As a partner of the Empire Building Challenge, BXP will complete a decarbonization pilot project at 601 Lexington Avenue. The 1.52 million square foot, 59-story, multi-tenant premier workplace in midtown Manhattan was constructed in 1977 and features building systems typical among commercial high-rises of a similar vintage. The innovative measures planned for implementation demonstrate a scalable and replicable decarbonization opportunity within a difficult-to-decarbonize building type.
As part of their demonstration project, BXP will install water-to-water heat pumps to transfer heat from the condenser water loop to secondary water systems. Recovered heat will then be used to offset perimeter heating loads. By deploying existing technology in a novel way, this project creates a thermal network which utilizes heat that would otherwise be rejected to the atmosphere from the building’s cooling system. BXP will reduce the building’s annual steam consumption by over 30% with this innovative thermal system.
BXP is a fully integrated real estate investment trust and is the largest publicly traded developer, owner, and manager of premier workplaces in the U.S. with a portfolio spanning 54.5 million square feet.
Project Status
Planning
Under Construction
Monitoring & Evaluation
Project Highlights
Progress
Construction drawings are complete, and the project is awarded to the selected General Contractor. Water source heat pump equipment procurement has also been released.
Steam Use Reduction
30%
Heat recovery retrofit at 601 Lexington Ave will reduce annual steam consumption by over 30%. The project uses an existing technology in an innovative way to create a thermal network in the building, using heat that would otherwise be wasted.
Lessons Learned
Reducing demand and dependence on fossil fuel driven heating systems is an enablement step for building decarbonization.
Testimonial
“At BXP, we are committed to carbon-neutral operations and the advancement of built environment climate action. Climate action is collective action and alongside our partners at Norges Bank Investment Management, we are thrilled to pursue this decarbonization initiative at 601 Lexington Avenue.”
Ben Myers Vice President, Sustainability
Boston Properties, Inc. (BXP)
Lessons Learned
The project is highly replicable elsewhere within the BXP portfolio and provides a bridge to carbon neutral planning.
Step 1
Step 1: Examine Current Conditions
A baseline assessment is key to understanding current systems and performance, then identifying conditions, requirements or events that will trigger a decarbonization effort. The assessment looks across technical systems, asset strategy and sectoral factors.
Building System Conditions
New heat source potential
Efficiency improvements
Asset Conditions
Carbon emissions limits
Owner sustainability goals
Market Conditions
Technology improves
Policy changes
Utility prices change
Fuels phase out
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BXP is committed to carbon-neutrality by 2025 for its actively managed occupied office buildings. Starting in 2010, BXP adopted a phased approach with a long-term goal of achieving low site energy use and reducing GHG emissions at 601 Lexington Ave. Compared to a 2010 baseline, BXP has reduced the building’s GHG Emissions by 47% and site EUI by 33%. The notable reduction in energy use was achieved through a series of targeted energy efficiency measures, including a building automation system upgrade, installation of Variable Speed Drives on all major HVAC equipment pumps and fans, lighting upgrades, modernization of the central chiller plant (replacing steam chillers with high efficiency variable speed electric chillers), and optimization of operational controls.
To accelerate decarbonization efforts, the next phase of retrofit projects should be geared to reduce district steam consumption within the building. This initiative aligns with BXP’s decarbonization strategy and energy efficiency objectives and positions the building on a path towards full compliance with Local Law 97.
The heat recovery project focuses on minimizing the dependence on district steam, a fossil-fuel sourced commodity. This project demonstrates a replicable decarbonization solution in existing commercial high-rise buildings and joins a list of energy conservation measures already deployed at the property.
To compare the energy and carbon reduction impact of the measure on a business-as-usual scenario, a comprehensive energy analysis was performed to establish a baseline operation and compare alternatives. The effort included review of existing HVAC systems, electrical infrastructure, space constraints, submetering of heating and cooling loads, potential for energy recovery to offset heat loads, and evaluation of energy use and costs.
The detailed energy analysis indicated a considerable reduction in energy and GHG emissions compared to baseline energy use and significant utility savings per year.
Step 2
Step 2: Design Resource Efficient Solutions
Effective engineering integrates measures for reducing energy load, recovering wasted heat, and moving towards partial or full electrification. This increases operational efficiencies, optimizes energy peaks, and avoids oversized heating systems, thus alleviating space constraints and minimizing the cost of retrofits to decarbonize the building over time.
Existing Conditions
This diagram illustrates the building prior to the initiation of Strategic Decarbonization planning by the owners and their teams.
Click through the measures under “Building After” to understand the components of the building’s energy transition.
Sequence of Measures
2024
2034
Building System Affected
heating
cooling
ventilation
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The project at 601 Lexington Avenue will deploy existing technology in a novel way, creating a thermal network that recovers and utilizes heat which is otherwise rejected by the cooling towers.
