From photovoltaics to solar thermal collectors: Evaluating and improving gr...( Relatively few good examples exist of b...)

Relatively few good examples exist of buildings that have excellent energy performance. Often "green buildings" are developed and publicized, but then actual energy functioning is not reported, sometimes because performance is less than anticipated. Having inhabited its new green headquarters for the first year, The Woods Hole Research Center is addressing those issues by tracking, and making publicly available, information on the performance of its building.

Because the Research Center's Ordway Campus incorporates so many different efficiency and renewable (clean) energy collection strategies, Center staff decided to display the energy flows through the building in a series of web pages designed to provide a full overview of the building's energy performance. This near-real time display collects and synthesizes data from over 70 different sensors which measure flows of electricity, heat, and fluids (air and water) into and out of the building as well as the site's local environmental conditions. These pages provide information and data to interested members of the public as well as other organizations and institutions considering innovations like these for their own facilities.

According to Joe Hackler, a research associate at the Center, "Engineering is, by nature, conservative and if large gains are to be made in the efficient design and specification of mechanical systems to support very efficient building design and operation, the engineering community needs real performance data to support their efforts. The 'public face' of the monitoring system is designed to encourage any one to come in and explore how energy flows through a building of advanced design such as this one."

By using the facility as an example, and providing real-time data, the Center's experience can become a model for others to evaluate and emulate. In designing the project, the Center chose to use commercially available equipment and technologies to demonstra
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Contact: Elizabeth Braun
ebraun@whrc.org
508-540-9900
Woods Hole Research Center
2-May-2005

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