Education & Training Archives - Page 12 of 13

Webinar: Strategic Energy Management in Local Government Buildings, Nov 18th

November 16, 2020 By SBC staff

Wednesday, November 18th
1:00 PM Pacific Time
Register Now

In partnership with Puget Sound Energy, the Smart Buildings Center (a project of the Northwest Energy Efficiency Council) brings you an engaging webinar exploring concepts of Strategic Energy Management (SEM) specific to local government buildings, and the unique characteristics, challenges, and opportunities this sector brings. In this lively panel discussion, SEM experts will share their on-the-ground experience with overcoming challenges and adopting best practices in local government buildings. Attendees will come away with practical resources for implementing strategic energy management in their own facilities.

Panelists include:

Emma Johnson, Senior Energy Management Analyst for Seattle City Light; formerly Resource Conservation Manager at City of Bellevue
Nicole Laky – Energy and Resource Program Manager for Metro Transit Facilities; formerly Sustainability Specialist for King County Wastewater Division and Resource Conservation Specialist at Seattle Public Schools
Seth McKinney – SEM Specialist, Stillwater Energy; formerly Resource Conservation and Strategic Energy Manager for Pierce County
Kevin Ruuhela – Energy and Resource Conservation Specialist, Snohomish County

Register Now

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

Webinar: Innovation in DCV Strategies: How ATS and Nomad Go Help Customers Increase Energy Efficiency & Improve Sustainability, Nov 18th

November 16, 2020 By SBC staff

Wednesday, November 18
10:00 AM PST
Register Now

Learn how ATS and Nomad Go partner together to utilize building management systems and real-time occupancy data to save energy, reduce emissions, create healthier spaces, and optimize space utilization.

Attend this webinar to learn more about the exciting partnership between ATS and Nomad Go designed to help you make your buildings smarter, more efficient, and more sustainable.

In this webinar, you will learn more about:

How intelligent building design can help your organization dramatically reduce energy costs and energy-related carbon emissions
The innovative design that Nomad Go uses to address these issues
Occupancy-based ventilation strategies
How ATS is using the solution today

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Is the Workforce Ready for High Performance Buildings? Report Finds Major Skills Gaps

September 30, 2020 By SBC staff

Melanie Danuser and the Smart Buildings Center team contributed to the ACEEE report “Training the Workforce for High-Performance Buildings: Enhancing Skills for Operations and Maintenance.”

By Mariel Wolfson, Editor/Writer

We know that improving the energy efficiency of the U.S. building stock can reduce building-related carbon emissions by as much as 50%. High performance buildings, which are energy-efficient, durable, resilient, and offer excellent indoor air quality, will be critical for cutting emissions and meeting our climate goals. Yet these buildings also require highly specialized knowledge to optimize performance.

This specialized knowledge is the focus of a new ACEEE report released today. The report — based on an original survey and expert interviews with professionals who work with high performance buildings as owners, managers, and technicians — identifies the precise skills that education and training programs should prioritize to ensure that the workforce can meet current and future demands.

The vast majority of respondents — 92% — said that operations and maintenance (O&M) is the most critical skill area for the buildings workforce of the future…

Continue reading the blog post

Download the report

Ask the Lighting Experts: What 1:1 Replacement Means for Energy Savings and Light Quality

September 24, 2020 By SBC staff

There’s a lot of buzz about the benefits of luminaire level lighting controls (LLLC), from space flexibility to simplicity of installation and beyond. Now, a new research study shows LED retrofits with luminaire level lighting controls have the potential for big energy savings and high quality of light – but without the big price tag.

For this first-of-its-kind research, experts from the University of Oregon and the Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance (NEEA) studied a 1,000 square foot office space, analyzing the amount of energy saved when fluorescent lights were individually retrofitted with an LED equipped with LLLC compared to a complete redesign.

Join us for a free, virtual event on Thursday, October 1, at 10 a.m. PT as the researchers behind the study unveil the results and discuss the lighting implications as we look at the future of commercial spaces.

To attend, you must register in advance HERE.

Have questions you want to ask? Feel free to submit them ahead of time in the questions/comments box when you register. Or, send them to nshaddy@cplusc.com.

Building Tune-Up Accelerator Program – Final Technical Report Published

September 3, 2020 By SBC staff

In 2016, as part of its Climate Action Plan, the City of Seattle passed a mandatory Building Tune-Ups requirement (SBTU) for commercial buildings over 50,000 square feet gross floor area, with a focus on optimizing energy and water performance by identifying low or no cost solutions related to building operations and maintenance.

The Tune-Up Accelerator (TUA) Program was an opportunity for building owners to meet the requirements early and receive incentives from the utilities for the corrective actions implemented to optimize building performance. 102 buildings completed the TUA program representing 6.9 million SF total and about 18% of the target market buildings with 50,000-100,000 SF. The final technical report for TUA program is published on the City of Seattle Office of Sustainability and Environment (OSE) website.

The Smart Buildings Center (SBC) was a program partner and served as a primary provider of training & curricula, Tool Lending Library (TLL) support, project tracking and help desk support for the Tune-Up Accelerator (TUA) Program.

SBC along with Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) and OSE led the development of the curriculum, which was centered around a customization of PNNL’s Building Re-tuning training for SBTU requirements. To track deliverables required by each participant and evaluate savings resulting from corrective actions taken by buildings, a robust custom database was created by SBC.