Through NYSERDA’s Empire Building Challenge, BXP will install water source heat pumps (WSHPs) that will capture waste heat from the condenser water loop. The recovered heat will be reused into the building’s perimeter heating.
Currently, the building condenser water system carries heat from base building and tenant cooling systems to the cooling towers, where it is rejected evaporatively to the atmosphere. In office buildings, this heat is often constant and available for recovery year-round. In the proposed measure, WSHPs will be installed. They will replace the function of the cooling towers during the heating season and will reclaim heat from the condenser water loop for beneficial use. An automated bypass valve will divert condenser water from the cooling towers, retaining as much heat in the building as possible for recovery by the WSHPs. The heat recovered will be reused in the building’s heating systems and will significantly offset reliance on fossil fuel-based steam. These measures will reduce annual steam consumption by an estimated 30%.
These measures partially electrify building heat sources while recovering waste heat for beneficial re-use. This results in reduced energy consumption and enhanced demand management. These measures are replicable for existing buildings, designed to be both space-efficient and cost-effective.
In addition to the WSHPs, air source heat pumps (ASHPs) may be installed in the future to produce low-temperature hot water to cover some of the remaining heating loads. The project team plans to continue investigating ASHP infrastructure within the physical space constraints of this occupied building to minimize reliance on steam heating.
Step 3
Step 3: Build the Business Case
Making a business case for strategic decarbonization requires thinking beyond a traditional energy audit approach or simple payback analysis. It assesses business-as-usual costs and risks against the costs and added value of phased decarbonization investments in the long-term.
Decarbonization Costs
$3.65M
Capital costs of decarbonization.
Business-as-Usual Costs
$262k / YR
Energy cost savings: 287k / YR.
Repairs & maintenance savings: 25k / YR.
Business-as-Usual Risks
$120k / YR
LL97 avoidance from 2030-2034.
No fines in 2035+ assuming electric grid coefficient aligns with CLCPA goals.
Decarbonization Value
$1.1M
Incentives.
Pursuing ConEd Rebates through the Clean Heat Rebate Program.
Net Present Value
$525k
Net difference between the present value of cash inflows and outflows over a period of time.
Learn More
A simple payback measure as a standalone analysis does not accurately represent the benefit of decarbonization over time. A long-term outlook for decarbonization investments that accounts for utility cost escalations, building performance standard compliance fine avoidance, procurement costs to meet voluntary carbon neutral operations commitment over the life-cycle of the project, and other risks associated with taking the business-as-usual approach are critical while creating a business case for decarbonization.
The financial analysis for the project included a relative comparison to business-as-usual costs under various scenarios as described below:
Scenario 1 represented the financial impact of paying Local Law 97 penalties;
Scenario 2 represented a proactive procurement of carbon credits to minimally comply with Local Law 97;
Scenario 3 represented RECs and Carbon Credit procurement costs to achieve the goal of Carbon Neutral Operations by 2025.
The proposed project has a positive NPV when compared to a business-as-usual scenario and is a critical first step in the building’s long-term decarbonization plan as it significantly reduces the dependence on district steam for building heating loads. This is an enablement step for future decarbonization phases in 2034 and beyond. Additionally, the project is highly replicable elsewhere within the BXP portfolio and provides a bridge to carbon neutral planning.
Strategic Decarbonization Action Plan
An emissions decarbonization roadmap helps building owners visualize their future emissions reductions by outlining the CO2 reductions from selected energy conservation measures. This roadmap is designed with a phased approach, considering a 20- or 30-year timeline, and incorporates the evolving benefits of grid decarbonization, ensuring a comprehensive view of long-term environmental impact.
Learn More
To advance the building’s broad decarbonization objectives, and through the reduce, recycle, electrify approach, the team studied energy and carbon emission reduction pathways for 601 Lexington Avenue through a robust, collaborative process with multiple stakeholders.
The decarbonization projects require a phase-in plan and a multi-step approach, which includes technical analysis, detailed design, procurement, and implementation. The preliminary technical analysis for the decarbonization roadmap was performed in Q4 of 2022 as part of the Empire Building Challenge application. The first phase of the decarbonization roadmap is the Condenser Water Heat Recovery project, which received NYSERDA funding through the Empire Building Challenge. The full design (DD and CD) of this project was completed in 2023 and construction is expected to be complete in 2025.
On-site decarbonization efforts may be furthered in a subsequent second phase implemented in 2034 with electrification of heating and DHW through air source heat pumps. It is anticipated that the heat pump technology and pricing will continue to improve; because of that, the energy and GHG reductions reflected in the carbon neutrality roadmap below are conservative estimates. As an interim phase, starting in 2025, the building will achieve Carbon Neutral Operations for Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by offsetting them through a combination of renewable energy and carbon credits procurements.
