Providing on-site power.

It may be surprising to many, but nearly two-thirds of our energy is consumed in office buildings.

As a key stakeholder, it is a responsibility of office owners to address this issue.

To harness dependable, efficient and cost-effective sources of power to deliver lower energy and electric costs to their tenants, Equity Office, the nation's largest owner and operator of office buildings, has launched a unique, comprehensive and strategic approach to energy management.

By leveraging our size and scale, we developed the industry's first comprehensive internal energy and engineering team focused on reducing energy usage and utility costs to make sure energy is utilized, distributed, generated and procured as cost effectively and efficiently as possible across our nationwide portfolio of buildings.

Equity Office's total energy initiative focuses on energy monitoring, procurement, conservation and distributed generation. Using a progressive computer-based energy management and monitoring system, our engineers can evaluate energy usage and saving investment opportunities.

In New York, property owners are able to take advantage of the ability to purchase electricity on the open market, and offer lower electric prices. As the price of electric power and steam continues to rise, and increased demand puts a strain on New York's utility grid (i.e. the cause of potential blackouts), we have responded by deploying distributed generation systems to generate energy at twice the efficiency of traditional utility systems. Distributed generation features the use of small-scale power plants located at the point of use (e.g. an office building.)

In fact, some distributed generation systems can generate energy at twice the efficiency of a typical electric utility. The key operational benefits of these systems include improved power reliability, cleaner electric power, below market energy rates, back-up power to critical building and or tenant requirements, in an environmentally friendly manner. We are currently installing a cogeneration system at 1301 Avenue of the Americas, a 1.7 million square-foot office tower in Midtown. The building's electric load, available space to install a power plant system, and need to have back-up power, made it an ideal fit for a distributed generation system.

The system has a capacity of 2,250 kw of electricity and 4,050 lbs/hour of high pressure steam, and is located on the 11th floor roof set back area of the building. It includes multiple generator sets and waste heat recovery steam generators, and provides electricity and steam to the building at 99.5 percent of the market prices for these commodities, and supplies approximately 25-30 percent of the building's energy requirements. Leveraging our on-site engineering and energy team, we are able to execute the design, engineering, purchase, construction and installation.

We will also be responsible for the operation and maintenance of the system. Equity Office is committed to projects that support power generation, availability, reliability, and emphasizing energy efficiency and environmental quality, and we will continue to invest in projects that will result in direct energy, environmental and economic benefits.

FRANK FRANKINI, SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT, ENGINEERING & ENERGY OPS, EQUITY OFFICE