By / Steve Clayman
That’s it! The proverbial light at the end of the tunnel is not an oncoming train. I sanitized my crystal ball to try to understand what is in store for the mechanical insulation industry once we emerge into the light. Rather than rely completely on my thoughts, I reached out for background information from a few accredited sources, and so here goes.
Remote work is not all that it’s cracked up to be. For those who believe this is a permanent manifestation of the COVID-19 pandemic and have moved to lower cost areas, several companies have been signalling incomes will be reduced to reflect the lower cost of living. We read that many employees miss the office environment, the collaborative nature of work, and the socializing. Ultimately, employees will return to office buildings.
Mechanical engineers are busy these days. An unscientific survey I ran by talking with several is that office building management companies and owners want their buildings to be safe. Can ducting be reconfigured to reflect this? Is there the ability to introduce higher levels of fresh air and filtration? Where can air purification systems be installed in the ducts? Obviously multi-million dollar properties can’t just sit there empty. We are experiencing the direct and add-on effects of downtown areas of cities being hollowed out.
Facing these challenges, building owners are also tasked with reducing the carbon footprint of their respective properties to hopefully achieve a Net Zero designation. The range of locations undergoing these evaluations encompasses everything in the broader categories of commercial and institutional buildings. The built environment would include everything covered in the National Energy Code for Buildings (NECB) and the various provincial and municipal energy and building codes.
To underscore what is now happening with building retrofits and upgrades, The Globe & Mail, on December 1, 2020, reported that a 20-storey office building located in downtown Toronto is in part undergoing an HVAC upgrade. This upgrade is replacing a 60-year-old installation. To quote from the article, “The project is one example of an industry-wide strategy to press ahead with sustainability investments in commercial real estate despite pandemic-induced economic setbacks.”
The Province of Ontario has what is referred to as the Financial Accountability Office of Ontario (FAO). Earlier this year, the FAO published, “Provincial Infrastructure – A Review of the Province’s Infrastructure and an Assessment of the State of Repair”. I will assume other provinces have similar reporting protocols in one form or another. I will also assume the “state of repair” similarly impacts on the infrastructures of other provinces. The infrastructure categories consist of Transit, Highways & Bridges, Hospitals, Schools, Colleges (including universities), and Other. For the purpose of this article we’ll focus on hospitals, schools, and colleges.
The FAO report shows the Share of Assets Not in a State of Good Repair including Hospitals 45.9%, Schools 28.4%, and Colleges 34.9%. These percentages include everything from envelope to floor tiles and, of course, HVAC. To give you an idea of the dollars involved just for Ontario, the FAO report estimates the dollar amounts required to bring these facilities up to acceptable standards: Hospitals $4.8B, Schools $3.7B, and for Colleges $1.0B.
Given the negative financial impact of COVID-19 on all levels of government, it’s not very likely any government has the funding or the will to tackle such huge monetary undertakings. Nevertheless, the need for repairs and upgrades will not conveniently disappear. In fact, the backlogs will continue to grow. Rubber bands and chewing gum can only go so far.
Again, I’ll make an assumption and that is, generally speaking, mechanical insulation represents 1.0% of the cost of a project. I’ll leave the math to the reader. Spread out by as much as ten years, the mechanical insulation potential for upgrades and retrofits is significant.
Included in the ongoing challenges facing large building managers (whether the buildings are government owned or not) is the mandated requirement to reduce their respective carbon footprints while addressing the huge backlog of repairs.
Facilities Net, an American online magazine (www.facilitiesnet.com), recently published an article describing how hospitals are moving forward with energy reduction targets, given that hospitals are among the most energy-intensive facilities anywhere. Hospitals function 365/24/7 in all climate zones with cooling requirements even during cold weather. The article emphasizes the demands placed on HVAC systems on the supply side contrasted with the need to reduce energy consumption. A large Toronto hospital recently commissioned an on-site co-gen plant to ensure a 100% reliable source of low-cost power. The capacity of this plant is such that future hospital expansions will be easily handled and any surplus power would be sold and sent into the grid.
From the perspective of the mechanical insulation industry, almost everything that is now in progress or planned will require pipe and/or duct and/or equipment insulation. There will be mechanical insulation going in somewhere. The challenge for our industry is twofold as I see it—access the entry points to help the individuals responsible for designing, managing, and purchasing HVAC systems, and in doing so emphasize energy savings and carbon reductions while promoting optimum thicknesses and installation best practices. ▪
