June 29, 2011 –
UC Irvine is taking a giant step closer to its goal of carbon neutrality by retrofitting most campus laboratory buildings, including CALIT2, with a sensor system that saves energy and maintains indoor air quality.
The Aircuity OptiNet system is a network of air-sampling stations that delivers packets of air to a centralized sensor suite, where they are monitored for particulates, gases, chemicals, temperature, and humidity. If air quality doesn’t meet acceptable standards, the sensors send a signal to the building’s air valves to increase air flow until normal levels return.
The sensors also recognize movement, reducing air flow in unoccupied rooms. Manual controls can override the system in an emergency, and audible alarms will alert occupants in the event an evacuation is required.
Current systems typically change the air in campus buildings on a fixed schedule, every six to eight minutes, depending on criteria like usage, occupancy and equipment. The Aircuity sensor system can safely reduce the number of air changes per hour by a factor of three, providing enormous energy savings. Certain high-risk labs will be excluded from the system, allowing them to continue providing more frequent air changes.
In addition to saving energy by reducing air changes per hour, the system will speed up ventilation rates if it senses carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, airborne particles or other chemicals outside of acceptable levels.
Installation will begin July 5 and should be completed by the end of the month. The sensor suites and air data routers will be installed in the building’s electrical rooms, while duct probes, emergency pushbuttons, occupancy sensors and audible alarms will be installed in the laboratories. Monitored rooms in the CALIT2 Building will include the bio-nano, microscopy, visualization, MDP, biomedical device and wireless sensor labs; as well as the auditorium, training rooms and TechPortal. Sensors will be replaced every six months to ensure proper calibration.
“Research universities have large carbon footprints because laboratories are energy-intensive, typically constituting two-thirds of the utilities consumed by such institutions,” said Wendell Brase, vice chancellor for Administrative & Business Services. “Reducing laboratory energy consumption is the primary way to shrink our carbon footprint.”
Retrofitting existing laboratories with Aircuity systems is part of a larger Smart Labs initiative launched at UCI in 2008 with a goal of reducing laboratory energy consumption by 50 percent, said Brase.
The effort furthers the University of California’s commitment to reducing its greenhouse gases to 2000 levels by 2014 and to 1990 levels by 2020. The university is a founding partner of the “American College and University Presidents’ Climate Commitment,” which seeks to address global warming by tracking, reporting and reducing greenhouse gas emissions and by accelerating research and educational efforts to control climate change. Last week at the ACUPCC Climate Leadership Summit in Washington, D.C., UCI received a 2011 “Second Nature Climate Leadership Award” in recognition of its demonstrated commitment to carbon reduction strategies.
— Anna Lynn Spitzer