Alternative Energy

We noted recently that Community Housing Innovations (”CHI”) has broken ground on the $4.5 million, affordable, green Minerva Place Condominiums in White Plains, but wanted to formally present you with a few more details about the project. Minerva Place is one of the first low-rise new developments in Westchester County to satisfy the New York Energy $mart Multifamily Performance Program guidelines. The project includes a 350-foot-deep geothermal heating and cooling system, as well as efficient insulation and construction techniques that CHI anticipates will save residents up to 30 percent on energy costs. Minerva’s energy-efficient features are being subsidized by a $55,000 grant from NYSERDA. The project was designed by Warshauer Mellusi Warshauer Architects and includes 11 two-bedroom (priced at $265,000) and 3 one-bedroom units ($225,000), each with hardwood floors and granite kitchen countertops. To qualify, families must have incomes between $73,000 and $91,000.

Schenectady-based Price Chopper Supermarkets has broken ground in Colonie on what’s set to become New York’s first LEED-certified supermarket, just north of Albany. The 69,000-square-foot facility is scheduled to open up sometime in early 2009, and Price Chopper hopes to use the project as a template for future green supermarkets across the Northeast. A fuel cell from UTC Power will supply 60 percent of the supermarket’s electricity requirements, as well as 400 kilowatts of standby power in the event of a grid outage. The supermarket will recover heat from its refrigeration equipment and use it as space heating. Other green design features are LEED-standard, including locally-sourced construction materials and energy-efficient lighting.

When New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg goes to Vegas, he bets big. At an alternative energy conference, perhaps bullied by T Boone Pickens, the mayor proposed installing wind turbines, among other power-generating technologies, on Manhattan’s skyscrapers and bridges. And why not: aiming to slash the city’s greenhouse emissions by a third by 2030 is rather ambitious. The mayor also proposed ocean wind farms off the coast and solar panels across the city’s rooftops. He’s dreaming big (Statue of Liberty powered by wind farms) while keeping the character of the neighborhood when it comes to the turbines (”If there is a large ape that starts climbing the Empire State Building, it might get in his way” - yes, that is our mayor speaking.

gbNYC has noted two green projects on the Hoboken side of the Hudson previously; we pointed you to SJP Properties’ Waterfront Corporate Center III and Bijou Properties’ Dean Marchetto-designed, 180-unit condo project on 14th Street, both of which are seeking LEED ratings from USGBC. Green efforts in Hoboken aren’t limited to these projects alone, though; Bijou is also developing the Garden Street Lofts at 14th and Bloomfield Streets, which were also designed by Marchetto and are seeking a LEED Silver rating. Meanwhile, Mayor David Roberts recently announced a tax credit plan for residential owners that install solar panels and is quick to point out Hoboken’s taxi fleet that features seven hybrids.

The saltbox is one of the country’s oldest home construction techniques and an excellent example of American colonial architecture. Dating from the 1600s across New England, the saltbox’s shed roof and single story would face north with little to no glass in an effort to deflect winter winds. The two-story side of the design faced south, using large windows to passively collect solar energy. The Litchfield House is an effort to implement the principles of the historical saltbox using modern green building techniques. Perhaps the biggest difference in the Litchfield House from a traditional saltbox is that the house’s large roof faces south instead of north, allowing a rooftop photovoltaic system to collect nearly 13,000 watts of solar power annually.

During a panel discussion that was held earlier today at Hunter College, local alternative energy experts and city officials debated how Gotham might encourage increasing solar power to public and private buildings. The City Council’s infrastructure task force organized the forum, and co-chair Daniel Garodnick explained that under current regulations, a building owner is required to pay the costs of hooking a solar power system to the Con Edison grid. It’s not that simple, though; a 32-page .pdf document called “Standardized Interconnection Requirements and Application Process for New Distributed Generators 2 MW or Less Connected in Parallel with Utility Distribution Systems” sets forth the parameters. The New York Times’ City Room blog reports that one idea the task force is considering is creating various “solar empowerment” zones, where neighboring buildings that are suitable for solar installations could tie their arrays together and pay for just one connection to the Con Ed grid.

Albuquerque, New Mexico’s Energy Conservation Codes were signed into law back in January, but their implementation was delayed until July 1 after industry groups voiced concerns during the spring that the Codes were, among other things, preempted by federal law. The Codes purported to raise the standards on the installation of HVAC equipment for all new and retrofit commercial and residential projects to a Seasonal Energy Efficiency Ration (”SEER”) of 15 (for air conditioning) and an annual fuel utilization efficiency (”AFUE”) of 90 percent (for heating). The suit was filed in U.S. District Court for the District of New Mexico by, among other plaintiffs, Air Conditioning, Heating and Refrigeration Institute.

Consider your typical New York gym: so much jogging/spinning/lifting, but no one is going anywhere. All that energy, wasted. Architect Mitchell Joachim of Archinode Studio and Douglas Joachim, a personal trainer and lecturer, thought so, too, and designed the River Gym, a . . . well, a “useful multi-planar kinetic space,” really. The concept is actually quite simple - harness all that human locomotion into energy to propel vessels along the Hudson and East Rivers, to several points across the city. In addition to converting the mechanical energy into propulsion, onboard purification devices would clean up the water they travel through. Finally, these floating gyms would take on the non-athletic commuter as well. And instead of TV monitors, everyone gets to watch the changing skyline.

The Richard Stockton College expansion project is an excellent case study for how to build green in a small space while acknowledging development’s impact on its natural surroundings. Richard Stockton was originally constructed in 1973 on New Jersey’s Pinelands National Park Reserve before the land was protected. The Pinelands include over one million acres of farms, wetlands, and forest and are located in the center of the southern part of the state. Expanding Stockton’s existing site footprint would have translated into additional costs and time through the NJDEP/Pinelands permitting process. Instead, the school decided to simply build on top of an existing one-story laboratory building.

The New York Power Authority announced yesterday that it will install a fuel cell at the FXFOWLE-designed Lion House at the Bronx Zoo. The installation will offset 200 kilowatts of electrical demand at the landmarked, Beaux-Arts Lion House, which is on track for a LEED Gold rating from USGBC. The project broke ground back in 2006 and is part of a larger renovation of the Zoo’s Astor Court; the Lion House itself has remained vacant since the lions were moved outdoors almost twenty years ago.