Journalism renovate newsroom
Combine two rooms in the Journalism building into the new Newsroom, providing air services that met the necessary minimal noise requirements of the customers.
Project context
The School of Journalism at the University of Georgia wanted to merge the old production room and the current Newsroom to handle a more modern workflow. The current supply air to the newsroom and the production room was to be demolished and replaced by two variable air volume terminal units with reheat to controlled by the campus standard digital control system. In addition, it was requested that the HVAC system be sufficiently quiet so as to not be registered during recording sessions in the space.
My work
Aside from the usual work associated with commercial scale renovations like these (original building construction document investigation, heat-load calculations, ductwork pressure loss calculations, and of course, the drafting), this project was a great opportunity to learn about how to design HVAC systems for quiet operation. This required becoming educated about recommended ASHRAE practices for quiet duct operation and collaboration with vendors to select the options to ensure near-silent operation. And given the desired open-ceiling concept space, any mistakes in design or equipment selection would have definitely been noticed! I'm happy to say that the school was satisfied with the job.
