Session and presenter information will be updated as speakers are confirmed and information becomes available.

Reducing Data- Center Energy Use Without Compromising Uptime

Session Presenter:

Don Beaty – PE, FASHRAE

President
DLB Associates

Data centers are mission-critical facilities, housing vital computer systems and enabling myriad business operations. They also are major consumers of electricity, accounting for nearly a quarter of global carbon-dioxide emissions. Reducing data-center energy use without compromising uptime is a challenge, but can be accomplished.

In this session, Don Beaty will provide a practical and effective approach to saving energy in data centers without impacting uptime. Included will be discussion of the major mismatch between the typical lifetimes of computers and HVAC equipment, operational and energy challenges associated with greatly overstated or understated loads, the impact of redundancy and uptime on energy, and embedded energy costs.

Smart Grid: What It Means to the HVAC Industry

Session Presenter:

Anto Budiardjo

President & CEO
Clasma Events, Inc.

Session description:

The emergence of Smart Grid has caused quite a stir. With the Obama administration, electric utilities and venture-capital firms all pouring billions of dollars into Smart Grid, various industries are racing ro determine how they will be affected and how they can benefit. Anto Budiardjo, who has spent 15 years in the building-automation industry – the past five in the Smart Grid arena – will explain what Smart Grid is, discuss how it will impact the HVAC industry and identify business opportunities Smart Grid represents.

Practical Energy Benchmarking for Commercial, Institutional, and Light-Industrial Facilties

Session Presenter:

Gary W. Wamsley – PE, CEM

President
JoGar Energy Services

Session description:

Benchmarking energy usage allows facility managers to analyze historical performance, identify trends related to site activity and weather conditions, and determine how their building’s energy performance compares to that of similar buildings. Benchmarking also enables facility managers to forecast budgets more accurately and to identify with greater precision processes that offer opportunities for improvement.

This session will discuss a means of tracking the energy performance of a facility using a single-page Excel sheet. The program identifies the most energy-intensive processes and provides both individual-system and total site benchmarks. The single-page format is technical, yet quite effective for management briefings and facility comparisons.

Best Practices for Specifying and Purchasing Commissioning for Schools

Session Presenter:

Ron Wilkinson – PE, LEED AP

Commissioning Project Manager
AKF Group LLC

The commissioning quality-assurance process is especially important for schools not only because our children deserve the healthiest and most productive indoor environments, but because, in many parts of the United States, commissioning is mandated by law for public and private educational facilities. What’s more, school expenses are under increasing scrutiny, and commissioning is an important part of minimizing energy use. Although commissioning is widely used, there is no systematic approach to specifying and purchasing it for the best results at the lowest price.

In this session, Ron Wilkinson, an authority on commissioning Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Green Building Rating System projects, will share best practices for developing requests for proposal for commissioning for schools. Also discussed will be the various commissioning certifications and the levels of expertise they represent; the differences between air and water balancing, measurement and verification, and commissioning and the consequences of combining them in the same contract; what commissioning providers need to know about digital control systems and how to make sure they have that knowledge before they are hired; and the extra LEED point for envelope commissioning and how to get it for minimal cost.

Building Energy Rating Systems: Which is Right for You?

Session Presenter:

Peter D'Antonio – PE, CEM, LEED AP

President
PCD Engineering Services Inc.

Verification of building operating performance is important to increasing the marketability and asset value of a property, tracking and managing costs, and providing feedback on the design and construction process. To independently validate the performance of their facilities, building owners, operators, and designers have a number of choices, from the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED green-building certification program to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Department of Energy’s ENERGY STAR program to the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers’ new Building Energy Quotient (bEQ) program.

In this session, Peter D'Antonio, a bEQ assessor with more than 200 Energy Star certifications and 25 LEED projects to his credit, will provide a practical, stepped approach to using these systems during the design, construction, and operational phases of a building's life, presenting lessons learned through a case study of certified buildings.

Constant Commissioning for Continual Energy Efficiency

Session Presenter:

Jon Greenberg – CEM, LEED AP

Sales Engineer
Optimum Energy LLC

A commonly understood, but rarely discussed, fact about commercial buildings is the difficulty maintaining HVAC systems for optimal energy efficiency. The complexity and unique nature of commercial HVAC systems can give rise to “drift,” or degradation in performance resulting from ill-functioning mechanical and control systems. Buildings in which HVAC systems are maintained consistently and performance drift is mitigated have the opportunity for increased energy efficiency and sustained operating-cost reductions.

This presentation will discuss how energy-efficiency performance drift occurs within HVAC systems, pitfalls of conventional energy-efficiency approaches, and benefits, implementation barriers, and costs associated with energy-efficiency software solutions.