Client: Humber College
Year: 2022 – Present
Project Highlights
- Goal to reduce total greenhouse gas emissions by 30% by 2034
- Reduce natural gas use at the North Campus by 70% by 2034
- Reduce source energy use by 50% per square foot by 2034
- Forecast savings of $55 million in utility bills over the next 30 years
From Steam to Hot Water: Humber is making a SWITCH for the climate
This project is part of Humber’s Integrated Energy Master Plan (IEMP), an ambitious 20-year strategy guiding campus development and operations to prioritize environmental protection and the health of our communities. Greening building infrastructure is integral to climate action, as the building sector is Canada’s third highest carbon emitter (Canada Green Building Council). The SWITCH project aims to decrease Humber’s dependence on fossil fuel by renovating the heating and cooling system at the North Campus, and is instrumental in helping Humber reach net zero by 2050. The project is expected to reduce natural gas use at the North Campus by 70%, and will lead to a 30% reduction in the college’s overall greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The infrastructure that will be installed will make it easier to continue decarbonizing campus heating.
The 2023 phase of the project replaced more than four km of pipe across all campus buildings and installed new equipment in the campus’ Central Plant. The campus installed an electric boiler that will provide heating to the campus during off-peak times and utilize heat pumps. In 2024, they installed a heat recovery chiller system, converted the bulk of campus buildings to its new system, and the final decommissioning of steam heating system. In 2025, the project will see the installation of energy-recovering ventilators and the project’s final commissioning.
FVB Energy is the Owners Engineer for this design-build district energy and steam-to-hot-water conversion project. FVB, collaboratively with Humber, developed the project outcomes, project goals, key performance metrics, deferred maintenance plans and campus development plans to execute a successful project.
FVB provided review of all aspects of the design documents produced by the design builder, provided site visits and site reports during the construction and implementation of the district energy and steam to hot water conversion project. Ecosystems is the design/builder and FVB is working with Ecosystems and Humber to ensure a world class low carbon thermal energy network and steam to hot water conversion project is implemented successfully.
FVB Scope of Work
- Recover waste heat from air handling units, using the district cooling network and the existing chillers. Utilize water to water heat pumps to boost the temperature of the waste heat recovered from the chilled water network. The peak campus heating load is ~9MW.
- Battery storage is being implemented to bolster the ~1MW of solar PV and assist with realizing Class A electricity rates for the campus.
- Electric and condensing gas fired hot water boilers are being utilized for peaking and redundancy.
- Steam to LTHW conversion of all campus buildings
More Information
Visit Humber College | SWITCH
Keywords
Campus, Steam-to-Hot Water Conversion, DPS, ETS, Design-Build