Victoria Soto School

The newly built Victoria Soto School lies on a twenty-five acre campus in the historic town of Stratford, Connecticut. As part of The Stratford Academy, the school serves kindergarten through second grade. Kohler Ronan was pleased to design complete MEP/FP systems for the new school in the hopes of creating a comfortable ad safe environment for students and faculty.

Ventilation is provided via dedicated outdoor air units with energy recovery, and all the classrooms are provided with radiant floors. Dual fuel boilers allow the facility to choose the fuels utilized based on cost efficiency. Significant energy analysis was conducted in order to obtain the highest possible level of cost-effective energy efficiency.

To achieve the building’s energy goal’s, the design team created an initial energy model to reduce energy expenditures and optimize overall energy performance. The energy model was also used as a tool to evaluate various design concepts and strategies. Energy efficiency measures incorporated into the final design included improved thermal envelope, energy recovery ventilators, variable refrigerant flow systems, energy efficient lighting, light shelves and occupancy sensors.

During the Construction Documentation phase, whole building performance simulation was performed in accordance with ASHRAE 90.1-2007 Appendix G Building Performance Rating Method in order to demonstrate compliance with the Energy Performance section of the Connecticut High Performance Building Standard (HPBS). The design performed 27.3% more efficient in terms of energy cost than the ASHRAE 90.1-2007 Baseline, earning the mandatory strategy.

Photo credit: © Robert Benson