What is the Venmar CES Carbon Challenge?

To demonstrate the significant, positive impact that energy recovery ventilation has on climate change and resource depletion by reducing building emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG), Venmar CES Inc. has committed to purchase enough carbon offsets to compensate for the difference between how much carbon equivalent gases (CO2e) that we produce at our manufacturing facilities against how much CO2e we have saved through the first year of operation of the energy recovery equipment that we have sold in a given calendar year. We will share the results of this years challenge in January 2009.

What are the carbon equivalent gases that contribute to climate change?

The Kyoto Protocol lists six greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change: Carbon Dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs) and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6).

How did you calculate difference between emissions saved and emissions produced?

We determined the yearly energy savings that result from the first year of operation of Venmar CES energy recovery equipment sold across North America in a given calendar year. We then converted these energy savings into CO2e emissions (this is the result displayed, in real time, in the "carbon ticker"). Then, we quantified our GHG yearly emissions in CO2e. We then subtracted these two values. After a years time, if the NET result indicates that we have produced more carbon than we have saved, we will purchase carbon offsets to make up the difference.

How did you calculate the GHG emissions for your factories?

We evaluated our carbon footprint by using the GHG Protocol Corporate Accounting and Reporting Standard to quantify our GHG emissions with respect to the six greenhouse gases covered by the Kyoto Protocol. We defined the Organizational Boundaries for both of our manufacturing facilities and chose to use the Control Approach (as we do not exert any financial control over our Representative network or our Suppliers). We defined our Operational Boundaries as stringently as possible by including Scope 1 (direct), Scope 2 (indirect) and Scope 3 (other indirect) emissions.

What did you include for your direct, indirect and other indirect emissions?

We considered all of the direct emissions that resulted from sources that are directly controlled by Venmar CES including: the combustion of propane (for unit testing), the combustion of natural gas (for unit testing and heating of one of our facilities) and the fugitive emissions of HFC gases. The indirect emissions that we considered resulted from the generation of purchased electricity (which is fairly low as our facilities primarily run on clean, renewable hydroelectric power). Finally, the other indirect emissions that we chose to include accounted for employee business travel, employees commuting to and from work, as well as transportation of sold products to the end-user.

How did you estimate the CO2e savings of your equipment?

Estimating the CO2e savings is the most difficult area to calculate since there are numerous assumptions and uncertainties involved in this type of exercise. ASHRAE recognizes these difficulties and has created a special project called Carbon Emissions Calculations Tools (SP119) with the goal of developing a tool to estimate carbon emissions and educating ASHRAE engineers so they will know how to use the tool and evaluate alternative designs. We are following the progress of this special project closely and will amend our estimates accordingly, once the tool and methodology become clearer.

The main difficulty lies in the fact that our equipment is used in a variety of building types and geographic locations across North America, and while the tools for estimating the carbon footprint for a specific building is fairly straightforward, we do not necessarily have intimate knowledge of all of the buildings and locations where our equipment is installed. Given this fact, we have produced a methodology that we believe is accurate and conservative to provide a realistic estimate of the positive effect that energy recovery equipment from Venmar CES has on climate change.

Our current methodology is as follows:

1. We examined the total volume of equipment sales, as they were installed in each of the DOE climate zones, and our AHRI reported sales to determine the percentage of total and sensible energy recovery devices installed in each of those zones. Based on this distribution, we performed an energy analysis for each of the representative cities in each DOE climate zone (as outlined in the technical support documentation for the development of the ASHRAE Advanced Energy Design Guides) using Venmar Select™ to estimate the total amount of energy saved for a typical meteorological year (assuming conservative hours of operation to be 10 hours per day, 5 days per week).
2. Once we had this number, we converted the energy saved into an equivalent mass of CO2e emissions based on an emissions factor (which is energy source specific and varies from building-to-building in each geographic location). We used our sales distribution and statistical information based on market distribution in the geographic zones and determined the representative emissions factor for the energy use for space heating and cooling.
3. Once that was determined, we multiplied the amount of energy saved in the first year of operation by the appropriate emissions factor to determine the amount of CO2e saved.

How much CO2e have you saved and what does it mean?

The amount of CO2e that we have saved is constantly increasing. The real time results are presented on our "carbon ticker". Here are two examples to put the numbers into perspective:

1. In less than 3 hours, Venmar CES equipment saves enough CO2e to offset the emissions created by one mid-sized vehicle; that's a little over 3,000 automobiles per year!
2. Each day that Venmar CES equipment is in operation, we save the equivalent amount of CO2e that is absorbed by 4,800 trees in an entire year!