Answering the EPIC Challenge

The California Energy Commission asked designers: ‘Can we design and build a mid-rise, mixed-use development that is affordable, equitable, climate resilient, cost-competitive and emissions free?’

A partnership led by Family Health Centers of San Diego (FHCSD) and LPA recently won a $1-million grant from the California Energy Commission to explore strategies to reimagine “affordable mixed-use development in a carbon-constrained future.” The program, the EPIC Challenge, focuses on real-world projects in development that can be realistically built, using technologies and strategies that might not normally be considered in a commercial marketplace but that can have a real impact in the future.

Last spring, three teams, including FHCSD/LPA, were selected to move forward with their designs, with funding to explore the potential for their projects to push the envelope to develop affordable housing that can contribute to the community’s larger health and energy goals.

FHCSD’s proposal focuses on Newton Housing, a five-level, modular, zero-emission, mixed-use development in Barrio Logan, one of the lowest-income and most polluted zones in San Diego. The top three levels of the project are dedicated to 80 studio, one- and two-bedroom residential units offered exclusively to low-income families, with the bottom two floors reserved for parking and office space for supportive community services.

“Newton is part of a long-term relationship between Family Health Centers of San Diego and LPA focused on developing efficient, sustainable affordable housing,” says Matt Winter, LPA’s Director of Mixed-Use. “Our work is about supporting FHCSD’s mission to serve families that need help.”

The EPIC grant — EPIC stands for the Electric Program Investment Charge — provides the designers with the opportunity to explore emerging technologies and broader regional energy goals, without the typical financial restraints. Most of the technologies already exist, but they have not been widely analyzed in real-world environments. EPIC’s goal is to support projects that “lead to technological advancement and breakthroughs to overcome barriers that prevent the achievement of the state’s statutory energy goals.”

The EPIC Challenge raises the bar for sustainable projects, asking designers to push convention by considering technologies without a proven track record, says LPA architect Ellie O’Connor, who managed the EPIC submission. The EPIC grant “bridges the gap,” giving a boost to “grand new ideas that are simply not getting enough steam or traction in the marketplace to become commonplace,” she says. Newton Housing is a perfect fit. “The EPIC program is about pushing the boundaries of our industry, while also providing for the needs of this community,” O’Connor says.“ I feel like the EPIC program is exactly what the Newton project is about.”

ALL-ELECTRIC, NET ZERO AFFORDABLE HOUSING
The Newton project will be the first development of its kind to provide affordable housing in Barrio Logan within an all-electric, net-zero-energy building capable of responding to the needs of the grid and islanding during power outages. Recycled, highly insulated housing modules will be used for most of the residential construction. Passive design features — including natural ventilation, enhanced daylight and shading design — will reduce the building system’s capacity and energy requirements. The roof area will be reserved for photovoltaic and solar thermal panels for on-site energy generation.

The design’s goal is to “set an exemplary standard for natural resource conservation.” The landscape design calls for extensive vegetated elevated decks and a community vegetable garden. Landscape areas will reduce heat gain and collect stormwater. A biofiltration system would treat and store water collected on-site while promoting biodiversity with an adaptive landscape palette. The team will also analyze how the use of a graywater system for stormwater and graywater reuse for the landscape irrigation could lower potable water demands.

As part of the process, the designers are analyzing several high-performance technologies for domestic hot water, always a big energy use in a residential project. The analysis will focus on the relative cost and efficiencies of a variety of water heating systems, including rooftop solar thermal, central air source heat pumps and wastewater heat recovery.

“We’re going to make the building all electric no matter what, so we have to pick between those hot water systems,” says Blake Herrschaft, an environmental engineer with Rising Tide Design and Engineering, who worked with FHCSD and LPA on the grant submission.

In addition to the building’s performance, the designers will analyze the project’s potential to play a larger role in one of the most fossil fuel-intensive energy corridors in the state. Stakeholders include the Port of San Diego, the Navy, large industrial manufacturers and dock facilities that host more than 100 cruise calls a year. Docked ships typically burn diesel fuel, which is a major cause of harmful air pollution in the area. Local agencies want cruise ships to use “shore power” — electricity generated onshore — instead of fossil fuel-burning generators. This strategy will require expensive new electrical infrastructure, which can be partially offset by better electrical management in the neighborhoods during peak times.

The Newton Housing building will be designed as a “good grid steward,” capable of reducing the energy load when the grid is at near capacity, Herrschaft says. Battery systems and on-site power generation would allow the building to cut its load on the grid when power is needed for the docks. “If we electrify buildings in Barrio Logan and do it in a grid-integrated way, we should have additional capacity to electrify the rest of the industrial uses there,” he says. “And, when we do that, we can improve the air quality.”

