by Shane Henson — November 15, 2013—The Energy Systems Integration Facility (ESIF) on the campus of the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in Golden, Colorado, has earned the LEED Platinum for New Construction designation from the nonprofit U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). ESIF is the fifth facility at NREL to achieve a LEED Platinum designation.
Considered one of the most unique scientific research laboratories in the world, the 182,500-square-foot user facility is reportedly America’s first to help both public- and private-sector researchers demonstrate how clean energy technologies interact with each other and the grid at a utility scale.
With so many distinct yet integrated sections to ESIF, the design-build team of SmithGroupJJR and JE Dunn incorporated a range of advanced sustainable design technologies and best practices throughout that were instrumental in it earning Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Platinum designation.
Natural light enters deep into ESIF through 15-foot long skylights and large expanses of clerestory glazing, allowing electrical lights to be shut off between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. daily in the office and laboratory buildings. Operable windows enable natural cooling and ventilation throughout the building, and solar-powered fans aid in extracting heat from offices. A model of sustainability, 78 percent of construction waste was recycled or reused while 27 percent of the facility is comprised of recycled materials, says the NREL.
Just as impressive, the facility boasts a high-performance computing (HPC) data center designed to be one of the most energy-efficient data centers in the world because of its innovative warm-water cooling system. It is expected to achieve an annualized average power usage (PUE) effectiveness rating of 1.06 or better. Typical data centers achieve a rating of approximately 1.80. PUE is defined as the ratio of total power to run the data center facility.
NREL estimates that leveraging the energy-efficient HPC data center will save approximately $1 million in annual operating cost compared to a traditional data center. The cost savings are due to a potential $800,000 electrical energy savings and $200,000 thermal energy savings from reuse of the waste heat to heat ESIF.
ESIF achieved all 56 LEED points applied for, and the facility is 40 percent more energy efficient than the baseline building performance rating per ASHRAE/IESNA Standard 90.1-2004.
