Salas O'Brien News

Salas O'Brien has once again been named to Consulting-Specifying Engineer's list of Commissioning Giants. The award is based on annual billings and includes firms performing all types of commissioning around the world.

In engineering, a project’s square footage doesn’t always indicate its complexity. Small, key environments like data centers, laboratories, and clean rooms often require incredibly detailed design work to achieve necessary outcomes. Our work for the Georgia Department of Public Health in Decatur, Georgia, is a prime example of this type of small-scale, complex project.

In recent articles, we’ve talked a lot about the ins and outs of commissioning. This systematic process has clear benefits, and not just for new projects—the owners of older structures may have even more to gain from commissioning than property developers that build new.

Salas O’Brien is pleased to announce the addition of James (Jim) Anderton to the firm’s leadership team for commissioning. Anderton comes to Salas O’Brien from Independent Commissioning Consulting (ICC), a firm he led for the past eight years, and he brings more than 30 years of experience in commissioning, construction, facility maintenance, and design.

The U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) began in 1993 with the singular mission of promoting sustainability in the building industry. This passion led to the creation of what has become the world’s most widely respected and utilized green building rating system: Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED). Since the system’s inaugural year at the turn of the century, LEED has been part of more than 92,000 projects in over 165 countries and territories across the world—and its impact on the community, the environment, and building-owner costs is nothing short of revolutionary.

A LEED certification from the USGBC is more than just an environmental stamp of approval—it’s a recognition of exceptional design that will translate into energy and operational cost savings and improved quality of life for building occupants. Research also shows that these quality and cost benefits attract tenants and lead to higher property sale value.

Commissioning plays a big role in achieving the level of design sophistication LEED requires, and as top U.S. commissioning firm with extensive LEED experience, Salas O’Brien has both the training and the track record to guide clients through the complex process.

To Salas O’Brien clients, the word “commissioning” means energy savings, lowered operating costs, and optimal environments—but a lot goes on behind the scenes to achieve these amazing results.  The field is constantly evolving, so having a trustworthy, communicative expert by your side through the process will make all the difference.

Sophisticated property owners aim to construct a building as economically as possible, and for good reason. Financial pressure is intense.

But yet, over a 30-year span, a building’s utility, maintenance, service, and system replacement costs can run between 50 to 80% of the facility’s total cost (including construction costs). The more complex the building and the more energy it uses, the higher that percentage will move within this range—especially in regions with high or increasing utility costs.

Salas O'Brien's merger with T-Squared Professional Engineers has brought us a team experienced with military projects—yet the word "military" includes a wider variety of projects than you might think. For example, a child development center owned by the U.S. Navy received engineering and LEED consulting services and achieved Silver Certification. In another case, we provided mechanical and plumbing design and LEED consulting for the U.S. Navy Fleet Numerical Meteorology and Oceanography Center. Monitoring weather or sea conditions and children require vastly different equipment and facilities, but our team proficiently accommodated both.

As Bermuda’s second largest employer and its only hospital, King Edward VII Memorial Hospital (KEMH) provides state of the art healthcare facilities for the 65,000 residents of the island nation as well as its many annual visitors. Its isolated location in the Atlantic Ocean demands self-sufficiency: KEMH provides a remarkably comprehensive range of services, and its facilities must grow to meet any increase in demand.

Improving the efficiency of large institutional buildings has been a core part of Salas O'Brien's work and history since its founding in 1975. While others worked for the good of the environment in a variety of ways, we knew that we could have a dramatic impact through the quiet, behind-the-scenes work of making buildings operate more efficiently and reliably.