Independence Place Wellness Center Uses SageGlass to Create a Healthful Indoor Environment

August 12, 2015 | By Business Wire News

MINNEAPOLIS

A senior apartment community in suburban Cleveland, Ohio is using SageGlass® dynamic glass, a product of Saint-Gobain, in its new Wellness Center to create a more comfortable, healthful and energy efficient indoor space for residents and staff.

Independence Place is a residential campus for seniors that is owned and operated by national real estate company, Forest City Enterprises, Inc. The company recently built the new Wellness Center to offer active seniors a unique combination of market rate apartment living with convenient access to healthcare services. The new Independence Place Wellness Center is an amenity building connecting two large apartment towers.

“The Wellness Center was designed with exam rooms and healthcare spaces to provide residents with in-home nursing, therapy and other services to improve their quality of life and allow them to remain safely at home on the campus. It also has a large grand room for community events and activities,” said Gina Anselmo, energy program engineer at Forest City.

With studies showing that optimizing natural daylight and outdoor views in healthcare facilities contributes to improved outcomes for patients, Forest City’s Building Technology Services (BTS) group saw the Wellness Center as a prime opportunity to test new building technologies. SageGlass windows were installed throughout the entire 9,300-square-foot Wellness Center including offices, corridors and the Grand Room. SageGlass is electronically tintable dynamic glass that maximizes daylight and outdoor views in buildings while controlling glare and heat gain.

“Electrochromic glass was one of the technologies identified by the BTS group to pilot. This technology was especially applicable in the Wellness Center because of its large curtain wall of windows in the 2,400-square-foot Grand Room, which holds community events and activities for the residents. SageGlass is helping to optimize daylight and control the sun’s glare without cutting off the connection to the outdoors. It’s also aiding in the cooling of the building,” Anselmo said.

In fact, SageGlass’ ability to reduce cooling loads was instrumental in helping Forest City pursue LEED® Silver certification for the facility. SageGlass aided in the “optimize energy efficient” credit by allowing the windows’ Solar Heat Gain Coefficient (SHGC) to increase from 0.41 to 0.09 at full tint, as well as an improved R-value over the ASHRAE 90.1 baseline standard for windows. “SageGlass combined with other energy efficient technologies – including DC-powered LED lighting and VRF heating and cooling – has enabled the Wellness Center to achieve 30 percent more energy efficiency compared to the ASHRAE 90.1 baseline,” Anselmo said.

About SageGlass

SageGlass®, a product of Saint-Gobain, is advanced dynamic glass that can be electronically tinted or cleared to optimize daylight and improve the human experience in buildings. SageGlass manages the sunlight and heat that enter a building, significantly reducing energy consumption while improving people’s comfort and well-being. It can reduce a building’s cooling load by 20% and HVAC requirements up to 30%. It is a smarter, more elegant solution than conventional sun controls such as mechanical window shades, blinds and louvers. With SageGlass you can control sunlight and glare without shades or blinds while maintaining the view and connection to the outdoors. SageGlass is manufactured in Faribault, Minn., in the heart of “the Silicon Valley of the window industry,” and is a wholly owned subsidiary of Saint-Gobain of Paris, the world’s largest building materials company.

About Saint-Gobain in North America

Saint-Gobain has its North American headquarters in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. As the world leader in sustainable habitat, Saint-Gobain is committed to inventing solutions to help professionals and communities around the world build and renovate comfortable, healthy, economical and energy-efficient buildings. The company has more than 250 locations in North America and approximately 15,000 employees. In the United States and Canada, Saint-Gobain reported sales of approximately $6.2 billion in 2014.

Recognized as a 2009 and 2010 ENERGY STAR Partner of the Year by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Saint-Gobain earned the 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015 ENERGY STAR Sustained Excellence Award, the highest level of recognition for outstanding contributions to protecting the environment through energy efficiency. For more information about Saint-Gobain in North America, visit www.saint-gobain-northamerica.com and connect with the company on Facebook and Twitter.

About Saint-Gobain

In 2015, Saint-Gobain is celebrating its 350th anniversary, 350 reasons to believe in the future. Backed by its experience and its capacity to continuously innovate, Saint-Gobain, the world leader in the habitat and construction market, designs, manufactures and distributes high-performance and building materials providing innovative solutions to the challenges of growth, energy efficiency and environmental protection. With 2014 sales of $54.6 billion, Saint-Gobain operates in 64 countries and has over 180,000 employees. For more information about Saint-Gobain, visit https://www.saint-gobain.com/en and the twitter account @saintgobain.

For more information about SageGlass please visit:
Website: www.sageglass.com
Blog: http://sageglass.com/blog/
Twitter: twitter.com/Sage_Glass
Facebook: Facebook.com/SageGlass
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/sage-electrochromics-inc.
YouTube: Youtube.com/SAGEElectrochromics
Pinterest: https://pinterest.com/sageglassusa/