1st Army Headquarters Renovation

Existing building retrofit: 1st Army Headquarters Renovation; Pond and Co.

By Source: Pond and Co. August 9, 2012

Project name: 1st Army Headquarters Renovation

Location: Rock Island, Ill.

Firm name: Pond and Co.

Project type, building type: Existing building retrofit, office

Project duration: 2 years

Project completion date: May 30, 2007

Project budget for mechanical, electrical, plumbing, fire protection engineering only: $181,000

Engineering challenges

The project was challenging in that it involved a complete HVAC and electrical renovation of a 200,000-sq-ft historic building with the most modern and secure global communications systems. The project design also achieved LEED Silver certification. The project budget required that existing mechanical and electrical equipment be reutilized to the greatest extent possible while providing for redundant system requirements due to the nature of the building operations.

Solutions

Pond MEP engineers designed a way to cross-connect existing systems to account for some of the system redundancies that were required, thereby saving approximately $1,000,000 in new equipment costs and the need for a building addition to house the additional equipment. The innovative design required a new direct digital control system to alter the HVAC equipment operations in the event a piece of equipment was down due to failure or for maintenance.