The project’s goals mesh with a larger movement within the city to develop buildings that provide broader neighborhood benefits. By demonstrating grid-enabled strategies, demand response and islanding, the project will highlight the ability for cutting-edge building strategies to help reduce infrastructure costs and improve the community’s health and wellness.

“This is our opportunity to analyze the effectiveness of different technologies in a real-world environment,” says LPA Design Director Matthew Porreca. “This work on Newton will set exemplary standards for energy performance, natural resource conservation and healthy living environments.”

AN ANALYTICAL PROCESS
The next step is for designers to take the broad palette of technologies and strategies and determine which will be practical, cost-efficient and beneficial for the project and the larger goals of the EPIC Challenge. Not all the elements in the initial proposal will make it into the final project. The ability to develop a large-scale battery storage system to make the building “fully islandable” and controls to better integrate the building with the grid will be challenging. Many concepts will be constrained by emerging technological limitations or the ability of the city and local agencies to properly review and approve new systems.

The analysis will break down the costs and potential of different aspects of the project, including the benefits of modular construction, providing important data for future projects. The data could provide an important case study for the potential of using prefabrication to speed delivery of multistory residential projects.

Several elements of the EPIC proposal would represent intriguing steps forward. Plans include the potential to use a vehicle-to-grid energy system, developed by local San Diego company Nuvve, which could draw extra battery power from the cars to the building’s system. The technology has been discussed for many years, and, amid the push to develop all-electric buildings, it might finally be ready for broader acceptance.

“Vehicle-to-grid integration is an interesting idea and makes a ton of sense on a conceptual level,” says LPA Director of Engineering Erik Ring. “Rather than installing a separate battery bank in your building to store and discharge energy, why not just use the batteries that you already own that are sitting in the cars?”

Innovative design options for the hot water system will likely draw extra attention. Developed by SHARC International Systems, the wastewater heat recovery system under consideration extracts heat from the hot water going down the shower drain and supercharges that heat with heat pumps, to heat fresh, incoming hot water for the building. The system offers a new approach to reduce energy costs, but it’s still relatively untested; about 25 systems are either installed or in progress around the world, the company says.

“One thing that makes it a challenge is we don’t have a lot of examples of multifamily buildings that use electricity for the hot water in San Diego,” Herrschaft says. “A multifamily housing project in San Diego that uses central heat pump hot water will be a real, replicable case study for the region. By 2026, we expect all new multifamily projects to use this type of water heating system, so our local industry needs to start learning how to design these systems immediately.”

The project will also combine energy goals with a proactive approach to improving air quality for residents. Operable windows and natural ventilation will reduce the load on air conditioning. Sensors will monitor the indoor and outdoor air quality for every apartment. The system will advise residents when it’s safe to open windows or when it’s better to use the building’s filtered air system. “The idea that we can do monitoring in a place that has such high asthma rates and poor air quality is really an exciting opportunity,” Herrschaft says.

THE NEXT STEP
More than anything, the EPIC Challenge is about demonstrating what is possible. The funds target projects illustrating that new technologies and energy initiatives are not only for expensive, market-rate housing projects.

“This program asks, how do we take the qualities and objectives that we want to see in new market rate housing projects and make sure we’re also pursuing those goals for an affordable housing project?” Ring says.

After a new round of submittals and more detailed plans, the state will pick one of the three projects to receive as much as $7 million in additional funding. Either way, the process will move discussions forward and increase knowledge of strategies for developing more affordable housing, Winter says. The effort can also spur local agencies to evaluate standards to permit the new technologies, similar to an effort a few years ago when LPA engineers worked with the city to evaluate and approve the first mass timber diaphragm building in San Diego County.

EPIC is helping designers to push the boundaries, advance innovation and find answers to the larger issues facing the development of more energy-efficient affordable housing.

“The work we’re doing on Newton Housing and the EPIC Challenge grant will inform our future work,” Winter says. “We’re addressing very real housing issues and evaluating technologies that will have an important impact on projects.”

ALL-ELECTRIC, NET ZERO AFFORDABLE HOUSING

A partnership led by Family Health Centers of San Diego and LPA recently earned a $1-million grant from California’s EPIC Challenge to explore next generation strategies for creating healthier and more energy efficient affordable housing. Designers are focusing on technologies to support Newton Supportive Housing, an all-electric, zero emission modular housing project in Barrio Logan.