Johns Hopkins University
Innovative Ideas in an Urban Setting

In the middle of the city is not where you would seem to find a model of efficiency. As you walk the streets, the tall buildings tower like giants. Cars rumble by and concrete stretches on for miles. Sections of grass and trees emerge to break the scene but overall it is an imposing place.

Jack Grinnalds sat down for an interview about the facilities he manages for Johns Hopkins University (JHU). The buildings under his management are but a small part of the JHU facilities, but he does manage twenty-two buildings related to the Schools of Medicine, Nursing and research facilities.

Jack leads the engineering and facilities management operations for these buildings. There have been periods of construction of new facilities, but most of the buildings were renovated and the original construction dates range all the way back to 1929. The building where the Facility Management Administrative Offices are located formerly housed the Levinson and Kleins furniture company until the late eighty’s.

The facilities and management operations under Jack always think of the future and how to implement beneficial changes. The signing of the 2025 University Climate Action Plan Commitment (www.sustainability.jhu.edu/projects/climate_action.html) by JHU helped accelerate the process. Jack is fortunate to have a mix of engineers, architects, and facility managers able to develop creative solutions to existing issues. They usually are the test group for innovative ideas, and other facilities and campuses pick up the actions after being tested at their facilities.

The forward thinking and innovation has put his group two and one-half years ahead of schedule for the goals within the University Climate Action Plan. Some of the future initiatives discussed later will push them even further ahead of schedule. From the roofs down to the basements, there are not many opportunities overlooked by his investigative staff. Many of the highlights can be found in the 2010 Sustainability Report (www.sustainability.jhu.edu/resources/reports and publications) issued by JHU.

Every time it rains in the city most buildings divert water through storm drains directly into the stormwater system. This ends up washing nutrients and sediment directly into local streams and rivers contributing to poor water quality and algal blooms. Water is routed from some of the buildings into collection tanks in the basement to capture and store 3,000 gallons of water from various rooftops. The collection of water does not stop there, as purified water from research facilities are diverted into storage. Research facilities require purified water for their labs and the exacting standards of the water needed lead to nearly a fifty percent rejection rate. This water also makes its way into the storage tanks.

The last source of water collection results from the operation of the air conditioning system. Condensation from the cooling system is redirected into the collection tanks. The 3,000 gallon capacity is created by the use of five 600 gallon storage tanks. The tanks capture 678,000 gallons of water from these three methods. The overall usage per month is 720,000 gallons, so they are collecting a majority of the water used, and more importantly reusing it within the building. There is a bypass for the system if environmental conditions such as lack of rainfall are not cooperating.

The collected water is used for toilets, urinals, irrigation around the building and green roof, and process water to clean animal cages. All of these operations go a long way towards reducing the amount of water used within the managed buildings. There are plans for the future to divert rainwater and cooling system sources from additional buildings within the campus.

JHU is moving towards becoming a zero waste facility. A composting program was initiated in the fall of 2010 and already 375,000 tons of material have been recycled or composted. An average Sport Utility Vehicle (SUV) weighs 2 tons, so they have composted the equivalent of 187,500 trucks. The material is generated from construction waste, cardboard, paper towels, organic material and animal bedding. All of the material is put in a two sided compactor and compressed into a cube. Not only the compressed material for composting, but all of the recycling material is taken to a central location within JHU to lower the transportation cost of picking up materials. The compost material is taken to Peninsula Green (www.peninsulacompostcompany.com/process/index.html) in Delaware where they have a state of the art facility to turn the material into compost.

There are a few other recycling programs in place to handle plastics, shipping pallets and electronic equipment. The plastic material is gathered from facilities. One source is small plastic tubes used for testing DNA material. All of this material is picked up by Waste Management. The shipping pallets are transported to a local business and resold to shippers. An electronic recycling program handles computers and electronic equipment replaced by newer technologies. Old metal desk and materials are also recycled.

Times of tough budgets are usually tough on employees and operations but can also provide opportunities. A few years ago, there was a mandate from the University, to reduce costs across the board by 5%. A study was conducted to determine employee’s vacation time and when certain offices and rooms were not occupied. The program reached its objective and created a new vision for operations. A majority of the lighting has been changed over from T12 to T18 lighting, which when implemented on a large scale can produce significant changes. New construction utilizes natural light so lights are not needed during the day.

Occupancy and daylight sensors were installed in the facilities to automatically turn off lights and adjust temperature when vacant. Another major change which occurred was changing some of the HVAC systems from constant air to variable air volume. This change alone provided a 17% reduction in energy usage. The monthly usage for 22 buildings is around $2,000,000 per month, so you can see that reducing the energy cost by $340,000 per month provides a significant savings in operations.

There was of course a large expenditure to change over the system - but over the life of the project - these changes will provide operational savings and reduce the amount of energy consumed by the facilities. Future changes are looking towards changing the amount of time air is cycled in the research facilities. Labs require a high volume of air flow to ensure an environment where all of the variables can be measured to make sure the results of the study are accurate. Currently, the air is changed out 6 times per day and they are looking at reviewing work schedules to reduce it from 2 to 4 changes per day.

Initial talks with firms have been conducted to perform an analysis of implementing a solar project. Most of these changes can not be seen as they are on the roof or sit in the basement, but as the puzzle pieces are placed together into one large picture, the beauty of an efficient operation emerges before your very eyes. Jack is fortunate to have a talented and creative staff to constantly think bigger. Most of their work and progress is then implemented by other JHU facilities.

Jack has worked at JHU for 23 years in facility operations. Before joining JHU, he was a partner in an architectural firm and noticed the declining trends of the industry during the late seventies. He used his knowledge to move to facility management. His creativity and operational knowledge have contributed significantly to improving not only the facilities under his management, but allow for others within JHU to benefit from their teams success.