Carrier's New Headquarters Earns Top Green Certification
HVAC company Carrier attained top green building status in its category when its UTC Center for Intelligent Buildings—the new company headquarters in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla.—was certified LEED Platinum v4.
It's the first commercial building in Florida to obtain this level of certification. In order to score enough points to qualify for LEED Platinum, a building must innovate across human-centric, environmentally-friendly, and energy-efficient design and construction.
As a systems manufacturing company, Carrier has been on the forefront of many of the latest engineering technology advancements in refrigeration, heating, and ventilation, and its new headquarters is intended to be a “living showcase" of sustainable building practices for large commercial spaces. Simultaneously, it's a showcase of Carrier's product portfolio.
“We designed the UTC Center for Intelligent Buildings to push the boundaries of sustainable building design and provide our employees and customers with a model of what's possible when Carrier's best technologies are deployed," said Carrier president Bob McDonough in a public statement acknowledging the designation.
To meet LEED Platinum certification, the complex utilizes a combination of energy-efficient technology, innovative ventilation design, and most notably, smart Internet of Things (IoT) technology that monitors and utilizes occupancy data and systems performance information to adjust elements in real time.
The company integrated Automated Logic's WebCTRL building management software with LenelS2 OnGuard occupancy data monitoring and feedback to track how many people are in different areas of the building, and from that data, adjust accordingly so that energy usage is optimized (i.e. AC is not being used in empty rooms), but occupants are still comfortable.
In another forward-thinking application of IoT tech, the dynamic glass exterior of the building's façade has multiple IP addresses embedded at points across the surface, and uses these points to self-adjust the window tint in various places based on the sun, thereby reducing heat and the need for cooling airflow.
Air quality throughout the buildings is an important priority for Carrier, as it has proven to improve workers' mental wellbeing and cognitive function. To optimize indoor air quality within UTC Center for Intelligent Buildings, the project designers and engineers were tasked to meet Impact of Green Buildings on Cognitive Function (COGfx) standards, which based on a 2015 study found that the best worker performance occurred with carbon dioxide (CO2) levels below 600 parts per million, ventilation rates at 40 cubic feet per minute per person, and total volatile organic compounds below 50 micrograms per cubic meter.
Some of the most notable implementations within the complex were not deployed to earn LEED points, but to attain other high standards in workplace safety and efficiency. For example, the company is setting out to eliminate key card security features, wall switches for lighting, and various other manually operated logistics by switching all these everyday employee-controlled logistics to an IoT management platform via the proprietary MyWay app. The goal is not just to put controls at the touch of employees' fingertips, but to automate them based on employees' proximity and pre-determined preferences.
In 1993, Carrier was the first corporation to join the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), which invented the LEED rating system.
“The innovative technologies found at the UTC Center for Intelligent Buildings are an inspiring example for future sustainable buildings in Florida and beyond," said Mahesh Ramanujam, CEO and president of the USGBC, upon the public unveiling of Carrier's new headquarters earlier this year.
Although HVAC is, unavoidably, one of the systems that drives up energy consumption in any building, Carrier is dedicated to innovation in its monitoring, engineering technology and other sustainable practices.
In addition to its commitment to efficient HVAC systems, another area where Carrier consistently tries to make a large-scale sustainable impact is commercial refrigeration. The company is a proponent of natural refrigerants for foodservice and other commercial refrigeration solutions. Its annual World Cold Chain Summit is a recurring opportunity for global thought leaders to address food waste and climate change, and come up with actionable strategies to improve and extend the cold chain. Through doing this and reducing the amount of food waste, the goals are twofold: to reduce carbon dioxide emissions caused by spoiled food, and simultaneously reduce global hunger by getting more food to places and people in need.
Carrier's new UTC Center for Intelligent Buildings is a showcase to its commitment to refining its products to meet evolving environmental awareness.