A baseline assessment is key to understanding current systems and performance, then identifying conditions, requirements or events that will trigger a decarbonization effort. The assessment looks across technical systems, asset strategy and sectoral factors.
Building System Conditions
Asset Conditions
Market Conditions
Learn More
Step 2
Step 2: Design Resource Efficient Solutions
Effective engineering integrates measures for reducing energy load, recovering wasted heat, and moving towards partial or full electrification. This increases operational efficiencies, optimizes energy peaks, and avoids oversized heating systems, thus alleviating space constraints and minimizing the cost of retrofits to decarbonize the building over time.
Learn More
Step 3
Step 3: Build the Business Case
Making a business case for strategic decarbonization requires thinking beyond a traditional energy audit approach or simple payback analysis. It assesses business-as-usual costs and risks against the costs and added value of phased decarbonization investments in the long-term.
Decarbonization Costs
Business-as-Usual Costs
Business-as-Usual Risks
Decarbonization Value
Net Present Value
Learn More
Strategic Decarbonization Action Plan
An emissions decarbonization roadmap helps building owners visualize their future emissions reductions by outlining the CO2 reductions from selected energy conservation measures. This roadmap is designed with a phased approach, considering a 20- or 30-year timeline, and incorporates the evolving benefits of grid decarbonization, ensuring a comprehensive view of long-term environmental impact.
Learn More
Project Team
Additional Resources
Tags
During this High Rise / Low Carbon series program developed to support the Empire Building Challenge and other NYSERDA programs, hear from experts focused on recent innovations in delivering high-performance, low carbon envelope retrofits, an essential keystone for maintaining high quality indoor environments while radically lowering heating and cooling demand to realize a low-carbon future.
Featuring diverse examples, from the over-cladding of masonry buildings to the re-cladding of curtainwall buildings, this discussion will focus on the technical aspects of high performance envelopes like integrating MEP systems into cladding, but also the ownership structures and cost compression that can result from innovation in this critical space.
Opening Remarks
James Geppner, Senior Project Manager, Retrofit NY, NYSERDA
Moderator
Todd Kimmel, Regional Specifications Manager, ROCKWOOL North America & Chairperson, Rainscreen Association in North America
Presenters
Abdulla Darrat, President, Renewal Construction Services LLC Laura Humphrey, Director of Sustainability, L&M Development Partners
Panelists
Abdulla Darrat, President, Renewal Construction Services LLC Aurimas Sabulis, CEO, Dextall Erin Fisher, Director of Engineering Services, CANY John Ivanoff, Associate Principal, Buro Happold
A baseline assessment is key to understanding current systems and performance, then identifying conditions, requirements or events that will trigger a decarbonization effort. The assessment looks across technical systems, asset strategy and sectoral factors.
Building System Conditions
Asset Conditions
Market Conditions
Learn More
Step 2
Step 2: Design Resource Efficient Solutions
Effective engineering integrates measures for reducing energy load, recovering wasted heat, and moving towards partial or full electrification. This increases operational efficiencies, optimizes energy peaks, and avoids oversized heating systems, thus alleviating space constraints and minimizing the cost of retrofits to decarbonize the building over time.
Learn More
Step 3
Step 3: Build the Business Case
Making a business case for strategic decarbonization requires thinking beyond a traditional energy audit approach or simple payback analysis. It assesses business-as-usual costs and risks against the costs and added value of phased decarbonization investments in the long-term.
Decarbonization Costs
Business-as-Usual Costs
Business-as-Usual Risks
Decarbonization Value
Net Present Value
Learn More
Strategic Decarbonization Action Plan
An emissions decarbonization roadmap helps building owners visualize their future emissions reductions by outlining the CO2 reductions from selected energy conservation measures. This roadmap is designed with a phased approach, considering a 20- or 30-year timeline, and incorporates the evolving benefits of grid decarbonization, ensuring a comprehensive view of long-term environmental impact.
Learn More
Project Team
Additional Resources
Tags
This Urban Land Institute webinar highlights strategies that can be employed by real estate companies to drive sustainability through tenant engagement. The best practices and examples shared by property owners illustrate how sustainability goals can be aligned with tenant engagement strategies. Some strategies explored in this webinar include tenant engagement through green leasing, as well as through collection of data. Panelists speak to their own organization’s experiences, and more broadly, on the importance of integrating sustainability into tenant engagement.
A baseline assessment is key to understanding current systems and performance, then identifying conditions, requirements or events that will trigger a decarbonization effort. The assessment looks across technical systems, asset strategy and sectoral factors.
