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Central Nebraska Veteran's Home (CNVH)

The CNVH is a new community providing domiciliary, dementia, palliative. and long term care to Veterans in the region. The project will be located on the former army base near the Kearney airport. As a component of community engagement and design, a model unit was constructed for confirmation of design intent.

Collaboration

The model unit was assembled by construction management students at University of Nebraska - Kearney. All the mechanical, electrical, lighting, and technology features correlate with the design documents created by Morrissey Engineering. The mock up room is a genuine representation of what the final units will look like when completed. Actual light fixtures, registers/grilles, and plumbing components were provided by the community and local businesses.

Lighting's Impact

By 2050, over twenty five percent of the United State’s population will be over the age of 60. For this aging population it is more important now than ever to create healthy spaces in which we live. Light plays a major role in entraining sleep/wake patterns, body temperature, brain activity, subjective alertness and overall performance - otherwise known as circadian rhythm. The unit’s lighting system assists in circadian entrainment through the use of color-tunable LED lighting which shifts in color temperature throughout the day to simulate the spectrum of natural light. Additionally, night lights are located in strategic locations to reduce the likelihood of falls. These night lights produce a low intensity amber-colored light which is least disruptive to sleep/wake patterns. Control is automated to simplify operation for residents while maximizing health benefits. The resulting design is a space that is not only pleasant but positively impacts the human circadian system.

HVAC

The veteran's community will have one of the most energy efficient HVAC systems available. The state of the art Water Cooled Variable Refrigerant Volume (VRF) system will use ground-coupled geothermal well fields to reject and absorb heat into the earth. The geothermal VRF system uses water cooled condensing units located inside the building. Indoor DX HVAC fan coil units are located throughout the community to heat and cool the veteran's homes and all common areas.

Energy usage for the VRF system is predicted to be 25-35% less than a traditional HVAC system.

Digital controls will allow the building operators to control the system and to monitor energy usage to allow the most efficient operation of the system.