Columbia University
OP-5: Building Energy Consumption

The building energy consumption baseline was adopted when Columbia signed onto The NYC Carbon Challenge for Universities.

Columbia's Sustainable Leaders Network (SLN) Workspace Certification Program aims to shift individual attitudes and practices related to sustainability, including energy efficiency. The program engages a wide range of students, faculty an staff from schools and departments across the University and provides them with a simple, easy to use survey tool that functions as a roadmap toward creating lasting culture change. Participants are encouraged to partake in simple but meaningful behavior change practices that they themselves can implement, in order to encourage a more sustainable workplace.

A number of buildings use timers to regulate temperature. Temperature timers in buildings are on schedules, such as office spaces. These times are virtually managed. Night set back and cut back on usage on air handlers turn them off completely or change set points in IAB, CEPSR, Social Work, Northwest Corner on mostly the north campus at Morningside depending on lab or office space usage and occupancy. Columbia University Facilities, depending upon the time of the year, sets forth targeted interior space temperature ranges in commonly (temperature controlled) zoned areas for academic, administrative spaces and residence halls. http://policylibrary.columbia.edu/indoor-space-temperature-guidelines The chiller optimization program installed metering and sensors on the chillers and on the chilled water loop so Facilities can read how the system is performing and run more efficiently. Columbia has an economic dispatch model (told to run the most efficient machines) so the University had 11 and replaced 2 with more efficient units and adding 2 new ones and then will remove the 3 in CEPSR. The University is able to trend over a period of time with an optimization program. Typical faculty, staff, and graduate student apartment buildings have timers for temperature control to monitor the temperature in the apartments. If above the set point, the temperature control turns the boiler on, and if below the set point, the control system turns it off for far reaching apartments furthest from the loop technology. The technology has resulted in savings of 20-25% on consumption. LEED Gold-Certified Faculty House contains an HVAC system that is highly energy efficient. The air conditioning is partly an outdoor air cooling system. On warm days, it uses chilled water provided by the main campus system – which also provides steam heat during winter. When the outdoor air is dry, and temperatures range from around 55 to 65 degrees, automatic controls shut off the chilled water flow and louvers open to bring in outside air. Additional sensors count occupancy and adjust the necessary amount of air flow accordingly. For additional information: Faculty House: http://www.environment.columbia.edu/newsandprofiles/faculty-house-reopens-%E2%80%93-green-inside-and-out http://facilities.columbia.edu/node/1328/1330 New Water Chillers and Timers Project: http://facilities.columbia.edu/new-water-chillers-bring-energy-savings

LED lighting retrofits and upgrades have taken place across Columbia's campus, with most of the residential properties completed. The University intends to fund a Lighting Master Plan program in 2018 which will evaluate the remaining campus buildings and assemble a three-year implementation schedule on LED lighting & controls projects.

n/a

Columbia's first microturbine, built by Capstone Turbine Corporation, is housed in an 8-ft.-high container that's 30 inches wide and 9 ½ ft. long at 600 W. 113th St. , and uses natural gas purchased from Consolidated Edison to generate about half of the electricity used in the building. Exhaust from the turbine is forced into a heat-recovery module through which water is circulated and heated. For each microturbine installed, the estimated annual reduction in greenhouse gas emissions is equal to taking at least 45 cars off the road each year and a conservative estimate projects savings of about $20,000 per year on electric and heating costs. Two additional turbines were installed and came on-line in 2015 at 542 W. 112th 545 W. 112.

Columbia University launched a comprehensive retrofit and modernization of its central chiller plant. The project consisted of installing a new steam drive and electric drive chillers, cooling towers with variable speed drives, pumps with variable speed drives and a comprehensive network of controls, metering, hardware, programming software, and other upgrades to the school’s chilled water system. In conjunction with the modernization of the chilled water plant, a real-time optimization program from Optimum Energy was implemented to take advantage of the new equipment and the data collected from the new metering and monitoring equipment to maximize the overall efficiency of the chilled water plant and distribution system. Chiller operation is continuously metered and monitored to ensure the plant operates at its maximum efficiency. Columbia University has completed energy efficiency reports and has identified retro-commissioning measures for 33 of its buildings in a comprehensive campus-wide energy efficiency effort. The University has funded $2M toward retrocommissioning in the upcoming fiscal year.

MMBtu- source data provided.