As higher education facilities’ professionals look for innovative ways to fund campus refurbishment programs and upgrade building systems, performance contracting is becoming an increasingly popular means through which efficiencies can be achieved with a budget-neutral approach. Administrators at West Virginia University (WVU) chose this option to address their eight million square foot built environment, significantly improving facilities and increasing energy efficiency, while at the same time helping to improve safety.
Before work commenced, WVU was eager to find a way to reduce utility costs, improve facility operations, address deferred maintenance and lessen the impact of its campus buildings on the environment. Many of the facilities built in the 1960s and 1970s were still operating with original equipment and limited centralised building automation systems. “We were keeping a lot of the systems running, but they weren’t running very well,” says Joe Fisher, from Facilities and Services at WVU.
Following a tendering process which saw bids submitted by 18 companies, each of the three selected finalists was asked to undertake an investment-grade energy audit analysing consumption and identifying where WVU could maximise energy saving. Siemens was chosen as the partner for this project.
Achieving substantial savings
Once selected, Siemens recommended facility improvement measures that would deliver the greatest impact in this multi-phase project which runs over eight years.
The anticipated $60 million cost of the building and refurbishment program, once all projects are completed, will be significantly exceeded by the savings achieved through adoption of the new, more energy-efficient technology. The cost of the project was divided by the guaranteed annual savings to determine the length of the contract.
Central to the project was the provision of new building automation systems at WVU. Some facilities will have new energy management systems installed, while in others modifications are being made to improve the efficiency of building operations and even out temperature variations. “Two to three million dollars worth of controls upgrades in the first and second phases will both help their buildings operate more efficiently, and improve comfort levels for students, faculty and staff”, explains Jim Platz, senior account executive at Siemens.
The close cooperation with the university resulted in identifying requirements for campus facilities in terms of urgency of repairs and upgrades, and balanced payback periods to select the right combination of projects. ”It was a mix of projects with greatly varying payback periods”, says Fisher. “Projects with quick payback like power factor correction offset projects with longer payback or even training which offered no payback at all.”
West Virginia University uses Siemens for new approach to institutional sustainability
18 Jul 2012
