While on a press trip in New York City with Lutron last week, I got to visit their new Commercial Experience Center as well as the gigantic $20 billion Hudson Yards development located just south of the Javits Center. If you have an interest in the power of commercial lighting and controlling it, I highly recommend visiting the Experience Center. If you have a general interest in green building, I recommend a visit to Hudson Yards.
Wikipedia does a good job explaining the scope of the Hudson Yards development. According to the site, Hudson Yards is a real estate development in the Chelsea and Hudson Yards neighborhoods of Manhattan, New York City. It is the largest private real estate development in the United States by area. Upon completion, 13 of the 16 planned structures on the West Side of Midtown South would sit on a platform built over the West Side Yard, a storage yard for Long Island Rail Road trains. The first of its two phases, opened in 2019, comprises a public green space and eight structures that contain residences, a hotel, office buildings, a mall, and a cultural facility. The second phase, on which construction has not started yet, will include residential space, an office building, and a school. A YouTube video of the project says it will eventually include more than 2.7 million square feet of space.
Hudson Yards boasts a first-of-its-kind microgrid, which features two eco-friendly cogeneration plants. Four large engines in those plants generate electricity, but the excess heat they give off is recaptured and used to both heat and cool the neighborhood’s buildings. This state-of-the-art process reduces greenhouse-gas emissions by an estimated 25,000 metric tons of CO2 each year, the equivalent of taking more than 5,000 cars off the road.
Earlier this year, Crain’s New York Business reported New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio’s disapproval of the Hudson Yards project because of its energy inefficiency. According to Crain’s, a spokeswoman for The Related Cos., Hudson Yards’ developer, touted the massive complex as carbon efficient. “Hudson Yards was planned as the largest LEED neighborhood in New York City,” she said in a statement.
An Equinox hotel is part of the Hudson Yards development. A file dedicated to the hotel on The Related Cos. website addresses the hotel’s strong wellness emphasis but fails to mention anything about sustainability.
