GOBBELL HAYS PARTNERS, INC.

Gobbell Hays Partners, Inc. has participated in the Mayor's Workplace Challenge for the past year, which has resulted in the firm receiving Silver medals for each of the three categories the Mayor of Nashville, Karl Dean, set forth for businesses to strive for. From the Mayor's Workplace Challenge website, here are the goals of each category:

"The Green Workplace Challenge encourages organizations to reduce the environmental impacts of their operations and buildings. by engaging property owners, managers, and office tenants."

"The Healthy Workplace Challenge encourages organizations to foster an environment that promotes a more active and healthy workplace. This challenge will recognize efforts of Nashville businesses and organizations that make their work environment an easier place to be healthy while also encouraging all workplaces to join the goal of making Nashville a healthier city."

"The Involved Workplace Challenge encourages organizations to take an active role in promoting volunteer service inside and outside the workplace. This challenge outlines the following best practices for organizations looking to improve their level of community engagement."

GHP is proud of our accomplishments to be more Green, Healthy, and Involved; however, we realize there is still room for improvement. The firm's goal is to eventually achieve Gold, in addition to the newest top-prize - Platinum.

For more information on the Mayor's Workplace Challenge, click here.

Article written by Cory Garfin and listed on the YOUmedia network site (http://youmedia.org/youth-team-workshop-leaders-build-new-nashville-learning-lab) featuring GHP Project Manager Dominique Arrieta.

Teens in Nashville got a chance recently to whet their appetite for architecture, get involved in creating a part of their city, and have a say in what the soon-to-open YOUmedia space in the city will look like. The site, a center of hands-on learning with digital media in the Nashville Public Library, is in the planning stages this year, and a group of approximately 10-12 local youth are helping to design the physical elements of the new space with help from lead architect Dominique Arrieta and Associate Professor at Vanderbilt University  Kevin Leander. The teens are not only choosing the technology and amenities that will be available in the space, but also designing the logistics of its potential infrastructure using online design programs.

“We try to make it their space, something they’re proud of,” said Arrieta, “which is especially important in libraries because it’s their choice to be there.”

The teens are taking part in 13 workshop sessions, covering topics such as augmented reality, and space relations between physical and virtual worlds. The students are using Minecraft, the digital game in which users build and break down structures by moving computer-generated blocks, to practice building the structures they’ve designed.

Leander described Minecraft as “writing on the surface of a virtual earth,” and said he was surprised by how adept his students were at the game.  “It’s really astounding to me,” he said, adding that the game has become a kind of literacy in itself. Arrieta explained that they’ve also been using the game to role play the relationship between client and designer.

“It’s very exciting,” said Arrieta. “We’re trying to challenge them and to use other tools,” including Google SketchUp, which allows students to build 3D models.

The workshop leaders have also taken students on tours of other spaces, including libraries, to help enrich the ongoing conversation about space and how it affects learning. During these tours, students are asked to pay close attention to the surrounding architecture and the use of physical space in order to gain a better understanding for the spaces that comprise their community. As Leander noted, this collaboration between youth and designers has provided students with a unique learning opportunity where they have a role in creating part of their city.

The upcoming weeks of the mentorship will be dedicated to creating a prioritized “wish list,” by comparing elements that the students would like in their new Learning Lab against square footage and space limitations. Some of the priorities that have been confirmed include a makerspace—a place where teens can tinker and invent—and, in keeping with its Nashville roots, a place for music production and recording.

Leander said that their location is a key component in creating a singular space. “We want the space to be unique to the team we’ve assembled, and unique to Nashville,” said Leander. “We want to do something different where the virtual piece and the physical piece are interwoven.”

Finding a balance between creating the ideal concept, which is still in a developmental phase, and beginning to physically construct the space is one area that, according to Leander, can present some roadblocks.

