The National Library and Public Archives (NLPA) in Ottawa is part of the federal “Energy Savings & Acquisition program”. This program includes eighty buildings in Ottawa, including the Parliament Buildings, which are served by the ESAP district energy system. The current heating and cooling system are decades old and out-of-date. In the same way that you might replace an old furnace in your home with a more energy-efficient model, Ottawa is modernizing the system to cut Green House Gases and save money.
Many of the federal buildings here in Ottawa are fed by a central heating plant, Cliff Street. This plant takes water out of the Ottawa River and generates steam to supply heat to many buildings in the downtown core. Cliff Street is having its boilers converted from Steam generation to lower-temperature water as part of the ESAP. As such, every building that relied upon Cliff Street for their steam needs, has had to be retrofitted with local steam generation.
The Nation Library and Public Archive is the 5th largest library in the world, with over 54 million records stored within; it requires very accurate control over air conditions & humidity levels to ensure the longevity of its files.
In the NLPA, there was enough of a requirement for humidification that some dedicated electric steam boilers were installed within the facility. To save energy costs & overhead, O’Dell offloaded the humidification requirements to these dedicated boilers.
To disperse the steam in the space, we recommended the Neptronic SKD, which are direct injection humidifiers and were a perfect fit. Our office worked closely with FVB energy on the initial design for eight direct injection manifolds and four smaller electric Neptronic SKE4s for dedicated zones.
Here you can see a very nice install of one of our Neptronic SKD units. The manifold is installed directly onto existing ductwork, with the required controls, steam valves, traps & separators all manufactured by Neptronic and supplied by us.
Overall, this project was a great success due to careful attention and collaboration from the O’Dell team & Modern’s special projects division.
