In the woods right outside of Toronto, you'll find this 60,000 square foot facility.
Home to Earth Rangers, a non-profit organization focused on
promoting environmental awareness to those who matter most ...
>> At Earth Rangers, we like to think of ourselves as the kids' conservation
organization. So we teach kids about the importance of protecting
biodiversity, and then we get them engaged with different habitat and
wildlife protection projects right across Canada. >>
And Earth Rangers empowers kids with their outreach programs which
feature interesting and sometimes endangered animals. But running an
office that doubles as an animal care facility is challenging.
>> So the Earth Ranger's Centre is obviously the base of our operations.
But we wanted it to be a lot more than that. Since we talk to kids about
sustainability issues, we thought it was important that we were also
walking the talk ourselves. <<
>> Being environmentally friendly means doing the most that you can
with as little as you can. We could just shut the lights off, and the
building would use no energy. But that's not how we go about our mission.
In order to reduce that footprint, the Earth Rangers Centre incorporated a
variety of sustainable technologies including a green roof, solar panels,
an on-site water treatment facility to allow wastewater recycling, and even
"earth tubes" to allow geothermal heating and cooling. But Earth
Rangers knew that the real key to running a sustainable facility would
be the ability to monitor and manage their total consumption.
>> We wanted to find the best energy management solution. And we
wanted to be able to measure the energy consumption, water
consumption, and thermal comfort, but also be able to act upon that data. <<
That's when they turned to Schneider Electric, the Global
Specialist in Energy Management.
>> Earth Rangers was looking for a holistic solution to help them
manage their energy. <<
>> We originally came to Schneider Electric for two things: we needed
better visibility to where we were using energy in the facility, and we
needed better control of how we used the energy. <<
>> So what we got from Schneider Electric was really the base building
systems. We got HVAC control, so building automation that does
heating, ventilating and air- conditioning; lighting control;
security; and the all important to me, energy management information
system and energy metering. <<
And it's THAT energy management information system called
StruxureWare Energy Operation that really gives Earth Rangers the
holistic view they need to reduce their consumption.
>> Energy Operation is the software suite that would enable any
customer to make the energy visible throughout the operation and make
informed decisions, about how to fix problems. <<
>> It's an information system to allow us access, easy access — very important
part there -- into the data coming out of our base building automation system
and the energy metering system. <<
And you can tailor that data for each user so they see only the information
they need in order to make decisions.
>> It's given us visibility as to what's actually happening, as opposed to
just paying our gas and electric bill and not really being empowered to
really do anything about it. <<
Being able to share and react to this information has helped Earth
Rangers become one of the most efficient buildings in Canada.
>> Earth Rangers' buildings today consume 90% less than a traditional
building of the same nature. <<
>> We are, this year, on track to consume under 9 equivalent kilowatt
hours per square foot. The average Canadian office building consumes
about 35 to 37 equivalent kilowatt hours per square foot in a year. <<
So efficient that they've been recognized as one of the smartest
green buildings in the world.
>> Probably the cherry on top is the recent LEED for Existing Buildings
Platinum certification because that's proof of how efficient we're actually
operating. <<
All this success has resulted in the Earth Rangers Centre becoming a
showcase for sustainable technology where the building community can
come and see their solutions in action.
>> It's really ... it's a feel-good story when
you bring visitors here to make them see at-work solutions that really help
our customers make the most of their energy. <<