The Norman Hackerman Building—Meeting the Requirements of the Program, the Owner, and Mother Nature

Diane Hamlin, LEED® AP, CO Architects
Brian D. Moore, HMG & Associates

The new Norman Hackerman Building (NHB) at University of Texas, Austin provides space for an integrated and interdisciplinary approach to education and research environments in Neurosciences, the Center for Learning and Memory, and Organic Chemistry Teaching & Research. Austin's hot, humid climate, placed additional demands on cooling and heating, requiring innovative solutions to meet the owner's energy-savings targets and LEED® Gold requirements.

This presentation will demonstrate how the building was designed, balancing requirements of the owner, program, and mother nature, and will evaluate the following design strategies, with relation to Labs21 performance benchmarks:

  • Fumehood Density and Energy Use
    • Eight –8 foot (ft.) and two-6 ft fume hoods in each 1,050-square-feet (sq. ft.) teaching laboratory and 10–8 ft. fume hoods in each 1300-sq.-ft. research laboratory
  • Local Climate
    • Humidity
    • University of Texas, Austin mandated design conditions
  • Campus Utility Infrastructure
    • University of Texas, Austin generates its own power
    • Fifty percent of campus steam derived from gas turbine exhaust heat exchangers
    • Forty-two inch campus main chilled water (CHW) supply/return piping made building a distribution node
  • Heat Recovery
    • University of Texas, Austin rejected total energy heat wheels due to problems on other projects; other methods utilized to reduce CHW loads
  • Approaches used to meet energy savings and LEED Gold requirements
    • Variable air volume (VAV)-type HVAC systems with setback driven by occupancy sensors
    • Air handling unit (AHU) condensate routed to process cooling water pre-cool exchanger
    • University of Texas, Austin studied low flow fume hoods and selected hoods that decreased makeup air by +/-25 percent.
    • 40,000-sq.-ft. solar water heating array for heating dehumidified air to reach desired room temperature differential
    • Energy efficient HVAC system includes:
      • Variable frequency drives for all system equipment
      • Transfer air from adjacent spaces into laboratory areas
      • Local fan-coil units for sensible cooling of high heat load equipment spaces
    • Five variable-flow laboratory exhaust fans cycling on/off based on exhaust system static pressure; additional controls assure discharge velocities greater than 3,000 feet per minute
  • Additional features include enhanced Commissioning and Fume Hood Commissioning
    • AHU condensate pumped to central plant's cooling tower makeup
    • Separate electrical panels and distribution for lighting, general, and equipment power, for power usage measurement
    • Main substation and second Tier switchboards metered for power usage measurement
    • Lighting and HVAC setback controlled by occupancy sensors
    • Lighting controlled by photocell sensors at south-facing spaces
    • Stormwater retention system
    • Low-flow plumbing fixtures
    • City of Austin "purple pipe" system for irrigation

Biographies:

Diane Hamlin, a senior associate with CO Architects in Los Angeles, has practiced architecture for 14 years and offers specialized experience in academic research facilities. She recently worked on all phases of the 260,000-sq.-ft.William H. Foege Building (Bioengineering and Genome Sciences) at the University of Washington, completed in 2006. Ms. Hamlin was part of the team providing programming, design, construction documents, and construction administration services. She is the project manager for the 330,000-sq.-ft. Norman Hackerman Building at the University of Texas at Austin, which completes construction in 2010. Diane is also serving as the BIM coordinator for this project that is being constructed as Construction Management/General Contractors (CM/GC). Her recent experience also includes the 125,000-sq.-ft. Medical Education Building at Texas Tech University HSC – El Paso School of Medicine, and the 278,000 sq. ft. Kendall Square Building B Research Laboratory in Cambridge, Massachussetts. She also served on project teams for two large healthcare projects: 500,000 sq. ft. of new and renovated facilities for Santa Monica-University of California, Los Angles Medical Center, and a 400,000-sq.-ft. replacement hospital for Kaiser Permanente Panorama City Medical Center.

Ms. Hamlin received her Bachelor of Architecture from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona and is a LEED Accredited Professional.

Brian Moore, since he began his engineering career in 1971 at Lockwood Andrews & Newnam in Houston, Texas, he has been involved in a wide range of projects. During the course of his 38-year career, he has designed and/or led the design of mechanical and hydronic systems for over 40 million square feet of space. Mr. Moore’s diverse experience includes such projects as office buildings; schools; hotels; airports; manufacturing facilities for the food, beverage, and pharmaceutical industries; laboratories; animal facilities; clean rooms; and aerospace manufacturing and research facilities. Between 1983 and 1988 he was in charge of all building mechanical systems design for Sverdrup Corporation's St. Louis office. For the eight years prior to joining HMG & Associates, Inc., Mr. Moore was a principal and director of engineering for CUH2A, Inc., in Princeton, New Jersey. For nine years, Mr. Moore lectured in seminars in the United States and Europe on the design of pharmaceutical and biotechnology facilities. Mr. Moore is also a contributing author for the book Sterile Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Applications for the 1990s, published by Interpharm Press. Mr. Moore received his Bachelor of Science in architectural engineering from University of Texas at Austin in 1971 and is a registered engineer in 10 states.