Prison Warehouse Earns a LEED Silver Certification
Through a series of building design and engineering efficiency strategies, the Washington State Penitentiary Replacement Warehouse, designed by DLR Group, has just been named a LEED Silver certified project in the Washington Department of Corrections system by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC). All Washington public projects must now meet Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Silver or Washington State Sustainable Schools Protocol (WSSP) certification.
This 39,000-square foot building represents an intuitive understanding on the part of the building designers that warehouses can be energy-efficient buildings. LEED Silver certification was achieved through design and construction choices across all design and engineering disciplines. DLR Group Principal and design lead Bill Buursma, AIA, notes the State of Washington Department of Corrections has embraced sustainability goals for all future projects. "The department avidly supported the design team in the search for sustainable features that can co-exist with and add to operational goals for this facility."
Sustainable features significantly reduce operations costs (and thus tax dollars), but also minimize the facility's impact on the community's utilities infrastructure—especially water and electricity. Additionally, the warehouse consolidates logistic supply traffic into one service entry road, thereby reducing traffic congestion and increasing traffic safety.
Using indigenous, climatically responsive, energy efficient and other sustainable design strategies helped paved the way for WSP's Warehouse to earn 33 points and the LEED Silver rating. Some sustainable design features are:
- Run-off from impervious site paved surfaces and roof areas are retained in bioswales and 18 drywells.
- Showers, bike storage and car pool parking encourages employees to consider alternative transportation methods.
- Building materials chosen for their durability, recycled content, low-VOC content and manufacturing location.
- Some raw materials (like concrete and crushed rock) were harvested regionally, further reducing environmental impact through production and transportation.
- Over 1,600 tons of material were excavated from a former garbage dump on the site and used as a berm on the site.
- Energy efficiency measures include low-e windows, ground source heat pumps, walk-in cooler heat recovery, light dimming and low-flow plumbing fixtures.
- Rooftop skylights provide natural daylighting in warehouse spaces.
- A daylight sensor system automatically switches off the artificial lighting when sufficient daylighting levels are reached.
- Rain water harvesting and site water recycling are used for irrigation to reduce potable water consumption by 50 percent.
- Water use was reduced by more than 30 percent by using water conserving appliances like low flow showerheads, waterless urinals and dual flush toilets.
|
DLR Group Principal and structural engineer Dan Munn, PE, said, "The architectural layout of north facing skylights combined with occupancy and daylight sensor units controlling the high bay warehouse lighting combined with a light reflective shake-on floor hardener provide light levels in excess of code standards with little to no lighting during a typical sunny day! Our client can't believe the improvement from their previous facility provided by this key feature of our green design!"
The integration of the sustainable design features between disciplinary team members produced a high quality project. DLR Group's in-house team of architects and building engineers worked side-by-side to assemble and share ideas, designs and documents in a highly coordinated fashion. But perhaps more importantly, the project's successes were the result of collaboration between all project stakeholders: DLR Group, sustainability facilitator SOLARC, civil designer KPFF, and the Institution's logistics, mechanical and electrical department heads.
"Close coordination between architectural, structural, and mechanical designers was required over a multi-day eco-charette process to provide schematic design level information for pricing comparison and energy modeling studies so that the design team could communicate with the owner the cost/benefit study of this key feature of our green design," cites Munn.
DLR Group provided architectural design, structural engineering, electrical engineering and mechanical engineering services. SOLARC served as LEED facilitator for the project and Lydig Construction was the general contractor.
Heat Pump Systems Provide Multiple Mechanical Efficiencies
The ground-source geothermal heat pump system that minimizes energy use utilizes two sources of heat to heat the building and domestic water: 1) the system uses solar energy stored in the earth's crust and 2) it draws rejected heat from the warehouse freezers that run day and night throughout the year.
The office area and canteen storage are heated and cooled using a rooftop heat pump, which is tied to the geothermal loop. The geothermal loop passes through a water-to-water heat pump to provide the terminal heating units in the office area to heat water. Another water-to-water heat pump, double walled for potable service, generates domestic hot water. As a result, the traditional heat rejection systems that most owners are forced to maintain (chillers, cooling tower, etc) are absent. The ground loop of the geothermal system is a horizontal style bed with five independently-valved loops, such that the entire system will keep operating even if one loop fails. The subterranean geothermal pipe loop is located under the lawn in the front of the building. The system also uses the ground to increase cooling efficiencies year-round, greatly reducing heating and cooling energy consumption and costs.
General storage areas feature no mechanical systems for cooling. Instead, the high-mass envelope of internally insulated tilt-up wall panels creates a flywheel stored energy effect to keep these spaces cooler throughout the day. High-capacity automated wall intake louvers and roof fans are used to provide daytime cooling (if the outside air is cooler than inside), and to also flush out warm building air in the middle of the night and bring in cool nighttime air to precool the building's concrete mass for the next day's use.
Currently ranked No. 1 in criminal justice design by World Architecture magazine, DLR Group is a nationally-recognized, full-service architectural, engineering, planning and design firm that specializes in the delivery of quality design services focused in justice, education, corporate, sports and entertainment. DLR Group provides an ever-expanding array of professional disciplines for the built environment backed by a rich history of noteworthy projects, a solid reputation for quality and stability. With 15 national offices throughout the United States, DLR Group has been responsible for the strategic facilities planning, programming, design, development and implementation of many national landmark projects. For more information, please visit www.dlrgroup.com. |
