HOK Designs NASA's Greenest Building at Johnson Space Center

"HOK's design for NASA's Building 20 at Johnson Space Center in Houston, a three-story 83,000-square-foot contemporary office facility, has achieved LEED — Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design - Platinum certification. The integrated architectural and design strategies include a highly efficient building envelope, an underfloor air distribution system, a total energy recovery wheel and a solar hot water harvesting system on the roof that accounts for 18 percent of the building's domestic hot water consumption. Building 20 is designed to be 57 percent more energy efficient than a typical office building and serves as a public showcase for high-performance, environmentally sound building design and construction at the Johnson Space Center."

A Higher Standard: The Christman Building

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Christman building in Lansing, MI not only is a state landmark but also made history as the world's first building to be awarded two LEED Platinum certifications (LEED Core and Shell and LEED Commercial Interiors). Preserving the building's rich architectural history and achieving LEED certification challenged The Christman Company as well as Detroit-based SmithGroup, the architect and engineer of record for the project. A raised access floor system was the solution — one that uniquely supported both historic preservation and sustainability, helping to adapt the historic building to meet the needs of a 21st century corporate facility...."I think that’s one of the neat things about the raised floor system. More than any other system I'm aware of, it allows new systems to go in buildings, new or historic, that weren't necessarily made to be flexible and contributes in a big way to their sustainability, in this case without compromising the building's historic integrity."
 

Ron Staley, senior vice president, Mid-Atlantic operations and director,
historic preservation at The Christman Company
ED+C, June 2010

Banner Bank Building

The Banner Bank Building is a model for high performance buildings in the US. The art-deco inspired building is the first LEED Platinum building in Idaho, earning 49 out of 62 possible LEED credits in the Core & Shell category. Worldwide, Banner Bank was the 16th Platinum building but the first speculative office building to achieve this level. "We created a beautiful, high-performance building that’s good for the environment. And it didn’t cost us any more to do it."

Sustainable Design Reaches a Highmark

"An underfloor air distribution system (UFAD) with a platform from Tate Access Floors serves the office spaces. Currently, about 15 to 20 percent of all new commercial office space employs a UFAD. UFAD counts toward one point for LEED because of its ventilation effectiveness."
 

Green Building Report: Raised Floors - A Green Building Advantage

"When PA's Rachel Carson State Office Building was designed in the early 1980s, green buildings were unheard of. A look at what the Carson building missed shows how raised floors can help make a design both green and cost- effective."

Green Ideas for Energy Efficient HVAC Systems

"As more projects stress sustainability and energy conservation, owners are rethinking the basics of building design to balance long-term functional and operational efficiency with sensitivity to the environment and resource use. Raised-floor ventilation systems, a staple of computer rooms for decades, have also been adapted successfully for various building types."

There is More Beneath Your Feet than just the Floor: Underfloor Air Distribution

"One of the more exciting benefits that UFAD affords building owners and administrators is improved energy efficiency. The systems require less airflow volume, lower fan power and a lower air supply temperature than a traditional system in order to cool the same space. This more efficient air distribution is able to help building owners bring their facilities one step closer to meeting LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification standards."

47 Million Green Regional Bus Facility Opens in Tempe

Valley Metro driver John W. Blake gazed around at the comfortable, glistening, spacious drivers' lounge in the brand new East Valley Bus Operations & Maintenance Facility in Tempe and had just one word to say. "Awesome!" Ken J. Anderson, project architect, said evaporative cooling is used throughout the facility to save energy and money, and an under-floor air distribution system reduces energy usage by up to 47 percent.
 

AZ Central.com, October 2007

Link: Read Article

There is More Beneath Your Feet than just the Floor: Underfloor Air Distribution

"With UFAD systems, airflow can be controlled at each air distribution vent so that individual users can adjust the supply of conditioned air in their own space. The air distribution method described earlier delivers more uniform temperatures throughout rooms in a building and better ventilation ensures cleaner air by removing dust and particles from the environment."

5 Radical Trends in Outpatient Facility Design

UFAD is safe for outpatient care facilities like the one in Holland, Mich. "Spectrum's infection control experts checked it out and found no inherent issues from an infection control standpoint," he says. "It's actually healthier, because the air is coming to the occupants in its freshest state. You're not mixing the stale air that's rising through the ductwork."

A Higher Standard: The Christman Building

In addition to delivering anticipated utility savings of 25 percent, the underfloor air distribution system is providing 200 to 300 percent more ventilation to the breathing zone than required by ASHRAE Standard 62.1-2004. The system creates a better work environment for building occupants. The air is pressurized under the floor, delivered to people where they're sitting, and then passed overhead to return air ducts in the ceiling. "As a result, the energy-efficient system makes for a healthier environment in which occupants have the ability to adjust the temperature within their workspaces for greater comfort," says Jeff Fedewa, project manager at The Christman Company.

Mechanical & HVAC Design Goes Underfloor

"Benefits of the UFAD system used in this project include an increased number of temperature control zones using adjustable swirl diffusers per cubicle or private office, UFAD systems are much quieter than overhead VAV systems which can be an issue in open office environments, improved ventilation effectiveness since supply air is introduced at low level, and improved IAQ since only the first 4 ft of the occupied zone is completely mixed and room air is allowed to stratify above."

Green Building Focus
October 2009

Link: Read Article

How Office Spaces Activate Mixed-Use Developments

"Everyone wants to maximize ceiling heights and the best way to do that is minimize the bulking infrastructure that is usually hidden away in an acoustical ceiling system...Some buildings use raised floor systems to limit what gets crammed into the overhead space."