Sandia National Laboratories (Albuquerque, NM)

Department of Energy

A facilities engineering team at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, NM implemented an innovative idea to construct a chilled water thermal energy storage (TES) system to serve their new Processing and Environmental Technology Laboratory. The new system optimized the capacity of an existing central chilled water plant and avoided the purchase of a new 900-ton chiller plant at about $900,000. Chiller operation during off-peak hours, efficiency improvements to the existing system, and reduced maintenance save almost $200,000 annually. At a total cost of $1.16 million for installation, the TES system paid back the premiums in approximately one year.