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Taco’s Design Pro community is for those involved in all aspects of the commercial HVAC market — designers, engineers, design-build contractors, building owners, facility managers and the green building community.

It’s a growing, interactive community that depends on HVAC pros like you to participate for the community to reach its full potential.

Are you willing to share your professional experience, thoughts, judgement and opinion with other Taco Design Pro community members? Please let us know. We would be excited to talk to you! Share your suggestions in the comments below. 

Tour the Mechanical Room

Have you taken a virtual tour of our new energy-efficient Mechanical Room at the Taco Innovation & Development Center (IDC)?

We invite you to visit Center’s dedicated mechanical room, a showcase for the latest in energy savings and sustainable products and systems available in the HVAC industry today. The building includes advanced hydronics system applications such as radiant cooling, radiant heating, snowmelt, geothermal and solar thermal in a total of 25 “Living Laboratories” that provide for hands-on learning.

In this video, Rich Medairos, project mechanical engineer, walks you through the highlights of this sophisticated, integrated installation incorporating a variety of design strategies for an energy efficient building including:

• Active chilled beams.
• An energy recovery unit.
• Solar hot water generation.
• The iWorx system building management.
• High-efficiency pumps, chillers and boilers.
• Variable speed pumping applications.

Take a virtual tour now: http://bit.ly/O5e4Ev

Better Buildings, Better Working Environments

Better Buildings = Better Working Environment

What does it take to create a better working environment? Designing greener buildings for the benefit of the people who work in them means providing better space organization, bringing ample fresh air, getting natural light into the building.

In the Taco Innovation & Development Center, our major focus of renovations to the existing Taco building was creating a more open, collaborative work environment for all departments. In this new video, the project’s architect Steve Decatur and interior designer Kate Ducat of Baker Design Group addressed the building’s core design objectives and energy-efficient lighting technology: http://bit.ly/TwTM8n

We would be interested to hear about your sustainability-focused experiences and projects you are involved with!

Web Based Building Controls

We are pleased to offer interactive classroom presentations in the new Innovation and Development Center (IDC). In partnership with B.J. Terroni Company, the training “Web Based Building Controls” is presented by Roger Michaud, iWorx National Sales Manager of Taco, Inc.

Hands on training allows you and your company with limited to no controls experience to fully create, install and commission web based systems. You will learn about the power and simplicity of a new generation of Building Controls, allowing you and your company to participate in the growing market for controls. You will experience hands on our iWorx system, a web-based building management, monitoring, and control system designed specifically for high-end residential and light commercial markets. From hydronics to VAV systems, Geothermal to BTU metering, iWorx provides a simple yet powerful controls platform.

Experience this interactive training by visiting our virtual IDC classroom tour.

Web Based Building Controls 

Building Retrofit for Energy Efficiency and Better Comfort

When the owners of Tanque Verde Apartments in Tucson decided to upgrade mechanical systems, they made it clear that they wanted a dramatic shift from old to new. Until recently, the 15 acre, 428-unit complex has met the heating and cooling needs of the tenants, but with little regard for the amount of energy consumed in the process.

When the apartments were built 30 years ago, energy efficiency wasn’t exactly the main focus. After all, the price for gas and electricity was a fraction of today’s rate.

At Tanque Verde, an enormous district system heated and cooled all the apartments. Last year, the hydronic system began leaking underground. Tenants complained about lack of controllability while repair bills accumulated. Making matters worse, the equipment was outdated, bandaged and in desperate need of replacement.

Keeping it all In-House 

When it comes to overhauling colossal mechanical systems, the Scotia Group Management LLC was quick to embrace the idea of a retrofit. Their mechanical contractor Oracle Control Systems, Inc. (OCSI) designed and installed all new hydronic heating and cooling equipment, solar-thermal DHW system, modular building automation controls, and large photovoltaic arrays to bring Tanque Verde out of the mechanical Stone Age.

“We’ve re-piped several properties in the summer without displacing tenants” Mo Forrey, owner of Oracle Control Systems, Inc. (OCSI).

OCSI crews tore out and replaced boilers, chillers, and underground hydronic lines. The two original mechanical buildings were kept; the smaller on the north side of the complex, and the larger on the south. Since none of the tenants could be displaced, OCSI installed parallel piping throughout the property while keeping the existing system on-line. Temporary chillers, boilers and piping were employed to maintain service.

