An Evaluation of the Actual Energy Performance of Small Office and K-12 School Buildings Designed in Accordance with the 30% ASHRAE Advanced Energy Design Guidelines (ST-16-C050)

The purpose of Research Project RP1627 is to determine the effectiveness of 30% Advanced Energy Design Guidelines for K-12 schools and small office buildings, determine the factors common to well and poorly performing buildings, and to provide recommendations for how future AEDGs could be made more effective. Group14 collected utility data and developed weather-normalized Energy Utilization Indices (EUIs; site energy use per unit area per year) for a sample of small office and K-12 school buildings designed in accordance with the first (30%) ASHRAE AEDGs. The results were compared to the modeled ASHRAE Standard 90.1-1999 Baseline and 30% Savings EUIs from the Technical Support Documents used to develop the two AEDGs. The sample included 30 schools and 23 office buildings; most designed to AEDG requirements. A total of 14 of the 53 building sample were designed to meet the ASHRAE Standard 90.1-1999 code; these code buildings provide a means for comparison to the AEDG buildings. Most buildings meeting 30%AEDG requirements achieved energy savings exceeding 50% of the ASHRAE 90.1 Baselines. However, non-AEDG schools, constructed to code, performed nearly as well. Most school districts are committed to energy-efficient buildings. The non-AEDG small office average EUI was near the Baseline EUI, but AEDG small offices EUIs were about 50% of Baseline EUIs, indicating significantly better performance for AEDG small office buildings. On-site energy and indoor environmental quality (IEQ) audits were performed on 5 schools and 5 small office buildings with different designs and in different climate zones to verify AEDG required strategies were included in the designs and that strategies are operational and effective. In general, most, but not all, AEDG strategies were in place and operational. The research project is still underway and is scheduled for completion in January 2016. The next steps are: to determine the factors common to relatively well-performing buildings, as well as the factors common to relatively poorly-performing buildings, based on building surveys.  The next step is to provide recommendations for how future AEDGs for small office and K-12 school buildings could be made more effective in achieving better energy performance than required by ASHRAE Standard 90.1 while providing acceptable indoor environmental quality. This project supports goals of ASHRAE’s Research Strategic Plan 2010 – 2015 and will help ASHRAE maintain its leadership position in the effort to help engineers, designers, and contractors build progressively more energy-efficient buildings that deliver acceptable indoor environmental quality at a reasonable cost.