Project Brief

Blaine Apartments, the Battery View senior housing building at 72 Montgomery Street in Jersey City, was cooled by a 280-ton natural gas absorption chiller, a matching rooftop cooling tower and three circulating pumps, all at the end of their useful life. An energy study under New Jersey's Pay for Performance program pointed to a gas engine-driven chiller, which runs at a coefficient of performance of 2.5 or better, far above the absorption machine it replaced. KeRi was the prime engineering consultant on the design-build team.

The new plant is a 300-ton Tecogen Tecochill CH-300X dual-compressor engine-driven chiller, delivered in two halves so it could be rigged into the existing boiler room, with its exhaust stack tied into the old absorber breeching and new gas, engine cooling and refrigerant relief piping. A new BAC cooling tower sits on the existing roof steel, the chilled water, condenser water and swing pumps run on variable frequency drives, and a condenser water chemical feed system was added. Because the new chiller uses refrigerant, KeRi added a refrigerant leak monitor that drives a 3,600 CFM emergency exhaust fan, a new louver, and measurement and verification points for the utility incentive. KeRi then reviewed the submittals and the condenser water pump balancing through construction.

MEP Engineering Scope

What We Engineered

Chiller plant replacement for the apartment building:

• 300-ton Tecogen engine-driven chiller replacing a 280-ton gas absorption chiller
• New BAC cooling tower on the existing roof structure
• Chilled water, condenser water and swing pumps on VFDs, with chemical feed
• Refrigerant leak monitoring with a 3,600 CFM emergency exhaust fan
• Chiller exhaust stack, gas and relief piping, and M&V points for utility incentives
• Submittal review and pump balancing during construction

The Challenge

The building's absorption chiller, cooling tower and pumps had all reached the end of their life, and the replacement had to fit through an existing boiler room and onto the existing roof.

Our Solution

KeRi designed a 300-ton engine-driven chiller delivered in two halves, a new cooling tower on the existing steel, VFD pumps and the refrigerant safety systems the new plant required.