SBC also conducted Measurement & Verification (M&V) services on 10% of the participating building population which included onsite verification and data analysis. The aim of M&V was to evaluate the energy and cost savings resulting from energy measure implemented by the buildings.

Read more about the findings of the Building Tune-Up Accelerator Program in the final technical report here!

To Learn more about our Tool Lending Library, click here!

Virtual Smart Buildings Week Replaces In-Person SBX2020 Conference

July 14, 2020 By SBC staff

Due to the uncertainty surrounding holding large events during the COVID-19 pandemic and with the health, safety, and well-being of attendees as our top priority, the Smart Buildings Center is postponing the in-person Smart Buildings Exchange (SBX) Conference & Tradeshow until August 24^th & 25^th, 2021. The event will remain at the Bell Harbor Conference Center in downtown Seattle, and any tickets purchased for the 2020 dates will be honored for the 2021 dates or may be refunded. A special thank you to SBX event sponsors, Advisory Committee members, and session speakers for your understanding and flexibility as we make this shift. Although we are disappointed we are unable to hold the in-person event this year, we look forward to convening the industry in the summer of 2021 to cover the robust agenda topics we have developed while also enjoying outdoor socializing and networking.

In place of this year’s planned in-person event, we are hosting a free Virtual Smart Buildings Week September 14^th-17^th, 2020. Each day during the lunch hour, a virtual session crafted from key topics and speaker commitments for our planned in-person event will feature a lively and interactive panel discussion as outlined below. Registration for the first three virtual sessions on September 14^th, 15^th and 16^th is now open and details for a fourth session on September 17^th will be announced soon. These one-hour sessions each qualify for 1 Building Operator Certification (BOC) credential maintenance point and 0.10 IACET CEUs towards the renewal of industry certifications, certificates and licenses including but not limited to AIA, PE, LEED, IFMA, ASHRAE, and AEE.

Smart Buildings: Using Data and Analytics to Improve Performance
September 14^th, 2020, 12:00 – 1:00 PM
This session brings together two leading local smart service providers and two facility directors who have real world experience bringing smart solutions to their buildings. Designing for optimal performance is no guarantee that it will happen. The ability to acquire system performance data is no guarantee that the data will trigger operational improvements. In these two case studies, buildings that should have been “top of their game” needed a new approach. Attendees will hear how ATS Automation and DB Engineering intervened to help facility directors collect relevant data from installed building systems, use analytical tools to provide insights into performance problems, and then – most importantly – help those facilities take action. The results speak for themselves. Improved energy performance that is persisting over time.

Moderator:

Stan Price, Smart Buildings Center

Panelists:

Pete Segall, ATS Automation
Trevor Sodorff, DB Engineering
Tim Wingert, CBRE
Keith Berkoben, Google

Smart Buildings: Grid Enabled (and Efficient) Buildings
September 15^th, 2020, 12:00 – 1:00 PM
Grid enabled buildings (GEB) are equipped with technologies for load management that can respond to dynamic conditions in the electric grid. GEBs are generally more efficient (HVAC, lighting, envelope, appliances), connected (hardware and software), smart (data and analytics), and flexible (loads, generation, storage). In an environment where hardware is increasingly attractively priced and a plethora of data is available, building owners are able to provide a significant benefit to a utility’s growing portfolio of resources and play a creative role in meeting its resource capacity needs in real time and for the long term. GEBs also offer the owner the additional value proposition of taking more control of their utility costs.

An expert, national panel will describe the key features of GEBs and outline the value streams that accrue to both the building owner and the serving utility in creating this grid enabled relationship. The panel will discuss both the technology required to create a two-way communication condition as well as the cost and benefits to all the parties in making GEBs a reality.

Moderators:

Ben Levie, Seattle City Light; Mark Lenssen, Puget Sound Energy

Panelists:

Alexi Miller, New Buildings Institute
Cara Carmichael, Rocky Mountain Institute
Mark Frankel, Ecotope
Mary Ann Piette, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory

Smart Buildings: Achieving Persistent Operational Performance
September 16^th, 2020, 12:00 – 1:00 PM
Facility energy performance and operations are often in direct conflict. It’s tough to hear, but the scales are not balanced for building owners or operators. Social pressure, building codes and new legislation are pushing EUI targets lower and lower. Advanced energy systems and smart building controls tease easy answers during initial design and construction, but the harsh reality is that designing an efficient building does not translate to operations success and often only adds to reactive practices, deferred maintenance and risk. In most cases, operators are not prepared to take on complicated building systems and new-to-them technologies. With inadequate training or resources, overtaxed staff override system settings to simply make it work. The result inadvertently drives up energy consumption and negates all efforts to optimize energy performance during design and construction while reducing asset life and introducing unnecessary risks.

The transition to smart and sustainable operations offers a best practice that balances the scales between energy expectations and operational realities. Panelists will outline proven approaches on actual projects that bridge design, build, train, optimize to ensure current energy requirements are effective and met.

Moderator:

Ric Cochrane, McKinstry

Panelists:

Mike Kowalick, South Landing EcoDistrict
Roy Buchert, Kaiser Permanente
Norm Menter, University of Washington

Register now for these engaging virtual panel discussions during Smart Buildings Week!