Building System Conditions
Asset Conditions
Market Conditions
Learn More
Step 2
Step 2: Design Resource Efficient Solutions
Effective engineering integrates measures for reducing energy load, recovering wasted heat, and moving towards partial or full electrification. This increases operational efficiencies, optimizes energy peaks, and avoids oversized heating systems, thus alleviating space constraints and minimizing the cost of retrofits to decarbonize the building over time.
Learn More
Step 3
Step 3: Build the Business Case
Making a business case for strategic decarbonization requires thinking beyond a traditional energy audit approach or simple payback analysis. It assesses business-as-usual costs and risks against the costs and added value of phased decarbonization investments in the long-term.
Decarbonization Costs
Business-as-Usual Costs
Business-as-Usual Risks
Decarbonization Value
Net Present Value
Learn More
Strategic Decarbonization Action Plan
An emissions decarbonization roadmap helps building owners visualize their future emissions reductions by outlining the CO2 reductions from selected energy conservation measures. This roadmap is designed with a phased approach, considering a 20- or 30-year timeline, and incorporates the evolving benefits of grid decarbonization, ensuring a comprehensive view of long-term environmental impact.
Learn More
Project Team
Additional Resources
Tags
With so many systems poorly installed and with maintenance so often neglected, ventilation systems in previous eras were often seen as the source of problems and little else. But today, a mixture of technological advancements and the migration of products from other markets places highly efficient systems that provide exemplary air quality and comfort within reach of virtually every building.
The days of balancing indoor air quality against energy use are over, with modern systems decoupling ventilation from cooling, utilizing high performance energy recovery ventilation (ERVs), and dedicated outside air systems (DOAS) that allow for high volumes of fresh air while drastically limiting the loss of heat and humidity. Decoupling ventilation from the heating and cooling systems is a key element of the Resource Efficient Decarbonization (RED) framework and a critical phase in producing low carbon buildings with the highest quality indoor environments.
During this High Rise / Low Carbon series program developed to support the Empire Building Challenge and other NYSERDA programs, hear from critical leaders in this field as they discuss how these innovative ventilation systems are addressing critical needs across all segments of the building sector, while also providing the foundation for full electrification.
Moderator
Benjamin Rodney, Vice President, Construction, U.S. East Region, Hines
Presenters
Daniel Bersohn, Associate, BuroHappold Engineering Benjamin Rodney, Vice President, Construction, U.S. East Region, Hines
Speakers
Vinca Bonde, Sales Director, Energy Machines Grace Kolb, Mechanical Engineer, AKF Group Tony Abate, Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, AtmosAir Miguel Gaspar, Vice President/Group Leader, Loring Consulting Engineers Dr. Marwa Zaatari, ASHRAE Distinguished Lecturer, Partner at D-ZINE Partners, enVerid Systems Advisory Board Member
A baseline assessment is key to understanding current systems and performance, then identifying conditions, requirements or events that will trigger a decarbonization effort. The assessment looks across technical systems, asset strategy and sectoral factors.
Building System Conditions
Asset Conditions
Market Conditions
Learn More
Step 2
Step 2: Design Resource Efficient Solutions
Effective engineering integrates measures for reducing energy load, recovering wasted heat, and moving towards partial or full electrification. This increases operational efficiencies, optimizes energy peaks, and avoids oversized heating systems, thus alleviating space constraints and minimizing the cost of retrofits to decarbonize the building over time.
Learn More
Step 3
Step 3: Build the Business Case
Making a business case for strategic decarbonization requires thinking beyond a traditional energy audit approach or simple payback analysis. It assesses business-as-usual costs and risks against the costs and added value of phased decarbonization investments in the long-term.
Decarbonization Costs
Business-as-Usual Costs
Business-as-Usual Risks
Decarbonization Value
Net Present Value
Learn More
Strategic Decarbonization Action Plan
An emissions decarbonization roadmap helps building owners visualize their future emissions reductions by outlining the CO2 reductions from selected energy conservation measures. This roadmap is designed with a phased approach, considering a 20- or 30-year timeline, and incorporates the evolving benefits of grid decarbonization, ensuring a comprehensive view of long-term environmental impact.
Learn More
Project Team
Additional Resources
Tags
Lessons from New York’s Empire Building Challenge
This article, published in NESEA’s BuildingEnergy magazine (Vol. 40 No. 1), addresses common “decarbonization blind spots” that impede progress and shares insights gained from the incremental methodology and integrated design process pioneered through NYSERDA’s Empire Building Challenge.
A baseline assessment is key to understanding current systems and performance, then identifying conditions, requirements or events that will trigger a decarbonization effort. The assessment looks across technical systems, asset strategy and sectoral factors.
Building System Conditions
Asset Conditions
Market Conditions
Learn More
Step 2
Step 2: Design Resource Efficient Solutions
Effective engineering integrates measures for reducing energy load, recovering wasted heat, and moving towards partial or full electrification. This increases operational efficiencies, optimizes energy peaks, and avoids oversized heating systems, thus alleviating space constraints and minimizing the cost of retrofits to decarbonize the building over time.
