LABBC CASE STUDY

PROPERTY OWNER
LBA Realty

PROPERTY TYPE
Office & Parking Garage

SQUARE FEET
1,625,641

Sponsoring Organizations

94.5

Average Energy Star Score

4.4%

Average Water Reduction in 2019

2020 Innovation Awards: Portfolio of the Year Finalist, Energy Performance Finalist (KPMG Center)

“The technologies of advanced building automation and variable frequency drives were utilized, but in-and-of themselves, they could not have produced the results of continuous improvement in energy efficiency without the people-driven component. Many buildings have these technologies in place, but very few take full advantage of them.”

MICHELLE GERMAN
Director, Operations & Sustainability, LBA Realty

CHALLENGE

LBA Realty always looks at its properties holistically, considering what opportunities are available to improve the environmental and financial performance of each asset in both the short and long term.  

For this project, they were driven by a desire for continued improvement in energy efficiency, commensurate greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions, and cost savings at two of their ENERGY STAR and LEED Certified properties (KPMG Center and South Park Center). These properties already demonstrated exemplary energy performance so the challenge was how to improve on past efforts, which had included typical commercial office energy retrofit measures: VFD’s on fans, pumps, chillers, and cooling towers; LED lighting in the common areas, exterior, parking garage, and tenant spaces; lighting controls; advanced building automation and control system. 

STRATEGY

Driven by the long-serving Chief Engineer and in collaboration with stakeholders, ownership and organizational resources, projects focused on continuous improvement in energy efficiency to reduce GHGs and cost for owner and tenants, through advanced and creative operational measures building on past projects and maximizing potential of technologies already in place.  

Given the stellar long-term energy performance at the KPMB Center, LBA relied on the Chief Engineer’s deep knowledge of the building, gained through operating the building since its original construction in 1991, combined with his controls acumen, to determine creative and innovative operating strategies for the building’s energy-using systems. The Chief Engineer developed the strategies and then wrote the software programs for the building automation system to enable implementation. 

LBA’s South Park Center garage lighting retrofit created the opportunity to leverage significant savings.  Cost would have been a challenge as there was not a requirement for replacing the garage lighting, however, with the partnership of LADWP they were able to move forward with the project at no cost to LBA or the tenants. The approach was not just to identify the opportunity, but also to collaborate and find a way to make a very expensive project a reality. 

IMPACT

Implementation of advanced automation systems at KPMG Center contributed to energy use reduction of 522,300 kWh in 2019 vs. 2018, equivalent to savings of $31,500, and avoided greenhouse gas emissions of 36 Metric Tons of CO2e.  

The lighting retrofit measures at South Park Center resulted in significant energy savings in excess of 675K kWh per year, 30 percent per year, with savings of $152,000 annually.