New York University

Campus Characteristics

• Location: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Abu Dhabi, Shanghai
• Founding year: 1831
• Total enrollment: 60,000
• Institution type: private
• Highest degree: doctoral

Institutional Goals

NYU is committed to achieving ambitious reductions in greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) emissions, with a goal to be climate neutral by 2040. Strategies to achieve climate neutrality by 2040 include the following steps:

1. Reduce on-site energy use. Energy use in buildings constitutes 99.4 percent of NYU’s on-site Scope 1 and 2 emissions. A holistic approach to renovations will help create green buildings. In addition to using less energy, green buildings are quieter, healthier, and more comfortable for their occupants.
2. Electrify remaining energy use. New York's clean energy transition will require buildings to dramatically reduce fossil fuel use to operate. As a result, NYU is increasingly investigating opportunities for building electrification.
3. Purchase and produce clean energy. NYU continues to examine opportunities for renewable energy generation on campus, including for solar and geothermal energy. One recent example is the installation of over 300 solar panels atop Bobst Library. Given the possibilities of electrification and the state’s 2040 carbon-free electricity targets, NYU hopes for minimal use of offsets.

In addition to NYU’s overarching climate goal, the university commits resources to ensure that every significant construction project will be LEED certified, targeting LEED Silver certification as a minimum. As of December 2024, 21 spaces covering 3.2 million square feet have been LEED certified across NYU’s campuses.

Background

NYU's historic Rubin Hall , located at 35 5th Avenue, is the former Grosvenor Hotel, a 155,630-square-foot, 16-story building built in 1928. In 1964, NYU purchased the building to provide housing for international students. In 1969, the Greenwich Village History District— which includes Rubin Hall—was designated a historic landmark by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Committee (LPC). Today, the building houses approximately 680 first-year students.

Like many other buildings from the 1920s, Rubin Hall had the following characteristics:

• Neo-Federal style clad with 4 inches of red brick surrounding 8 inches of terracotta brick
• Uninsulated exterior envelope
• Fuel-oil boiler and steam radiators
• Windows as the sole means of cooling and ventilation for the students

With no ductwork, conditioned air could not be provided to the students, and landmark restrictions prohibited the addition of window air conditioners. This building design created temperature inconsistencies that led residents to open the windows during the winter months, generating heat waste. Students also sweltered during the first and last months of the academic year without air conditioning.

Rubin Hall was ready for renovation to serve student needs, giving NYU an opportunity to simultaneously perform a deep energy retrofit that would help achieve NYU’s sustainability, comfort, and compliance goals in parallel.

Solutions Explored

The University initiated a pre-design study in 2019 with FXCollaborative and Steven Winters Associates to explore several decarbonization pathways, including a Passive House retrofit. One of the most rigorous energy reduction and sustainability strategies in the world, Passive House is a performance-based green building certification that focuses on limiting total energy use, decreasing greenhouse gas emissions, and increasing the interior air quality of buildings.

The pre-design study looked at several HVAC schemes, such as a variable refrigerant flow (VRF) system that consists of outdoor units connected to multiple indoor units via refrigerant piping to provide cooling and heating to individual zones; however, NYU had concerns about the amount of refrigerant required to serve a building of this size. A water-loop system and water-source heat pumps were also considered; in this case, a consideration was the potential maintenance required for compressors within student rooms. NYU ultimately settled on a mix of a two-pipe, fan-coil unit system that does not rely on ductwork—a system that doesn’t allow for simultaneous heating and cooling, but that may have greater reliability and less maintenance.

Solutions Implemented

Ultimately, NYU went ahead with a deep energy retrofit at Rubin Hall including the pursuit of Passive House EnerPHit certification and building-wide electrification. Construction began in May 2022, commencing 15 months of uninterrupted work.

The Passive House retrofit, which was approved by the NYC Landmarks Preservation Committee, has made the building more climate-efficient and comfortable, while preserving its 1920s landmarked façade. This retrofit implemented sustainability strategies while introducing air conditioning, sound insulation, and other improvements, which included:

• New windows. Custom-made to fit landmark preservation requirements, these triple-pane windows increase thermal retention and reduce outside noise.
• Insulation. The existing uninsulated exterior wall was insulated from the interior, achieving high levels of heat and energy retention.
• Electrification. All-electric space heating and hot water replaced fossil fuel-based radiators and boilers, effectively eliminating greenhouse gas emissions.
• Occupancy sensors. While air conditioning was introduced, occupancy sensors limit heating and cooling when rooms are empty.
• Ventilation upgrades. A rooftop dedicated outside air system (DOAS) that includes heat recovery provides filtered, conditioned fresh air directly to student rooms, enhancing indoor air quality.

Budget and Financing

The retrofit at Rubin Hall was identified as part of NYU’s capital replacement plan. Incentives from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) and Consolidated Edison, Inc. (ConEd) helped offset the costs.

Specifically, NYU was awarded $2 million through NYSERDA’s Building Cleaner Communities Competition to help offset the incremental costs for carbon-neutral systems and energy-efficiency improvements. The Building Cleaner Communities Competition, formerly known as the Carbon Neutral Community Economic Development Program (CNCED), was initiated to recognize and reward the design, construction, and operation of carbon-neutral and net-zero-energy commercial, industrial, and institutional projects.