Learn More
Step 3
Step 3: Build the Business Case
Making a business case for strategic decarbonization requires thinking beyond a traditional energy audit approach or simple payback analysis. It assesses business-as-usual costs and risks against the costs and added value of phased decarbonization investments in the long-term.
Decarbonization Costs
Business-as-Usual Costs
Business-as-Usual Risks
Decarbonization Value
Net Present Value
Learn More
Strategic Decarbonization Action Plan
An emissions decarbonization roadmap helps building owners visualize their future emissions reductions by outlining the CO2 reductions from selected energy conservation measures. This roadmap is designed with a phased approach, considering a 20- or 30-year timeline, and incorporates the evolving benefits of grid decarbonization, ensuring a comprehensive view of long-term environmental impact.
Learn More
Project Team
Additional Resources
Tags
This presentation covers green building and sustainable communities provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act including tax credits, rebates, grants, workforce training, and technology procurement.
A baseline assessment is key to understanding current systems and performance, then identifying conditions, requirements or events that will trigger a decarbonization effort. The assessment looks across technical systems, asset strategy and sectoral factors.
Building System Conditions
Asset Conditions
Market Conditions
Learn More
Step 2
Step 2: Design Resource Efficient Solutions
Effective engineering integrates measures for reducing energy load, recovering wasted heat, and moving towards partial or full electrification. This increases operational efficiencies, optimizes energy peaks, and avoids oversized heating systems, thus alleviating space constraints and minimizing the cost of retrofits to decarbonize the building over time.
Learn More
Step 3
Step 3: Build the Business Case
Making a business case for strategic decarbonization requires thinking beyond a traditional energy audit approach or simple payback analysis. It assesses business-as-usual costs and risks against the costs and added value of phased decarbonization investments in the long-term.
Decarbonization Costs
Business-as-Usual Costs
Business-as-Usual Risks
Decarbonization Value
Net Present Value
Learn More
Strategic Decarbonization Action Plan
An emissions decarbonization roadmap helps building owners visualize their future emissions reductions by outlining the CO2 reductions from selected energy conservation measures. This roadmap is designed with a phased approach, considering a 20- or 30-year timeline, and incorporates the evolving benefits of grid decarbonization, ensuring a comprehensive view of long-term environmental impact.
Learn More
Project Team
Additional Resources
Tags
Insights from Empire Building Challenge
Large commercial and residential buildings must overcome various hurdles before implementing deep retrofits or capital projects that help achieve building decarbonization. This section addresses technical barriers and questions often faced by building owners and retrofit project developers.
Decentralized Systems and Tenant Equipment
Access to Occupied Spaces.
Lease Concerns.
Regulatory Limitations of Rent Stabilized Apartments.
The building owner is required to provide free heat and hot water.
No mechanism to recover investment in new systems is necessary to achieve decarbonization.
Buildings are capital constrained.
Split Incentives (e.g. tenants pay for energy).
Facade and Windows
Work must be completed at the end of facade/window useful life; very long useful life.
Building codes.
Glazing reduction at odds with aesthetic/marketability concerns.
Difficult installing with occupied spaces.
Reduce Local Law 11 recurring cost via overcladding
Aesthetic concerns
At odds with historic preservation
Capital intensive
Lot line limitations
Technology Limitations
Need higher R-value/inch for thinner wall assembly:
Vacuum insulated panels
Aerogel panels/batts
Zero-GWP blowing agents for closed cell spray foam (nitrogen blowing agent needs to be more widely adopted)
Ventilation
Energy Recovery Ventilation (ERV)
Space constraints
System tie-in point accessibility/feasibility
Rooftop Supply Air (Reznor) Unit Alternatives
Heat pump alternatives to eliminate resistance heat
Combine with ERV
HVAC Load Reduction (HLR) Technology
Vent or capture exhaust gases
Space constraints
System tie-in point accessibility/feasibility
Central vs. Decentralized Ventilation Systems
Direct Outside Air System (DOAS)
Modular perimeter ducted air heat pumps:
Competition for leasable space
Space constraints
Ventilation Points-of-Entry
Aesthetic concerns
Lot line facades/building setbacks
Competition with leasable space
Space constraints
Heat Pump Limitations
Variable Refrigerant Flow (VRF)
Fire and life safety concerns about volume of refrigerant gas located within occupied spaces.
Regulatory risk from new refrigerant policies
PTAC and VTAC
Ducted Supply/Exhaust Air Source Heat Pumps
Domestic Hot Water
Central DHW Systems:
Limited domestic production.
Performance not confirmed by independent third parties.
More demonstration projects needed.
