Future Work Analyze results to determine retrofit options Retrofit the CNS building!

1. = X 10 Toward a More Sustainable Campus Part V: CNS Energy Footprint Calculator- Work in ProgressLia Stelljes, Peter Melcher and Beth Ellen Clark JosephIthaca CollegeApril 3, 2006 (Phu Dong Thien Vuong) Goal: Reduce environmental impact and footprint of the Center for Natural Sciences building (CNS) by retrofitting the building. CNS – Energy Facts: How many Earths do we need to sustain current and future human activities? Background: It is believed that in the year 1978 humanity’s consumption and waste production exceeded the Earth’s capacity to create new resources and absorb waste (Fig. 1). What is an Ecological Footprint? An ecological footprint is generally defined as the biologically productive global area (land and water) required to produce all the resources consumed as well as the amount of global area needed to absorb all the wastes generated. Wastes include the gas carbon dioxide (CO2) emitted from burning fossil fuels. Why worry about CO2? CO2 is a greenhouse gas and it is one of the major contributors to global warming. Currently human activity increases the atmospheric concentration of CO2 by about 0.5%. This is about 3.5 gigatons of CO2 a year. This is equivalent to about 3.5 billion metric tons. How does the Center for Natural Sciences Building (CNS) contribute to global warming? Because energy use coincides with CO2emissions, understanding how much energy CNS uses and the source of the energy greatly impacts the building’s calculated ecological footprint. During the summer months CNS uses an average of 365,000 KWh per month. This is equal to the electricity used by 730 average American homes. This is also equal to powering 2% of the residential population of Tompkins County or 10% of homes in the town of Ithaca! During the winter, CNS uses about 226,000 KWh per month. This is 139,000 KWh less than the summer electrical use due to air conditioning during the summer. We have just acquired the natural gas data and we are in the process of data analysis. CNS uses 43,000 Therms (Th) of natural gas to heat the building. • Steps: • Monitor resource consumption of CNS • Develop footprint calculator for buildings (Fig. 2) • Determine CNS footprint The major components of the footprint calculator Figure 1. Ecological footprint compared to Earth’s carrying capacity. Solid line represents Humanity’s Ecological Footprint. The dotted line represents Earth’s Ecological Capacity (Wackernagel, Mathis, et al. 2002). • Footprint Reduction (Retrofit) Example: • Currently, CNS uses an average of 12,000 kWh of electricity a day • Average insolation at IC latitude is 3.79 kWh/m2/day • If flat roof of CNS is completely covered with solar panels – approximately 5% (600 kWh/day) would be provided by panels. This would decrease emissions and building footprint. Figure 2. General flowchart describing the input and output (goals) of the building retrofit footprint calculator. • Future Work • Analyze results to determine retrofit options • Retrofit the CNS building! • Make calculator web-accessible Citations Wackernagel, Mathis, et al. “Ecological Footprint of Nations.” Sustainability Issue Brief Nov. 2002 Footprint artwork: The Genie of Phu Dong (Phu Dong Thien Vuong). oil on canvas,130 x 162 cm, 2002

2. Background and Project Goals Goals and Future Work: 1) Collect data from CNS 2) Use this data to develop footprint calculator appropriate for science buildings 3) Input data into calculator and determine footprint of CNS 4) Analyze results to determine retrofit options 5) Retrofit the CNS building! 6) Make calculator web-based and accessible to others For many individuals, a sustainable lifestyle is a challenging ideal in our modern world. With sustainability being a key issue in today’s society, we can make this worldwide matter more relevant in our own lives by calculating our personal ecological footprint – how many planets we would need for resources and waste absorption if everyone lived this way. Taking these issues into consideration, the CNS Footprint Committee would like to determine how the CNS building measures up to planet resource consumption and land use. The goal is to create a footprint calculator that will be applicable to science buildings and use the results to retrofit the building, making it more sustainable and closer to a LEED certified Green Building.

3. Terminology • footprint: biologically productive global area (land and water) required to produce resources and absorb the waste for any person or building (expressed in hectares) • green building: buildings that incorporate certain location, design, construction, maintenance and removal choices in order to reduce its impact on human health and the environment (small ecological footprint). • insolation: “incident solar radiation” – amount of solar radiation reaching the earth – depends on latitude • kWh (kilowatt-hour): unit of energy use (Energy = power*time [W*hr]) • LEED certified: Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design – national standard for developing high-performance, sustainable buildings • retrofit: to upgrade an existing building with new equipment

4. Survey totals: private car: carpool: pubic transportation: motorcycle: walk/bike: company vehicle: number reporting carpool: air travel: To-and-from office (mi/wk): 35, 699 402 757.5 60 120.5 500 4 --- Work related trips (mi/yr): 9,211 850 --- --- --- 2,200 3 (1 matches previous) 218,562 CNS Data Electricity: Summer months: 365,000 KWh per month = electricity used by 730 average American homes = 2% of the residential population of Tompkins County = 10% of homes in the town of Ithaca! Winter months: 226,000 KWh per month (139,000 KWh less than the summer electrical use due to air conditioning during the summer) Natural Gas: 43,000 Therms (Th) per month to heat the building. Roof dimensions: Total: 26303.5 sqft Barrel roof: 10039.5 sqft Flat Roof (Ar): 16264.0 sqft In order to have a better idea of a total, comprehensive, building footprint, we distributed a survey to faculty/staff and departments in CNS regarding work related transportation. (33 surveys returned)

5. Developing a Footprint Calculator Development Obstacles: 1) obtaining usable data: monitoring natural gas use is a recent undertaking and there is not any documentation on waste water treatment (chemical waste removal unknown) 2) finding a pre-existing calculator to use as a guide 3) figuring out how to convert emissions to “land use” and planet equivalent ~ given data, how do we calculate a footprint? Before creating a calculator of our own, we wanted to determine the footprint of CNS – the number of planets necessary to provide the resources and absorb the waste if everyone were to work in a building like CNS.