“You’re trying to bring a lot of imagination and creativity, but also trying to make commitments,” said Leander, “all in order to build a version of a thing no one’s ever seen before. It sort of feels like you’re building a boat while trying to sail it at the same time. At some point, you have to look at each other and say, ‘we’ve actually got to make this thing’.”

For Leander, one of the goals of the workshop is to connect in-school practices and literacies with those commonly cultivated outside of the classroom, and to recognize the role of technology within both settings. The mentoring program also aims to enforce architecture, management, and structural engineering skills, and to expose students to new career paths as well. Arrieta pointed out that engaging youth in these subjects will soon be essential in order to sustain her career, and other STEM-related fields.

“I really feel like it’s important to let them know about these options,” she said. She speaks from experience, She had never considered architecture as a possible career choice until college. “We need more interest in our field. We’re getting to a point where we really need young people.”

The key to engaging these young people is, of course, meeting them where they are, and learning from them. One of the biggest lessons Arrieta said she has learned during this process has been to abandon any preconceived notions about the students and their potential strengths or weaknesses. “We understand that they’re coming from a different skill set,” said Arrieta. “I’ve learned not to guess what they know, or assume anything, and to ask questions.”

The sessions will culminate on March 13 with students’ final presentations to the library board on what they’ve designed over the course of the program. “The overall goal is that, at the end of the day, we want them to produce a three-image document, or floor plan, that describes the intent of the new space,” said Arrieta.

Despite the fact that the YOUmedia space won’t be completed for quite some time, the bubbling excitement for this project is undeniably growing. “Creating spaces like this one is important,” said Leander. “I am really invested in what our students are going to experience.”

Ronald Gobbell, left, and Steve Hays of Gobbell Hays Partners Inc. have been business partners for the past 35 years. “We’ve become best friends over the years,” said Hays, who noted that it was “helpful that we got together young before we were molded,” making it easier to collaborate and work together.

When a recession hits your industry, it pays to be nimble.

That’s how Gobbell Hays Partners Inc., a 35-year-old Nashville-based engineering and architectural firm, navigated through recent tough times for the commercial construction world.

When its clients around the globe started putting building addition and expansion plans on hold, the firm led by architect Ron Gobbell and engineer Steve Hays made a decision to shift its focus.

“We went from doing nice photographic architectural additions and major renovations to working on keeping buildings open,” Gobbell said.

That meant concentrating on environmental issues (mold, asbestos, indoor air quality) that could force a business to close portions of its building.

“If a client has to close down a section of a hotel or hospital, they stand to lose a lot of revenue,” Gobbell said. “Our job is to get them back up and running quickly. That way we were able to keep our engineers busy dealing with mold issues. And our architects worked to figure out why they had moisture problems and how to fix it.”

The strategy paid off.

“We didn’t have to have layoffs like most firms did, because we did very well over the last four years,” Gobbell said.

It wouldn’t have worked without flexible and adaptable employees, traits the company looks for when hiring, Hays said.

“Being nimble is essential,” Hays said. “We do a lot of cross training.”

In 2012, the firm posted about $17 million in revenue. This year, it expects to reach $21 million. Hays and Gobbell anticipate growth to continue as the firm repositions to take advantage of bigger opportunities.

“We are really excited about 2014,” Gobbell said. “We hope to get up around $30 million as hospitals and hotels start to move forward with major additions and renovations that they have had on hold for the last four or five years.”

Gobbell and Hays believe the environmental work the firm did in recent years has strengthened its relationships with clients and will lead to bigger projects.

“It’s like that joke, if a camel can get its nose under the tent, the camel is going get in the tent,” Gobbell said. “Well, we’ve got our nose in several tents.”

Written by: Nevin Batiwalla, Staff Reporter, Nashville Business Journal
Photo credit: Nathan Morgan, Nashville Business Journal

Link to NBJ Online article

On Sunday, November 14, 2011, Mayor Karl Dean hosted the Mayor's Challenge 5K Run/Walk to encourage Nashville to be more active.  An addition to Mr. Dean's "Walk 100 Miles With The Mayor" campaign, more than 5,000 people came out to Public Square at the Metro Courthouse to run or walk 3.1 miles through downtown Nashville.