Decentralized DHW Systems
More open-source interconnection between devices/interoperability is needed to achieve energy distribution flexibility and capacity expansion:
Air source that has a manifold connection to interconnect with water source or refrigerant gas distribution.
Interconnectivity/simplified heat exchange between refrigerants/water/air, etc.
Other options and add-ons.
Steam Alternatives and Barriers
Below are high temperature renewable resource alternatives to district steam. These alternatives are limited and face barriers to implementation due to cost, scalability, and other factors.
Deep Bore Geothermal
Renewable Hydrogen
Carbon Capture and Sequestration
Biomethane
Electric Boilers
High-temperature thermal storage
Hight-temperature industrial heat pumps
Waste Heat Capture and Reuse
Fission
Barriers to Electrification and Utility Capacity Limitations
Building Electric Capacity Upgrades
Electric riser capacity
Switchgear expansion
New service/vault expansion/point-of-entry space constraints
Capacity competition with other electrification needs:
Space heat and cooling
DHW
Cooking
Pumps and motors
Local Network Electric Capacity Upgrades
Excess Distribution Facility Charges (EDF)
Contributions in Aid of Construction (CIAC)
Gas Utility Earnings Adjustment Mechanisms (EAM) focused on System Peak Demand Reductions
Partial Electrification concepts achieve deep decarbonization but do not necessarily achieve peak gas demand reductions (debatable)
Total Connected Loads and Peak Demand drive need for capacity upgrades
Demand reduction strategies do not obviate capacity limitations unless the utility accepts the solution as a permanent demand/load reduction strategy.
Battery Storage:
Fire danger
Space constraints
Electricity distribution limitations
Structural loads
Building Automation/BMS/Demand Response:
Cost
Integration limitations; Blackbox software
Microgrid development cost and lack of expertise
On-site Generation:
Space constraints
Gas use; Zero carbon fuels availability is non-existent
Structural loads
Pipe infrastructure
Thermal Storage
Space constrains
Structural loads
Technology limitations:
Vacuum insulated storage tanks
Phase change material (DHW, space heating)
Geothermal (ambient temperature), Deep Bore Geothermal (high temperature) or Shared Loop District Energy Systems provide cooling and heating with lower peak demand than standard electric equipment
Building pipe riser limitations; need additional riser capacity:
Building water loops are typically “top down” – cooling capacity is typically located at rooftop mechanical penthouses; cooling towers at roof. Some exceptions to this rule
Space Constraints
Drilling Difficulty:
Outdoor space constraints for geothermal wells
Difficult permitting
Mud and contaminated soil disposal
Overhead clearance constraints for drilling in basements/garages
Shared Loop/Thermal Utility Limitations:
Requires entity that may operate in public ROWs and across property lines
Utilities are limited by regulations for gas, steam or electric delivery versus shared loop media (ambient temperature water).
Only utility entities can provide very long amortization periods
Utilities are best suited to work amid crowded underground municipal ROWs.
Deep Bore Geothermal Limitations:
Requires test drilling and geological assessment
Seismic risk
Drilling equipment is very large – more akin to oil and gas development equipment
Subsurface land rights and DEC restrictions
Other Energy Efficiency/Conservation Measures with proven/attractive economics (these measures are limited by lack of capital or knowledge)
A baseline assessment is key to understanding current systems and performance, then identifying conditions, requirements or events that will trigger a decarbonization effort. The assessment looks across technical systems, asset strategy and sectoral factors.
Building System Conditions
Asset Conditions
Market Conditions
Learn More
Step 2
Step 2: Design Resource Efficient Solutions
Effective engineering integrates measures for reducing energy load, recovering wasted heat, and moving towards partial or full electrification. This increases operational efficiencies, optimizes energy peaks, and avoids oversized heating systems, thus alleviating space constraints and minimizing the cost of retrofits to decarbonize the building over time.
Learn More
Step 3
Step 3: Build the Business Case
Making a business case for strategic decarbonization requires thinking beyond a traditional energy audit approach or simple payback analysis. It assesses business-as-usual costs and risks against the costs and added value of phased decarbonization investments in the long-term.
Decarbonization Costs
Business-as-Usual Costs
Business-as-Usual Risks
Decarbonization Value
Net Present Value
Learn More
Strategic Decarbonization Action Plan
An emissions decarbonization roadmap helps building owners visualize their future emissions reductions by outlining the CO2 reductions from selected energy conservation measures. This roadmap is designed with a phased approach, considering a 20- or 30-year timeline, and incorporates the evolving benefits of grid decarbonization, ensuring a comprehensive view of long-term environmental impact.
