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SALT LAKE CITY — From the outside, Utah Clean Energy's Climate Innovation Center may look like any other typical building.
In reality, it is far from typical.
Opened Wednesday, the center is "so much more than a building. It is so much greater than Utah Clean Energy's headquarters," said Sarah Wright, CEO of Utah Clean Energy.
As could be expected from an organization leading the Beehive State's transition to clean energy, the Climate Innovation Center is a standing testament to everything the nonprofit Utah Clean Energy advocates for.
Wright described the center as a "living laboratory" and "catalyst for change" — and it's evident why.
The center was renovated into a beacon of sustainable design from a previously existing building, and everything about it was done with the environment in mind. Renovating an existing structure allowed Utah Clean Energy to reuse nearly 260,000 pounds of building materials, reducing the energy consumption and emissions associated with new construction.
The building is all-electric, powered with 100% clean energy through rooftop and canopy solar panels, coupled with a 90 kilowatt-hour, on-site battery for energy storage supplied via a Rocky Mountain Power Blue Sky Grant, which supported the solar installation and battery storage.
The center is also fossil fuel-free, boasting no on-site emissions.
Overall, the center is approximately seven times more energy efficient than a standard office building, projecting an energy usage intensity of 27.8, whereas a typical office building usually falls between energy usage intensity scores of 71 to 472.
"Upgrading new and existing buildings is a straightforward way to dramatically reduce emissions and teaching others how to do this is exactly what we aim to do on this center," Wright said.
The building, Wright said, encapsulates the mission of Utah Clean Energy and will serve as an example of how to build energy-efficient buildings for local governments and developers
"We'll be bringing people together to do education around that. Our work is all about climate and clean energy solutions, and we work in a lot of different venues," Wright said. "We have experts in climate science, experts in building efficiency and home efficiency, experts in utilities and grids and how to make that work better, and experts in working with community leaders to really bring everyone together."
Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall described the center as "the place where the spark happens for innovation around the buildings that we have in the state of Utah."
"(The building) is going to keep asking the question that most buildings stop asking as soon as they're complete. It's going to keep asking Joel Ferry (Utah Department of Natural Resources executive director) and our friends at Rio Tinto ... 'How can we do better?'" Mendenhall said. "Now show us in here and let this be a place where leadership around building innovation and adaptive reuse stems."
Throughout the renovation, Utah Clean Energy and its building partners documented all of the steps to achieve zero energy and will utilize the building and a dedicated website as a teaching tool to make it easy for others to follow suit, according to a release from Utah Clean Energy.