Gobbell Hays Partners, Inc. felt compelled by the Mayor's challenge and send out a team from the downtown Nashville office to "compete" in the race.  While none of our team "won" the race, we all felt like winners at the finish line.  Living a healthy, sustainable life is extremely important.  As we work to live sustainably, GHP also works to apply sustainability to our professional lives as well.  GHP strives to take the holistic approach to our architectural and environmental services and finds our calling in such works.  It was a great day for the GHP team; however, it was also a reminder to us that our professional lives aren't so different from what we completed in the 5K.  Probably the only difference being a leg cramp here and there.

Given these tough economic times, we are all searching for ways to cut spending.  A great place to start is operational energy costs.  What measures should I take?  How much will it cost?  This is not as easy as it may seem.  There is a lot of information out there about energy savings and a lot of people touting the importance of specific measures to save energy, but how do we know whom to believe and how accurate their claims are?  To effectively answer these questions, we must understand energy conservation, energy efficiency, and the difference in the two.

Two giant challenges facing the United States are Global Warming and Energy Security.  The key to both is energy conservation.  Energy efficiency is the low hanging fruit.  It will continue to improve and, therefore the cost of acquiring it will flatten.  Energy conservation will provide the true challenges for individuals and organizations.  In this newsletter, we’ll explore some of the facts and myths about energy conservation and efficiency. In addition, we’ll recommend specific measures to reduce operational costs on energy.

Myth: Efficiency equals Conservation

Fact: Efficiency does not equal conservation.  Energy conservation is the lowering of energy consumption by reducing energy services. For example, lowering a thermostat’s setting during the heating season is an example of energy conservation because less heating is provided. However, since the ratio of energy services to energy consumption is unchanged, energy efficiency does not change.  To use a lighting example, replace your incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) and you increase efficiency.  Turn the light out when you leave the room and you conserve energy.  Do both and you reduce energy usage and costs. 

Myth: Greater efficiency will result in less energy consumption.

Fact: Even with greater efficiency, demand will rise.  History shows that in the U.S., even as efficiency has increased since the 70’s, consumption has continued to rise.  The Energy Information Agency (EIA) predicts that overall annual energy consumption in the U.S. will increase by more than 30%, rising from 100.1 quadrillion Btu in 2005 to 131.1 quadrillion Btu in 2030. (A quadrillion Btu is equal to about 172 million barrels of crude oil.)

Myth: A LEED building is more energy efficient than a similar non-LEED building.

Fact: It depends.  The key here is energy consumption of one building as compared to another building of similar type and size.  If you design a building with 45% of wall area as windows for more daylighting, then you save on lighting, but the HVAC equipment will be larger and operate longer.  Also, if you increase the outdoor air ventilation above ASHRAE 62.1 (the ventilation standard recognized by LEED), then the size of the HVAC system increases.  This standard is sufficient for outdoor air and, especially with low VOC materials, is not needed for dilution. When making design decisions for a LEED accredited building, analyze every point and keep energy savings at the top of the priority list.