Learn More
Project Team
Additional Resources
Tags
Insights from Empire Building Challenge
It is clear today that the use of fossil fuel-fired equipment in buildings has a limited future due to technological advancements, policy changes, ESG requirements, and other externalities. As asset managers, sustainability managers, and their consultants pursue decarbonization plans, misconceptions about decarbonization arise that can delay action and progress. Below is a list of the misconceptions encountered by NYSERDA’s Empire Building Challenge team and our recommended approaches that debunk these inaccuracies.
1. Simple Payback Measures
Instead of looking for tangential ways to create value, energy efficiency and decarbonization projects repeatedly fall into the trap of using energy savings (and some may now include carbon emissions fines savings) to justify investments in energy conservation measures. Often, this linear thinking approach yields unattractive investment economics. Alternatively, conduct scenarios analyses including net present value calculations: The lowest net present cost or negative net present value (NPV) over the decarbonization period will help inform the prioritization and selection of energy conservation measures. Demonstrating the return on investment (ROI) and/or internal rate of return (IRR) on the incremental cost of action over a do-nothing baseline will help persuade real estate owners to prioritize these projects. Rather than a simple payback analysis that looks only at the decarbonization path, the analysis should focus on comparing a decarbonization path with a “business-as-usual” path. This approach helps isolate the incremental cost of decarbonization over a business-as-usual approach.
This type of analysis requires completing a Strategic Decarbonization Assessment (SDA), which is based on a Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) analysis over the decarbonization period. The SDA should include the complexities of a capital refresh, tenant improvements, and non-energy benefits. Asset investment should be in the context of a comprehensive decarbonization roadmap rather than simply reactive maintenance.
2. One-to-one Equipment Swap with Air Source Heat Pump Is the Best Electrification Option
A one-to-one equipment swap with air source heat pumps, which is typically the first full-electrification option considered, may not be a realistic decarbonization strategy – particularly for owners of large buildings facing various constraints around thermal distribution systems, roof space, tenant disruption, and energy supply. In fact, it is advantageous to determine the building’s need for heat pumps toward the end of the decarbonization road mapping process to ensure that the heat pumps can run optimally. Significantly reducing loads, recovering and reusing heat wherever possible by enabling thermal networking, and using a cascading approach to decarbonizing easy-to-electrify loads are likely advantageous steps to take before installing heat pumps. Systems should be optimized to deliver heating or cooling efficiently over the integrated sum of the year’s diverse conditions, the vast majority of which are at part-load. Efforts to reduce and shift loads can help reduce peak capacity. However, electrification of more difficult peaks may require special consideration within the building’s roadmap and taking a rational approach to resilience and accounting for evolving electric grid or thermal network supply conditions. This is the foundation of Resource Efficient Decarbonization.
3. Electrify Everything… Immediately and All at Once!
Perhaps because the electrification movement was born in mild-climate California, the cold-climate, tall-building narrative has been incomplete. Decarbonization skeptics suggest that if it doesn’t make sense to electrify everything in one simple move, then it doesn’t make sense to electrify anything. The reality is that tall buildings in cold climates like New York must overcome space constraints and distribution challenges to provide comfort at peak load conditions without straining the electric grid or requiring oversized, sticker-shock-inducing equipment capacity.
A more suitable slogan for Northeast electrification champions would be “Electrify Everything Efficiently.” Engineers should model building energy consumption data across granular temperature bins (see Figure below) and plan for electrification with “easy” loads like domestic hot water, then mild temperature loads (typically representing 80%+ of total loads), and finally for the extremes. This is the cascade approach. Until a viable solution emerges, a building owner might even keep a small gas-fired boiler and their steam radiators around as a reserve as they learn to grapple with resilient functionality at heating design conditions. Despite global average temperatures increasing, cold snaps may even become more extreme due to a collapsing winter Polar Vortex.
4. Technology Installed Today Will Be Obsolete Tomorrow
There are plenty of technology-neutral enabling steps to take prior to committing to a particular low-carbon retrofit technology. Buildings are constantly evolving and exist on a continuum unless demolition is planned. Reducing loads, enabling thermal recovery, sharing and networking, and implementing grid interactivity are all priority measures that might take place prior to electrifying heat sources. Consultants also must determine the value of inaction and the value at risk if a building owner decides to do nothing. Balancing this risk with the pace of technological innovation is a delicate analysis and is impossible to conduct without a Strategic Decarbonization Assessment. When in doubt, look to leverage existing infrastructure like using chilled water loops for heating to replace partial loads. Electrifying perimeter heating used during extreme temperatures may be a later priority or absent from the critical path on a strategic decarbonization roadmap. Look to the case studies emerging out of the Empire Building Challenge for more information on this strategy.
5. My Tenants Don’t Think This is a Priority
Consider the tangential benefits of pursuing decarbonization early. For example, more and more Class A tenants are demanding environmental action from landlords to comply with shareholder environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) requirements. Accelerating facade improvements may reduce the need for invasive and expensive maintenance down the line. Indoor air quality, improved comfort, and operability are emerging priorities among all tenant types.
