Friday, September 17, 2010

Tour of two commercial businesses powered by solar energy
Space is limited to 40 spots

NREL Research Support Facility >> Details
CaridianBCT Campus Buildings >> Details

REGISTER NOW:

Note important information for foreign nationals (below)
Friday, September 17th
$35 per person

NREL RSF Tour
For the NREL RSF tour, there will be two groups of 20 visitors each.

Registrants who are not US citizens are required to complete and submit a foreign national data card (provided in active MS Word Form Format). This includes Canadian citizens, permanent resident aliens, and resident aliens. This form must be transmitted electronically to Sarah Barba at NREL by COB September 8th.

The tour will start at NREL and will continue after lunch with tours of several local businesses, including CaridianBCT.

On the day of the tour, guests are instructed to park in the Building 26/27 parking lots and walk to the NREL Visitors Center.

RSF TOUR SCHEDULE

 

9:15 am	Arrival
9:30 am	Group A - Walk to RSF/TOUR (leader: Sarah)
9:30 am	Group B - Lecture in Visitors Center Exhibit Hall (CRES Speaker)
10:30 am	Group B - Walk to RSF/TOUR (leader: Jeff Scott)
10:30 am	Group A - Lecture in Visitors Center Exhibit Hall (CRES Speaker)
11:30 am	Lunch at Visitors Center for Groups A & B (boxed lunches provided by CRES)

NREL Research Support Facility

The Research Support Facility (RSF) is the laboratory's newest sustainable green building. This 222,000 ft2 office building is designed to be a model for sustainable, high-performance building design, and provides DOE-owned work space for administrative staff who currently occupy leased space in the nearby Denver West Office Park. The building makes substantial use of daylighting, dramatically reducing energy use and providing a pleasant and productive working environment. The RSF is planned to be designated to achieve a LEED® (Leadership in Environmental and Energy Design) Platinum designation — the highest benchmark awarded by the U.S. Green Building Council.

For more information, visit http://www.nrel.gov/sustainable_nrel/rsf.html

CaridianBCT Campus Buildings

Feature: 183.3kW Photovoltaic Array
CaridianBCT Tour Guide

Located at the foot of the Rockies, CaridianBCT, a global medical device company, has been practicing sustainability efforts long before recycling became a household word. From water and energy conservation efforts to the use of recycled materials within their buildings, CaridianBCT can now boast that it has installed one of the largest private, commercial solar installations by a medical device manufacturer in the state of Colorado.

When the CaridianBCT campus was hit with a microburst storm in the Spring of 2009, intense damage affected the buildings. This created the opportunity to provide a more sustainable building using solar panels. Because they were able to install the PV panels on two separate facilities they were able to maximize their Xcel rebates and Federal tax incentives; these opportunities resulted in a total cost less than $2.00/watt and less than a 5 year payback on the funds expended. SolSource Energy Solutions installed 448 Sharp 235 panels and turned the power on in early August of 2010.

The 182 kWh solar panel installation provides an average of 2% of CaridianBCT electricity requirements, which equates to the removal of 550,000 lbs. of CO2 annually, or the equivalent of 14 average households.

In order to continue to reduce their power consumption and energy costs CaridianBCT engages in yearly energy improvement upgrades that focus on their lighting and HVAC systems.