The tour last month at the Ernst and Young Tower was a great success. There were a record number of members for the presentation of the tower by the operators on site. Ryan Hays and Joe Ewing, the TR persons, Bob McMunn the Maintenance worker.

The Ernst and Young tower was occupied in April of the year 2000. WZMH was the architects and PCL was the Prime contractor on site. Hans Kneppers represented Oxford as engineer on site for the building and commissioning. Mechanical engineers were ESA, and TMP did the commissioning. Electrical engineers were MBI and ECE did the commissioning.

Mechanical contractor was Strathcona and Electrical was Canem. Siemens Building Technology has installed the APPOGY as the HVAC and building systems controls. Lighting is controlled by PDM, Life safety is controlled by Simplex.

Security is by C-cure, elevators by Dover and power measuring by Meter Manager.

The building is just over 600,000 square feet over 26 stories. The floor plate is 20,000 square feet and one of the most efficient floor plates in the Oxford portfolio. The structure is poured in place concrete with Italian marble and low “E” glass for the envelope. The building has three and a half levels of parking. The dock is shared with the building next door, the Sheraton Hotel.

The tenant area that was toured was the third floor. This is the only empty space left in the tower. The operators were able to view the mechanical systems that lay in the exposed ceiling. The floor HVAC is compartmentalized VAV fans serving each floor. The air is filtered, cooled and re-circulated back to the tenant space. The zone control is VAV and the perimeter is a radiant hot water heating panel pneumatically controlled. The interior is strictly VAV with a 15% minimum. The air is re-circulated six times every hour with a minimum of one exchange each hour, of fresh air.

The control make up air to the floor is DDC from the make-up air shaft through the Siemens system, APPOGY. The cooling is done by two 600 ton Trane chillers using 123 as the refrigerant. The heating is accomplished be three 10,000,000 BTU Bryant boilers. The cooling towers are two for the base building one for the tenants A/C needs and one for a separate tenant in the building. The manufacturer for all for units is, Evapco.

The installation of three generators for peak reduction was seen by the operators on tour. Two are natural gas and rates at 500 KVA the third is diesel and although its primary purpose is life safety, it is able to provide the building grid with electricity and is rated at 600KVA.

The parkade is monitored for CO and at a set point, will sweep the parkade with fresh air. I want to thank the operators who showed us their building. They showed pride of ownership.



First published April 2001