6. Electricity Produces Emissions
Yes, but not for too much longer. States are legislating 100% carbon-free electric grids like New York did in the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (Climate Act). Modeling total emissions over time using declining electric grid carbon emissions coefficients across multiple decarbonization scenarios is an important task. Phasing in electrification over time and in a strategic way is the only pathway to eliminating on-site emissions.
7. It’s Too Disruptive and Expensive to Decarbonize a Building All at Once
Achieving carbon neutrality typically requires and benefits from a phased approach versus decarbonizing all at once. Incremental implementation of low-carbon retrofits across a continuum is critical to reaching building operations carbon neutrality in cold climates. Evaluate the cost-effectiveness of phasing and maintaining technology optionality and the risk mitigation benefits these efforts might deliver. Decarbonization efforts fall on a decision-making tree, which evolves as time elapses and technology, policy, or other conditions change; each branch of the decision-making tree is a new decision point. Sustainability and asset managers can plan these intervention points over the decarbonization period.
A baseline assessment is key to understanding current systems and performance, then identifying conditions, requirements or events that will trigger a decarbonization effort. The assessment looks across technical systems, asset strategy and sectoral factors.
Building System Conditions
Asset Conditions
Market Conditions
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Step 2
Step 2: Design Resource Efficient Solutions
Effective engineering integrates measures for reducing energy load, recovering wasted heat, and moving towards partial or full electrification. This increases operational efficiencies, optimizes energy peaks, and avoids oversized heating systems, thus alleviating space constraints and minimizing the cost of retrofits to decarbonize the building over time.
Learn More
Step 3
Step 3: Build the Business Case
Making a business case for strategic decarbonization requires thinking beyond a traditional energy audit approach or simple payback analysis. It assesses business-as-usual costs and risks against the costs and added value of phased decarbonization investments in the long-term.
Decarbonization Costs
Business-as-Usual Costs
Business-as-Usual Risks
Decarbonization Value
Net Present Value
Learn More
Strategic Decarbonization Action Plan
An emissions decarbonization roadmap helps building owners visualize their future emissions reductions by outlining the CO2 reductions from selected energy conservation measures. This roadmap is designed with a phased approach, considering a 20- or 30-year timeline, and incorporates the evolving benefits of grid decarbonization, ensuring a comprehensive view of long-term environmental impact.
Learn More
Project Team
Additional Resources
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Learn how to maximize benefits from the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL), and related federal policies and incentives.
The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) is the greatest investment in US economic growth and climate action in our lifetimes. Together with related bills, its benefits will be far-reaching, including nationwide economic stimulus, cleaner air, improved health, new jobs, progress toward climate goals, and more. This dashboard hosts content on the opportunity and background of these laws, how they can be effectively implemented, success stories, and key tools.
A baseline assessment is key to understanding current systems and performance, then identifying conditions, requirements or events that will trigger a decarbonization effort. The assessment looks across technical systems, asset strategy and sectoral factors.
Building System Conditions
Asset Conditions
Market Conditions
Learn More
Step 2
Step 2: Design Resource Efficient Solutions
Effective engineering integrates measures for reducing energy load, recovering wasted heat, and moving towards partial or full electrification. This increases operational efficiencies, optimizes energy peaks, and avoids oversized heating systems, thus alleviating space constraints and minimizing the cost of retrofits to decarbonize the building over time.
Learn More
Step 3
Step 3: Build the Business Case
Making a business case for strategic decarbonization requires thinking beyond a traditional energy audit approach or simple payback analysis. It assesses business-as-usual costs and risks against the costs and added value of phased decarbonization investments in the long-term.
Decarbonization Costs
Business-as-Usual Costs
Business-as-Usual Risks
Decarbonization Value
Net Present Value
Learn More
Strategic Decarbonization Action Plan
An emissions decarbonization roadmap helps building owners visualize their future emissions reductions by outlining the CO2 reductions from selected energy conservation measures. This roadmap is designed with a phased approach, considering a 20- or 30-year timeline, and incorporates the evolving benefits of grid decarbonization, ensuring a comprehensive view of long-term environmental impact.
Learn More
Project Team
Additional Resources
Tags
The Empire Technology Prize is a $10 million competitive opportunity for global solution providers focused on advancing building technologies for low-carbon heating system retrofits in tall commercial and multifamily buildings across New York State. This NYSERDA initiative, administered by The Clean Fight with technical support from Rocky Mountain Institute, includes a $3 million sponsorship from Wells Fargo. Accelerating low-carbon building retrofits is fundamental to New York State’s national-leading Climate Act agenda, including the goal to achieve an 85% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
