energy consequences. It’s been an easy plug-and-play with our taken-for-granted energy infrastructure, letting modern heating and air conditioning systems overcome demands induced by the natural environment. Using naturally occurring solar, wind, and water patterns to influence commercial building design was once a necessity, but is now mostly a lost art. But this sort of thinking is migrating back toward the mainstream.

The Trombe walls at Cargas Systems's new facility. Photo courtesy of MM Architects, Inc.

Designed by MM Architects and installed by Wohlsen Construction, @WohlsenWorks and @LEED_Resource on Twitter, the Trombe walls consist of strategically positioned 18-inch thick slabs of concrete. They absorb solar radiation during the winter months, when the sun traces at low angles across the horizon. That heat is then radiated back into the occupied space throughout the day. At night, blinds are closed to retain heat within the building. Shading devices and the positioning of the walls prevent solar penetration into the building during the summer, when the sun shines at higher angles.

It all sounds simple enough, but designers were concerned that too much winter radiation might actually cause the building to overheat, leading to occupant discomfort and unwanted use of the air conditioning systems. The saying goes, ?ó?é¼?ôThe more passive the building, the more active the occupants.  In other words, regulating heat gain from passive solar elements requires people to actively engage in the operation of the building; in this case learning when and how to adjust the window shades. Could they count on that level of personal interaction in a commercial building?

When it comes to passive solar elements, the commercial building industry can probably learn some lessons from thoughtful residential builders. Michael Anschel (@MichaelAnschel on Twitter), Principal of Minnesota based Otogawa-Anschel Design Build, says that not paying attention to the potential for solar-induced temperature swings actually destroyed homes in the 1970s. Today his firm uses several modeling tools to optimize their passive solar designs. When asked if residential passive solar design is more art or science, he quickly responded “Science: 100% analysis.”

Peter Larson, Principal of Ashley McGraw Architects in Syracuse, NY, and @PeterLarson3 on Twitter is a bit of a pioneer in commercial building Trombe wall design. He agrees with the need for significant analysis. In his words, “We have found the design of Trombe walls to be an intricate thing, as they must be carefully matched to the spaces they serve, and to the sizing of the heating and cooling systems. These intricacies include thickness of mass and thermal lag, color, degree of shading, etc. I would not advocate using them without doing detailed modeling first, at least in a commercial or institutional building. We model them in DesignBuilder (Energy+), which seems to do a particularly good job assessing passive solar strategies.”

In Chip Carga’s case, the analysis seems to have paid off. Watch as he describes his first winter of managing the Trombe walls:

The design of the window-wall system has the added benefit of introducing glare-free daylight deep into the work space. After visiting their completed offices, I can attest that the walls do create an appealing work space. According to architect Donald Main, “We view the walls as a functional element with aesthetic opportunity. The walls are interesting due to their size and monolithic nature. The back sides of the walls are envisioned as a programming opportunity, a location to showcase Cargas’s company history.”

This unique design element will probably be a showcase for plenty of curious green building professionals for years to come. What do you think? Do systems like these belong in the commercial building industry?

The final phase of the East Lycoming School District’s biomass heating system commissioning took place on Friday, March 25, with air pollution emissions testing. Though considered a sustainable, carbon-neutral heating strategy, burning biomass material does produce air emissions that fall under the scrutiny of the U.S. EPA and Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). Here, environmental consultant Gavin Biebuyck of Liberty Environmental explains the purpose of the testing in more detail:

This is what “zero opacity” looks like out of the chimney. No smoke, all water vapor:

It’s very difficult to capture the total operation, from biomass fuel handling to combustion emissions, with camera still shots. Here’s a brief video tour of the entire system:

Despite the cold winter, the actual amount of purchased wood chips was lower than what we predicted for the first year of operation. While we suspect that’s due to better-than-published boiler combustion efficiencies, we’ll find out for certain in the coming months as we conclude our measurement and verification studies. Stay tuned!

