Roosevelt Island Roosevelt Landings Owner Urban American Seals Elevator Shaft Vents Preventing Heat Loss And Other Energy Efficiencies - Gains Huge Electricity Savings Says NY Times Article

An article in the March 17  New York Times headlined:

Environmental Report Details Heat’s Costly Escape Through Elevator Shafts

illustrates efforts made by our very own Roosevelt Island building complex Roosevelt Landings to prevent heat from leaking through the buildings elevator shafts. The NY Times reports:

... On Roosevelt Island, Urban American Management, an owner of a 1,003-unit rental building called Roosevelt Landings, recently instituted changes to make the structure more energy efficient, including sealing the elevator shaft vents.

Joshua Eisenberg, executive vice president of Urban American, which owns and manages 8,000 apartments in the New York region, said he expected the recent improvements — including better insulation, new boilers and digital thermostats in addition to the elevator fix — to reduce Roosevelt Landings’s annual $3.2 million electricity bill by $700,000.

At the top of Roosevelt Landings on Roosevelt Island, the elevator room now has vent coverings. Credit Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times

“This building consists of four towers, each 21 stories high,” Mr. Eisenberg said, adding that the 40-year-old structure used electric heat, the most expensive. “You have nine sets of elevators and, as a result, a lot of air and ventilation issues.”

Urban American also recently formed a separate company to carry out building upgrades.

“Sealing the holes, cracks and vents is critical because the biggest problem is air leakage from buildings,” said David Davenport, principal of Urban Greenfit, which is not related to the nonprofit group Urban Green that wrote the report.

At the top of Roosevelt Landings, with its unobstructed view of the Manhattan skyline, an elevator room now features a glass panel covering a large vent. (A screen covers a smaller vent, which is open to comply with the building code.) In addition, a hole in the ceiling directly above the elevator shaft was covered....

Click here for the full NY Times article.

Urban American tweeted:

“You have to think responsibly down the line in terms of our contribution to emissions and climate change,” http://t.co/A2ghUoqaAE
— Urban American (@UrbanAmerican1) March 18, 2015

Last November, Urban Greenfit's David Davenport described to me energy savings tips and ways to keep Roosevelt Landings apartments warm during the winter.



More on Urban American's plans for Roosevelt Landings from this previous post.