1293 Broadway, also known as The Herald Center, is undergoing an exciting rejuvenation that will entirely reinvent a dated commercial property and bring a new sense of spectacle to Herald Square.  Working with Moed de Armas & Shannon Architects in 2015, Vidaris is consulting and monitoring the curtain wall re-clad of the building’s first three floors, while the three floors above are resealed and recaulked.  The finished project returns a major shopping center to its original destination status.

Previously known as the World Financial Center, Brookfield Place encompasses over eight million sq. ft. of premier office space on the Hudson River waterfront in Lower Manhattan.  Each tower has a copper top with either a pyramid, stepped pyramid, mastaba, or a dome.  It was the first installment of Battery Park City and was a mixed use development build on fill from the construction of the World Trade Center.  Brookfield Place houses its grand centerpiece: a 10-story glass pavilion Winter Garden that features extensive public spaces, dozens of shops and restaurants, and a stunning outdoor waterfront esplanade.

Located in New York’s Murray Hill neighborhood on the southeast corner of East 32nd street, the 35-story building originally constructed in 1970 is undergoing a major façade renovation. The Class A office tower has 330,000 square feet of office and retail space for rent. The project was fondly called the “Green Giant” by locals, due to the green cladding that was once between dark glass windows. Pelli Clarke Pelli designed a unique, shimmering glass façade that transforms the building into one of the most magnificent office towers in Manhattan.

Vidaris provided consulting during all phases of the building envelope updates beginning in 2006. Vidaris performed an assessment of the existing building envelope and made recommendations during the planning and designing of the new glass facade. Vidaris also provided shop drawing review, facade inspection for make-safe work and the curtain wall inspection of the installation.

Opening in the summer of 2015, Prudential Skyline is a new 780,000 sf, glass office tower designed by KPF in Newark, New Jersey. The 20-story building is the workplace of nearly 3,000 Prudential employees and has expanded the company’s Newark campus, with the new building located two blocks from the global corporate headquarters. At 309 feet tall, the building spans two city blocks along Broad Street and includes a 19-story atrium, 3,700 sf employee gym, a high tech trading floor, and 1.1 million LED light-up media wall. It cost $444 million. The building has many environmentally friendly features, including:

• A water conservation system that provides 80,000 gallons of rainwater retention irrigation
• Energy-efficient water chillers, heaters and other fixtures
• Two living green walls, including one with a design derived from Prudential’s iconic “ Rock” logo
• A 50,000-square-foot rooftop terrace featuring a jogging path
• Electric car charging stations in the parking garage

Vidaris performed a visual only, due diligence review of the 30-story Eleven Madison Avenue’s exterior envelope as requested by SL Green. This visual examination was performed from the street level, at the main roof, basement and from an unoccupied tenant space, and included the viewing of the windows, the masonry facade, the roofs, the parapets, the railings, the skylights, the storefront windows and base building, the sidewalk and the connection bridge. Based on the due diligence review, Vidaris prepared a report stating conclusions and suggestions for SL Green for upcoming maintenance.

Soyak Center is comprised of a large core and shell office tower with sky garden (the Crystal Tower), a smaller office tower which Soyak’s will partially occupy, a 4 story plinth of support and retail spaces, roof gardens, and multiple levels of underground parking.  Vidaris worked closely on early design decisions and communicated ASHRAE, US-EPA and other U.S. design requirements to the local team to avoid potential problems with pursuing LEED certification.  Further complications arose from the Turkish project delivery model, in which design documents are turned over to the contractor at 75% completion and with minimal specifications.  Vidaris assisted the team in foreseeing the potential certification pitfalls and producing a more developed set of documents with robust and prescriptive specifications. Vidaris continues to provide construction phase support to confirm compliance with the more rigorous sustainable specification requirements.  Vidaris' energy analysis of the project indicated that local standard design assumptions would not achieve the required 14% energy savings over the ASHRAE 90.1-2004 Appendix G baseline.  To meet the requirement Vidaris worked with JB&B to test multiple energy efficiency measures including:

• Increased part-load efficiency and wet bulb reset controls for the cooling tower
• Decreased dynamic pumping heads on the hot and chilled water systems
• Lighting controls with occupancy sensors at back-of-house areas
• CO2 monitors with demand control ventilation at the large, variable use spaces in the plinth
• Lease mandated occupancy sensors for tenant office areas
• Lease mandated daylight dimming controls at perimeter tenant office areas

The energy efficient upgrades allowed the design to surpass the 14% requirement.  The team has also developed a tenant “ceiling design” in order to streamline the tenant lighting requirements and insure compliance Vidaris performed energy analyses, LEED/green consulting and commissioning. This iconic tower was designed by Pei Cobb Freed Partners as architects and JB&B as MEP.

This 123-story building is comprised of office, hotel, and retail areas. The project’s unique design includes an internal tower wrapped by a series of 12-story high semi-conditioned atria. Vidaris provided energy analyses, computation fluid dynamics (CFD) modeling, and measure & verification consulting in support of the design architect Gensler during the design phase. Vidaris' extensive analyses have included the following:

• An assessment of the impacts of orientation-specific fritting patterns on the façade glazing, as proposed by the architect, as well as orientation-specific shading devices, comprised of both horizontal shades and vertical fins. These analyses included the use of RADIANCE daylighting software.
• An assessment of a TriGen system, which includes gas turbines (generating electricity and heat), an ice storage system, and absorption chillers. Simulations were performed to determine the optimal sizing and most cost-effective operating strategy for the system components.
• An assessment of HVAC system options, including demand control ventilation utilizing CO2 sensors, an under-floor air delivery system versus an overhead VAV delivery system, and several innovative energy recovery systems.
• CFD analyses to evaluate the temperature and air flow distributions in the semi-conditioned atria during summer, winter and mid-seasons. The simulations were used to assess diffuser placement and air flows into the atria, to ensure comfort at the occupied levels while minimizing overall energy use in these 12-story spaces.
• Water fixtures usage analysis to determine potential water savings for each of the building’s usages areas.
• Measurements & verification plan for the HVAC systems and central plant

The International Finance Center in Seoul is one of the largest building complexes in Korea to earn a LEED rating. The project pursued a two-phased construction plan, highlighting environmental construction practices, building energy performance and the maximization of economic returns. Vidaris' energy analysis of the energy use of the entire complex shows that these buildings achieve significant savings when compared to with the LEED baseline. Energy efficiency measures include, among others, spectrally selective low-e glass, BIPV and rooftop PVs, solar thermal system used to heat domestic hot water in the Hotel and ice-storage for cooling. The project also utilized double effect direct gas-fired absorption chillers and condensing boilers to achieve over 13.4% modeled energy cost savings. Some sustainable features included are the mostly "green" landscaped plazas and roofs (including the roof to the parking ramp), integrated storm water management system with rainwater collection and reuse on site for irrigation and cooling tower makeup, a small forest that will significantly improve air quality, a minimum of 50% of the wood used in the entire complex will be FSC certified, and "Green" Tenant Design and Construction Guidelines.

The building houses the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene of New York City.  Designed by Moed de Armas & Shannon Architects and JBB for MEP, it includes many green and energy-efficient features such as efficient plumbing fixtures which achieve a 25% reduction in water use, materials containing recycled content, of low-emitting adhesives, sealants, paints, and carpets and implementation of an Indoor Air Quality Management Plan throughout construction.

Energy efficiency measures implemented by the Core & Shell included an envelope with higher insulating value than required by the ASHRAE Standard, a high-efficiency floor-by-floor water-cooled DX system, with multiple compressors and waterside economizer cycle and cooling tower optimization.

Vidaris performed both energy and green consulting, and collaborated with JBB on commissioning.  The work was co-funded by the New York State Energy Research & Development Authority.