If you’re new to the East Lycoming Biomass Boiler project, check out these previous posts:
An Energy Lesson from the Land of Lumber and Maple Syrup
Green without the Glamour
School District to Heat High School with Self-Grown Hybrid Willows
Hybrid Willow: School District’s Best Available Technology
School Biomass Fuel Crop Project Will Be Operational This Winter
Energy By the Truckload
A Tale of Two Biomass Boilers

Gib Armstrong

As an outcome of our evolving deregulated electricity market and quest for smart grid development, ?ó?é¼?ôsmart meters?ó?é¼?¥ are being installed throughout Pennsylvania and the country. While in many ways using these devices represent a game-changing approach to the business of electricity supply, the majority of home and business owners are unaware of their purpose and existence. As the new metering programs are unveiled, a debate has sparked within the energy industry over the merits of the new technology versus potential security and energy information/privacy risks.

To help us all become better informed on this technology, I interviewed a man in the know:
Gib Armstrong, Director of Regulatory Affairs for BlueStar Energy Solutions.

Q. Why are electric utility companies installing smart meters throughout their territories?
A. In Pennsylvania, Act 129 now requires them to. But some utilities, like PPL, took the initiative without waiting for a mandate. They did it to cut administrative costs and give customers more functionality. Beginning in 2002, PPL was the first utility to deploy Automated Meter Reading (AMR) meters that can record real-time usage and be read remotely no more meter readers. As a customer, I was glad to see that overhead disappear. AMR meters can also support demand response, data analysis, and money-saving, market-based, hourly pricing plans, which is the direction the electric market is moving.

Q. What are the potential benefits of smart meters to electricity customers?
A. For the first time, suppliers can see how much power a customer has been using in real time, make projections about future use, and offer them a price plan accordingly.

That’s just the beginning look for a host of innovative products and services to unfold. The revolution that occurred with telecom deregulation is waiting to happen with electricity. When the first cell phones came out, no one imagined that a mere 20 years later we would be sending video from our phones around the world for free. That’s the power of free markets and innovation, and that power is about to be unleashed in the electricity industry as well.

Q. From my perspective as an energy services professional, the high tech features of the meters are currently underutilized. Can you give us a glimpse of future program strategies?
A. The meters let suppliers do at least two things they could never do before: communicate price signals to the customer and see their customer’s usage in real time. Look for aggressive suppliers to begin offering not just fixed rates, but market rates, where your price moves with market conditions, which is usually lower than an annual fixed price. For example, I have an hourly rate with BlueStar Energy, the supplier I work for. Instead of paying over 10 cents for every kilowatt-hour, my price fluctuates sometimes going below five cents. Paying “by the hour” saved me over 20 percent on my June bill. BlueStar also sent me a device that tells me how much power I’m using. So now each day I go on the PJM website and download the PPL zone prices for the next day. When it goes above seven cents per kilowatt hour, I shut off the A/C. By the time anyone notices, it is 6p.m., prices are back down, and I turn the A/C back on.

You may also see suppliers offer demand response. Today this is mostly for large power users, who can get paid monthly for the promise that they will respond to high-grid demand by cutting back on usage?It’s kind of like a grid insurance program where the power user gets the premium. AMR meters create the opportunity for even residential customers to benefit from programs like this.

Q. There’s a rising tide of criticism that smart meter roll-outs are premature due to issues with security weakness. Is there merit to that criticism?
A. No doubt security will be a big deal, and there will be several issues to address. For instance, some AMR meters talk with each other through a “mesh” network, where each meter is also a relay device.   Sophisticated “listeners” can tell things about you just by intercepting your power noise, like whether or not you are home, and even what type of appliances you have. The challenge will be to transmit the information from the customer to the supplier and utility, while protecting it at numerous communication nodes along the way. While these and other issues pose real challenges, American persistence and ingenuity will find market-based solutions just as they always have as long as the market is not hampered by regulators and bureaucrats.