GLUMAC - Engineers for a sustainable future

John Taylor, Sacramento Mechanical Engineer

The groundbreaking ceremony for the new 8,500 sf building for the Glumac Sacramento office took place on April 26, 2006. The new office, located in Folsom, California (roughly 10 miles east of Sacramento) near the American River Bike Trail, Sacramento Light Rail, and beautiful Lake Natomas, will provide excellent sustainable commuting options. An anticipated LEED^® Platinum rated building stands to provide an exceptional working environment for employees and will also allow the City of Folsom to show that they are working toward a sustainable future. The building will also utilize new technologies to demonstrate sustainable design features.

Sustainable Design -- For The Clients

The idea behind the Glumac office building is to allow clients to experience, first hand, the capabilities and efficiencies of a sustainable LEED^®building. The mechanical, electrical, plumbing, and interior systems will work in a 5,000 sf or a 500,000 sf building while being efficient in any situation. Sammy Cemo, Steve Donley and the staff at Cemo Commercial, the owner/developer, are enthusiastically working with Glumac to construct a LEED^® rated building. Mitch Bjorgum with KMB Architecture designed the building shell and assisted with making the building envelope energy efficient, as well as incorporating some of the Glumac requested building features that will make the building more efficient. Laurie Bacon and her interior design firm, ESC Design Group, helped define sustainable interiors to be used in the building. The design team will use this project to show that being green is possible for any size or type of facility.

Consideration of sustainables include:

4                  Upgrades to the building
envelope

4                   Permeable pavement

4                   Native plants

4                   Recycling of construction waste

4                   Exterior views from all interior
office areas

4                   Underfloor air distribution

4                   Daylighting controls

The main mechanical improvement beyond a typical office building is that this office will have an ice storage system. Ice making operations will be conducted at night during non-peak utility hours. This will lower the demand for energy during the hot summer afternoons in Sacramento, reducing the burden on power generation facilities. The underfloor air distribution provides a greater comfort level for occupants because each person has more control over their own workspace.

Most of the lighting will be provided by natural light. Roughly 3% of the roof area will be skylights and a large percentage of the walls will be glass. Automatic window shades and skylight louvers will be integrated with photo-sensors to ensure that the proper amount of lighting is available at all times. Total lighting load for the new building will be approximately 0.8 watts/sf.

Innovative Plumbing and Heating

Plumbing is another unique aspect of the Glumac office building that will play an integral role in saving energy. The system will include a 5,000-gallon storm water collection tank. The rainwater collected during the winter months will provide enough water to flush the toilets and urinals for a minimum of seven months a year.

A solar water heater will provide hot water for all domestic hot water use. Solar power will be incorporated into the electrical system. The roof will have enough photovoltaic panels to provide approximately 25% of the building's annual energy consumption.

Controls and Systems

The brain behind all of these systems is the controls. BacNet controls will be integrated into every aspect of the Glumac Sacramento new office building. This will allow the operations to be refined over time, and to achieve the best possible efficiency and comfort. Glumac will also install a weather station to monitor wind speed and direction, outdoor temperature and humidity, and incident solar loads. These advanced controls systems will allow for the design team to constantly commission their project, enabling set points to be easily adjusted to achieve maximum comfort and efficiency.

Glumac is looking forward to moving into our new office and welcoming visitors to come see sustainability and thinking inside the building in practice.