Energy Reduction Actions

•  Hire someone to perform an energy audit for your facility.  This is costly but worth it.
•  Recycling “waste energy” can significantly increase the energy performance of a building. Energy recovery:  Combine fresh air and exhaust systems into an energy recovery unit. 
•  Demand Control ventilation (DCV) reduces the outside air demand based on occupancy at any given time.  DCV utilizes automatic controls, CO2 sensors, and actuators to modulate the fresh air based on occupancy.
•  Use less glass during design.  Windows and curtain walls are among the most expensive building components and they provide the worst energy performance. 
•  If your building is steel stud wall construction, insulate the studs on the outside for a continuous layer of insulation instead of cavity insulation.  This will create a true thermal break to isolate the inside from the outside.
•  Don’t operate equipment or fixtures when you don’t need them. Automatic control sequences can turn off air conditioning/heating equipment and lights based on your facility’s occupancy schedule, enable variable frequency drives (VFDs) to ramp pumps and fans down as demand decreases, raise air handler discharge air temperature when the ambient temperature lowers, and modulate air economizer sequences.
•  Lighting consumption can be reduced by using basic occupancy sensors. Lighting efficiency can be improved with use of compact fluorescent and light-emitting diode (LED) site lighting.
•  Inspect the building envelope for tightness.  Windows and doors should be properly caulked.  Exterior wall, floor, and roof insulation should be properly installed.
•  Inspect ductwork for leaks.  If you have leaky ductwork, it is inefficient and should be repaired by patching holes and applying mastic at the seams, equipment connections, and grille connections. 
•  To increase efficiency, install energy efficient HVAC equipment and low flow water fixtures. 
•  Maintain the equipment you own so it will reach its expected useful life and efficiency: Develop a strict and recurring maintenance plan for the staff at each facility.
•  Renewable resources such as solar, wind, and geothermal energy may effectively contribute to reducing the fossil fuel based energy consumption. Depending on your region, it is worth exploring government incentives that offer to abate the cost of the capital investment. 
•  The energy savings in adaptive reuse of existing facilities should be considered. While these savings do not translate into a direct financial advantage to the institution over the life of the building, they do save capital costs.  From an environmental standpoint, the amount of CO2 emitted by the cement industry is nearly 900Kg of CO2 for every 1,000Kg of cement produced.

Finally, energy usage is measured in BTUs and kWs.  These are specific scientific standards that cannot be reduced.  Only a reduction in the quantity of these measurements will result in energy savings. There are no magic solutions that will change that fact. The choice becomes how and when to cut it off.  As spring approaches, give yourself a gift: Fatten your pocketbook by reducing operating costs through reduced energy consumption.

Written by: Casey R. Hester, PE, LEED AP

The experience of watching the use and development of the LEED™ project implementation process has been an amazing thing to behold.  Gobbell Hays Partners, Inc. (GHP) has been a member of USGBC since 2001 back when LEED™ was largely an unknown acronym and commonly, yet incorrectly,  pronounced with an errant ‘s’ on the end of it.  At that time, there were only about ten LEED™ Accredited Professionals in the Middle Tennessee area and we all had that "deer-in-the-headlights" look about us wondering if this initiative was going to take hold. Something needed to be done as looming environmental threats became more publicized and we realized the adverse impact that the buildings we created made on the environment.  There were others, and some colleagues, who challenged us with the assumption that LEED™ was just a fad.  Well, fast forward to today and here we are with LEED certification quickly becoming the norm for validating sustainable design and while other forms of sustainable design validation exist, none have taken hold or are used to the extent of LEED™.
 
In 2009, GHP was delighted to guide several projects to LEED™ Silver Certification.  Of those, one was completed by way of the third-party LEED™ Facilitation process.  This process establishes GHP as the LEED™ facilitator for the project as a complement to the entire design team; meaning that your usual architectural and engineering design professionals are the respective professionals of record while GHP spearheads all of the LEED™ administration.  The actual list of services that can be handled by GHP can be customized to the needs of your project and according to those necessary to complement the team, but can include any combination of the following:
Preliminary LEED™ Point Planning, Assessment, and Allocation
LEED™ Online Administration
LEED™ Online Template Input
Preparation of Energy Models – usually by a GHP consultant
Fundamental, Enhanced, and/or Retro Commissioning
Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) Testing and Verification

Sustainable design not only makes a positive impact on public health and the environment, but it also reduces operating costs, enhances building and organizational marketability, increases occupant productivity, and helps create a sustainable community. GHP is excited to utilize its LEED Accredited Professionals for many of our current and future projects.

Written by: Mark Smith, AIA, LEED AP, Vice President and Carl Gerhold, Chemical Hygiene Officer, Senior Industrial Hygienist