Yellowstone National Park
Energy Program Development
Yellowstone National Park engaged E/S3 to help the Park coordinate and prioritize efforts to improve energy efficiency and correct other operational issues in park buildings and develop a plan with specific initiative that could be accomplished over both the short- and long-term.
After establishing the goals of Park Administration, E/S3 facilitated a three-day workshop with key representatives from administration, planning and construction, and maintenance to define and document goals and issues, identify several initiatives and strategies to be pursued, and provide a framework to further investigate how best to implement them to achieve the Park’s goals.
The highly participatory, open discussion exchanged viewpoints from the various participants to understand the current situation, identify initiatives for further investigation and begin discussion of strategies to pursue them. Objectives and strategies to achieve them were identified in seven major areas: Energy Tracking and Communication, Building Automation System Upgrades, In-house Retro-commissioning, Best Practices for Small Projects, Building Envelope Improvements, Deep Retrofits and Contracts for Large Projects.
Following the work on-site in the park, E/S3 worked with park staff to compile and publish an action plan for the objectives and strategies selected for further investigation that included potential benefits, challenges, next steps, responsibilities, timelines and so forth for each.
Retro-commissioning Program
One of the objectives in the action plan was to implement an in-house retro-commissioning program with park maintenance staff and E/S3 received a follow-on project to develop it. This work included retro-commissioning efforts at the Old Faithful and Canyon Visitor Education Centers to implement operational improvements and train Park staff.
The Canyon Visitor Education Center had experienced issues with its HVAC equipment for some time. The retro-commissioning work performed by E/S3 and park staff uncovered serious issues with an outdated main Building Automation System. The retro-commissioning effort helped to justify upgrading this system which was subsequently accomplished by Park Staff. E/S3 is provided advice to the park on new, more efficient sequences of operation to implement in the new controller programming.
Retro-commissioning work at the Old Faithful Visitor Education Center uncovered a substantial number of issues of missing or incorrect programming of the building automation system. These appeared to have been there since the building was constructed in 2010. E/S3 was authorized to provide additional services for the correction of these issues which are captured in the Issues Log. E/S3 also prepared and delivered an updated controls sequence of operations as an aid for park staff to be informed on the improvements that were implemented.
An initial comparison of energy use between the winter after retro-commissioning and the winter of the previous year indicated an improvement at the Old Faithful Visitor Education Center of approximately 8% lower electrical consumption and 4% lower propane use, even though the weather was colder.