Renovate by Berkowitz to Update Oklahoma City Skyscraper

The 30-story skyscraper is the centerpiece of the corporate campus for the independent oil and gas company.   

The 43-year-old building, formerly known as the McGee Tower, will be the largest and most complex installation of the Renovate system to date. In all, 2,808 windows will be retrofitted with the Renovate Platinum Plus II system, adding a factory-made insulating glass unit (IGU) with two lites of high-performance glass to the interior surface of the existing single-pane windows.

Project manager Fred Niggemeyer, of Oklahoma City-based Frankfurt Short Bruza Associates, said the team specified the Renovate Platinum Plus II system to help improve the year-round thermal and energy performance of the windows.

“Oklahoma City faces relatively cool winters, but summer days are consistently hot and can bring extreme heat,” Niggemeyer said. “By adding a passive low-e glass to minimize heating costs, and a solar control low-e glass to minimize cooling costs, we expect the performance of the windows to significantly improve the overall energy efficiency of the building.”

Rick Brown, director of facilities & construction at SandRidge Energy, said he expects the Renovate system to perform as designed, based on his own evidence.

“During the first week of March, the early morning temperatures were still in the 20s in Oklahoma City,” Brown said. “We used an infrared temperature gun to compare the internal surface temperatures of existing and retrofitted windows. Needless to say, the existing quarter-inch glass was in the 20-degree range, while the windows with the Renovate system were in the 60s.”

The Renovate system has the potential to reduce annual energy consumption for heating and cooling in aging commercial buildings by 25 percent or more, as proven in a U.S. Department of Energy–funded study at a 12-story building in Philadelphia.

In addition to making older buildings more energy efficient, the Renovate system is less expensive and disruptive to install than conventional “rip-out and replace” window/curtainwall retrofit solutions.

“Because the Renovate system installs from the inside of the building, the building has remained enclosed,” Niggemeyer added. “Also, the exterior skin of the building has not been impacted allowing it to maintain its original architectural character.” The project is expected to be completed in September 2015.

For more information on how the Renovate system can help improve aging commercial buildings, visit www.RbBwindow.com.

About RbB

Renovate by Berkowitz, LLC, (RbB) was established in 2010 by the owners of J.E. Berkowitz, LP (JEB), a leading architectural glass fabricator. JEB manufacturers the RENOVATE by Berkowitz™ window/curtainwall retrofit system at its 253,000-square-foot facility in Pedricktown, N.J. For more information, visit www.RbBwindow.com.  

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Renovate by Berkowitz is a trademark of RbB, LLC