6. THE ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT OF CNS CNS releases 3100 metric tons (310,000 kg or 683,000 lbs) of CO2; 350 kg (771 lbs) of methane; 66 kg (145 lbs) of Nitrous oxide into the atmosphere every year. This is equal in polluting power to taking about 550 cars off the road for an entire year! According to E.O. Wilson each individual on Earth should be allotted about 2.4 ha (5.9 acres) of land if we were to dived the planet's productive area up into "fair-share" allotments. How does this translate into a footprint? An average American requires about 5 planets of productive area to sustain his/her lifestyle (if everyone on the planet lived like and average American). This footprint calculation does not include the "work" lifestyle component. So if everyone on the planet worked in a building like CNS (global population of 6.5 billion people) and lived an average American lifestyle; and CNS "housed" 250 people during the work day; then we would need to add an additional 3.3 planet Earths to the average 5 planets already used. This leaves us with a total of 8.3 planets needed. Results from CNS 2005 data:Clean Air Cool Planet Greenhouse Gas Inventory Calculator v4.0 • Numbers Used in Calculator • 125,000 sq ft building (not including surrounding grounds) • 3,547,162 kw/h of electricity used per year • 48,000 million BTU's of natural gas used per year • An average mix of NY state energy suppliers was used to determine the amount and type of emissions generated for the amount of energy consumed. • 50 CNS employees (faculty and staff) • 200 students (academic year) 20 students (summer session) • 315,240 commuter miles driven per year (includes both commuter miles and work related trips to conferences. A carpool value of 13% was used for faculty and staff (determined from survey) and 80% of the students carpool (this carpool value was made up also a two-mile roundtrip student commute distance was used). • 53,350 gallons of gasoline were used (using an average value of 22.1 miles per gallon per vehicle). • This means that the faculty, staff and students of CNS spent about $100,000 last year on gasoline for their cars just to drive from home to CNS (this does not take into account student travel to their "parents" homes for holidays etc.) • If we use a carbon sequestering rate of 1.8 tons/ha/year (the sequestering capacity of a middle aged North temperate forest) then we would need about 1722 ha (4255 acres) of this forest to absorb the 3100 metric tons of greenhouse gasses emitted by CNS. On a per person basis (e.g., an individual that works in CNS) we would have to add an additional 6.88 ha (17 acres of productive land to the area of land already used to sustain our personal lifestyles.

7. Retrofit Options Elements • -HVAC • radiant/evaporative cooling system • underfloor air distribution – personal control • decrease pressure drop for • fans to overcome • low energy pumping systems • 2-way valves w/ variable flow • -generation • - wind turbines • electricity storage • - PV Panels • DC electricity from light – • rotate throughout • year for max avg. energy (directly facing sun) • charge batteries • - water turbine • drive electrical generator • inc. energy w/ inc. water pressure • - lighting • compact fluorescents • longer life (8-10)x standard incandescent • more energy efficient – less CO2 emitted • emit less heat – lower cooling costs • windows (pane and frame) • lower heat loss & air leakage (winter) • reduce solar heat gain (summer) • low-emittance coatings – diff. chem. composition • reflective coatings • suppress heat flow • gas fills (Ar, Kr) – reduce conductance of air space • less conductive, better insulating • spacers • -insulation • 100% HCFC-free – zero ozone depletion • phase out CFCs • LTTR – Long Term Thermal • Resistance (foam plastic roof installations)

8. Footprint Reduction (Retrofit) Example Equations to determine % of building’s energy use provided by solar panels on roof area of roof need for one panel (Ap) = (panel width (Wp)) * cosθ * (panel length (Lp)) where θ is the angle between the panel and the roof that provides the most direct sun exposure throughout the year # of panels needed to cover roof (#) = area of roof (Ar) / Ap solar energy provided over roof area via insolation (Es) = insolation at our lat (I)* Ar (provided entire roof is covered by panels) energy provided by panels (ET) = (Es) * PV panel efficiency (Pe) % of CNS energy (ECNS) provided by panels (E%) – electricity use = (ET/ECNS)*100 This is equivalent to: E% = ((Es*Pe)/ECNS)*100 = ((I*Ar*Pe)/ECNS)*100 total cost (CT) = ET * cost per kWh * # * cost per panel • Enter data: • Currently, CNS uses an average of 12,000 kWh of electricity a day • Average insolation at IC latitude is 3.79 kWh/m2/day • If flat roof of CNS is completely covered with solar panels – approximately 5% (600 kWh/day) would be provided by panels. This would decrease emissions and building footprint.

9. Works Consulted Canough, Gay E. ETM Solar Works. Microsoft PowerPoint Presentation. 4/21/2006 Campus Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory Toolkit CA-CP eCalculator v4.0. <www.cleanair-coolplanet.org>. Energy Information Administration. <www.eia.doe.gov>. Hinrichs and Kleinbach. Energy – Its Use and the Environment 3rd Ed. Thompson Learning Inc., 2002. Wackernagel, Mathis, et al. “Ecological Footprint of Nations.” Sustainability Issue Brief Nov. 2002 Wackernagel and Rees, 1995. Our Ecological Footprint: Reducing Human Impact on the Earth. Gabriola Island, BC and Philadelphia, PA: New Society Publishers Wilson, E. O. , The Future of Life (Knopf, New York, 2002). www.windstreampower.com/solarpower/solarinfo.html Acknowledgements Peter Melcher – advisor, footprint calculations Beth Ellen Clark Joseph – advisor, retrofit background CNS Faculty and Staff – surveys Joe Armstrong Jon Harrod