Setty Engineer Featured in Industry Publication

Setty's own Scott Pegler, PE, LEED AP, was recently featured in one of the leading publications for building engineers.  In the April 2015 print edition of Consulting Specifying Engineer magazine, Mr. Pegler is interviewed as part of a distinguished MEP Roundtable.  The topic of discussion—Government building design.  Be sure to check out his comments in either the print version or on-line at Consulting-Specifying Engineer. 

Good work, Scott!

National Building Museum Gala

Congratulations to our colleagues at STUDIOS Architecture for their 2015 Honor Award from the National Building Museum. On May 27, the National Building Museum will present the 2015 Honor Award to The Rockefeller Foundation, STUDIOS Architecture, and Capital Bikeshare to celebrate their commitment to the ongoing vitality and adaptation of our cities. The Museum has selected the theme of Game Changers, recognizing the profound contributions by their honorees and their work in inspiring the public to rethink what it means to be a part of an enduring and vital cityscape.

Setty Partners with Habitat for Humanity

Engineering firm donates services for new affordable townhome project

Setty is proud to announce its involvement with a project to construct five new affordable homeownership townhomes located in the west end of the City of Alexandria, VA.  The Stevenson Avenue site,  purchased by Habitat for Humanity of Northern Virginia (HabitatNOVA) in April of 2014, is situated in close proximity (within a 1 mi radius) to the Capital Beltway/I-95, Landmark Mall and several shopping centers along Little River Turnpike and Van Dorn Street.

Design services for the five new 1,400 sf, 3 bedroom townhomes are being provided by Wiencek + Associates, Dewberry and Setty.  Setty is providing MEP/FP design engineering services for the homes,  which will be constructed to earn Earthcraft Gold certification.  Additionally, through a partnership with Grid Alternatives, the townhomes will include solar panels. The energy efficiency of the homes will lower the homeowner’s energy costs, helping maintain affordability while providing residents with a healthy living environment.

      

The townhomes will be sold at cost of construction to qualified families who earn 30%- 80% of the area median income (AMI). Families must have adequate income for a down payment and monthly mortgage payments; 30 yr, 0% mortgage. Homeowners are selected through an extensive application process designed to find partner families who will succeed in a HabitatNOVA home. The application process seeks to determine the applicant’s financial need and willingness to partner. Once selected, the partner families must complete 300-400 hours of “sweat equity” in the building of their home and other HabitatNOVA homes.

The City of Alexandria faces a severe shortage of affordable housing due to sharply increasing real estate costs and regional development pressures over the past decade. Since 2000, there have been dramatic declines in market affordable rental units and opportunities for affordable homeownership by low and moderate income individuals and families. The Stevenson Ave development will provide five homeownership opportunities for families to live in the City of Alexandria. This opportunity is made possible through the generous support of donors and volunteers.

For More:

http://goo.gl/2V5Eo1

Setty Named One of DC Area's Top Minority-Owned Businesses

Fairfax, VA, March 9, 2015 – The Washington Business Journal has named Setty & Associates (www.setty.com) one of Metro DC's Top 25 Minority-Owned Businesses for 2014.  Ranked at #24, Fairfax-based Setty—a multi-disciplinary (MEP/FP) design engineering firm—earned $12.24 million in the past year.  Founded in 1984 by Indian immigrant Boggarm Setty, the company, which delivers high performing buildings for a diverse array of clients, remains family-owned and currently employs 60 in the metro area.  In addition to its Fairfax office, Setty has offices in Washington, DC, Baltimore, MD, New York City, and Mysore, India, and is a certified MBE (Minority-owned Business Enterprise) in Viriginia, Maryland, New York State, and New York City.

Contact

To learn more about Setty & Associates, please contact:

Christopher McGahey,

Marketing & Business Development Associate / Technical Writer

Christopher.McGahey@setty.com

703.691.2115

School Project Breaks LEED Record

The U.S. Green Building Council has just awarded DC's new Dunbar Senior High School—designed by a joint venture between Perkins Eastman Architects, Setty & SK&A. —an unprecedented 91 LEED credits, breaking the previous LEED for Schools record by 5 credits.  The largest portion of these earned credits came from the LEED category EAC1 (Optimization of Energy Performance), in which the new building's design earned an impressive 18 of 19 possible points, indicating that the School, opened in 2013, is projected to save from 46% to 48% in energy costs with respect to an ASHRAE-established baseline building performance rating.  These savings are being accomplished through an array of energy conservation measures, including a geothermal well field (DC's largest), PPA-acquired solar panels, radiant flooring, an advanced lighting system with dimmable ballasts, and a rainwater harvesting system.

Proving Emerging Chiller Technologies

SETTY, a leader in the field of high performing buildings, was recently chosen by the General Services Administration(GSA) to provide MEP design, controls integration, and commissioning services for an innovative 12-month comparison study of competing chiller technologies.  This effort is part of the GSA's Green Proving Ground (GPG) program, which is evaluating emerging building technologies in real-world settings and providing recommendations for their deployment across GSA's nationwide real estate portfolio.  The study site is the 5 story, 133-year-old Sidney Yates Building, located near the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

A joint effort between SETTY, Maryn Construction, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, this ongoing study is evaluating the technical performance and cost effectiveness of a variable-speed screw chiller compressor, one of only nine emerging technologies selected in 2014 for GPG evaluation.  The baseline for comparison is being provided by a magneticlevitation (Maglev) chiller compressor, a proven technology that was the subject of a 2013 GPG study.  Two chiller units—one variable-speed screw and one Maglev, both having identical capacity—are being installed side by side in the Yates building, and performance metrics for both units will be carefully monitored for the duration of the study.

Setty's engineers and commissioning experts are leveraging their expertise in high performing building design to ensure that the two competing chillers are installed in a manner that allows for a fair performance comparison and that efficiently serves the cooling needs of the  approximately 200,000 sf Yates building.  From field survey to design of new water pumps, variable frequency drives, a new advanced energy metering system, and a new central plant BAS, our engineers are customizing the installations to allow each chiller to operate at optimal efficiency. 

Once installation is complete, Oak Ridge will monitor and verify the study results.  Due to the variable-speed screw chiller compressor's ability to operate with high efficiency at partial cooling loads, the new technology is expected to outperform current ASHRAE efficiency standards by as much as 44%.  Other anticipated advantages include simplified operations and maintenance, and a short payback period—as low as 3 years according to manufacturer estimates.  The performance of the variable-speed screw chiller is expected to compare favorably with that of the Maglev chiller.  Study results are expected in 2016.

The SETTY Survey Team at NIST

Under our NIST IDIQ, SETTY is developing a full blown design to fix the problems of the Toxic Gas Monitoring System in the Advance Measurement Laboratory at NIST. Pictured in the required lab protection gear, the SETTY survey team has been working on solutions to fix the monitoring system that has been riddled with problems.