On the north side of the complex, a similar approach was used. The mechanical building had a large atmospheric boiler and three vertical water heaters for DHW, all of which were removed. Now the building houses two, 1,000 MBH gas boilers and one large chiller. Hydronic demands for the smaller system are 140 GPM on the heating side, and 280 GPM for cooling. Each mechanical building is outfitted with a Taco iWorx boiler control module (BLMC). Each module can monitor and control up to four boilers, as long as the boilers are serving a common load.

Read more about the building management systems in the next part of the blog. Until then!

Why Green is Good for People, Part 2

Why Green is Good for People? 

By Lynne Phipps, Taco Contributing Editor

Lynne Phipps, LEED AP

As discussed in Part 1, designing green buildings for the benefit of the people who live and work in them means bringing ample fresh air and natural light into the building and avoiding the use of materials that off-gas substances that are detrimental to human health and well being.

In addition, green indoor environments are both physically and psychologically comfortable for people.

Such design may include:
• The use of smart switches and thermostats for lighting and temperature control.
• Comfortable forms of heat such as radiant heat.
• The use of color, texture, and plants as interior design elements.

The use of technologies such as smart switches, which control lighting based on natural light levels as well as the presence of people in a space, is energy efficient and maximizes the use of natural light. Both factors make the environment more comfortable and healthier for human beings.

Smart thermostats provide similar benefits by regulating temperatures based on the availability of the sun’s thermal energy for heating. Both of these technologies are wonderful advancements. Any time the designer can reliably regulate the indoor environment to improve physical or psychological comfort, the individuals in that environment feel more supported and, as a result, happiness and productivity increase.

The use of color and texture, whether as paint, wall coverings and floor coverings, or as art work, also increases comfort and happiness indoors. In the work environment, this translates to decreased absenteeism and job turnover. It has been reported that second only to salary, the work environment is the most important factor in an individual’s decision to take a given job or stay with a company.

When designing a green building, the use of color is a craft. The designer must juggle the use of color with the ability of that color to reflect rather than absorb the natural light entering the space. Color also brings life to spaces and offers opportunities to add or reinforce a sense of identity, should the designer choose.

Likewise, plants can have a significant positive effect on the indoor environment. Studies have shown that one plant per person significantly increases CO2 in an indoor environment, decreasing absenteeism and reducing stress at work.

All of these elements — natural light, effective temperature control, color, the use of plants – contribute to the successful greening of buildings, whether new construction or retrofits.

Lynne Phipps is an interior architect and green building advocate with a holistic, integrated approach to the built environment. 

Join the Taco HVAC Commercial Designer Pro community to access more technical articles, industry news, videos, and discussions: http://commercial.taco-hvac.com

CANSTRUCTION RI COMPETITION

CANSTRUCTION RI COMPETITION STACKS UP FOOD CANS IN THE FIGHT AGAINST HUNGER

At a time when jobs are still hard to come by and food banks are working overtime to meet the nutritional needs of struggling families, area architectural firms, construction companies, and contractors  have stepped up to the plate to help – while having a bit of creative fun for a most worthy cause.

CanstructionRI Design/Build Competition

CanstructionRI, sponsored by the RI Community Food Bank and Taco, Inc. among other companies, is an annual event held at the Providence Place Mall and features the efforts of competing teams building imaginative food can constructions.  This year there were a total of six “sculptures” representing the work of numerous firms.

LLB Architects and Shawmut Design and Construction’s display featured Cangry Birds – birds angry at the state of hunger in RI. It received an honorary mention by the judges. Other notable displays included a New England clam bake with a giant lobster topping out a boiling pot, a tug boat plowing through waves created by blue and white labeled cans, and a Winnie the Pooh display with a lot of honey and peanut butter jars.

Shawmut Design and Construction is the general contractor overseeing the construction of Taco’s new Innovation and Development Center building as well as interior renovations to the manufacturer’s existing 1904 building on Cranston Street in Cranston, RI. Joe Raposo, Shawmut’s Assistant Project Manager, headed up the 2012 LLB Architects-Shawmut canstruction team.

The 2012 competition marked the fourth time that LLB Architects and Shawmut have teamed up to compete in CanstructionRI. Other participating firms included Dimeo Construction, GTECH, Gilbane, Saccoccio Associates and Michael Warner Architect, among others.