Project Description

U.S. Cellular Center
Asheville, NC

Located in the heart of the Blue Ridge Mountains, this event center first opened in 1974, and has hosted a variety of concerts, sporting events, trade and consumer shows, banquets, and other events. The facility has four major areas of service including an exhibition hall, a 7,200 seat arena, a 500 seat banquet hall, and a 2,431 seat auditorium.

GEI was selected by the city of Asheville to perform an ASHRAE level 2 audit on the facility to aid the city with producing a long-term sustainability plan. The project features include:

▪ Construction of an investment grade energy model of the entire facility.

▪ The model was capable of accurately predicting the proposed sustainability practices, lighting retrofits, and controls measures.

▪ The identified energy savings measures included improved controls,  airside economizers, lighting retrofits, rainwater harvesting, solar PV, and  HVAC upgrades.

▪ A detailed utility analysis was completed and identified the energy impact  of all major events in the facility.

▪ The project provided the City of Asheville a map for the future  sustainability of the facility.

▪ $125,400 annual energy savings was identified.

▪ 230,000 square feet.

One of the many challenges in modeling this facility was the lack of a consistent operating schedule, so that cooling and heating loads were mostly a function of scheduled events in various parts of the facility. As a result, custom event schedule solutions were created for the model.