Sanctuary Cooling System is in!: July 22, 2022

The UCE Sanctuary Cooling System is in! And we are ready for Chicago’s hot Summer.

Thank you to everyone’s contributions to the Capital Campaign which made it possible for us to install a cooling system for the Sanctuary and adjacent Social Area. We’ve been enjoying this system since the end of May. It simply “takes the edge off” the indoor environment by cooling the room and removing some of the humidity. The intention is to make the Sanctuary & Social Area more comfortable on oppressively hot and humid days in Summer. It is not UCE’s intention to have cold storage facility-like conditions. Instead, the goal is to create a space that will be more comfortable for the members, community members and friends of UCE as well as for renters, who approach to share or rent the Sanctuary and Social Area. We researched many options and chose the best one that balanced caring for the environment and costs. We are pleased with the results.

Here are a few details about our new cooling system. Like our gas-fired furnaces, the cooling equipment mirrors the zoning arrangement of the furnaces. These zones include the east & northeast portions of the Sanctuary, the west & north west portions of the Sanctuary and the South zone which is basically the Social Area at the back of the Sanctuary. We’ve retained our existing furnaces and retrofitted them with eight new indoor cooling coils. We’ve also added eight, new outdoor condensing units and had the systems filled with R410a refrigerant, an environmentally favorable refrigerant with an ozone depletion potential of zero and a low global warming potential value. R410a also has a low toxicity, is not flammable and has an A1 safety classification. The seasonal energy efficiency ratio, or SEER, of the condensing units is as high as 19. The new cooling systems are zone controlled by three Ecobee programmable thermostats each one paired with a wireless remote temperature sensor for accurate control of operation. And, as a plus, the systems can be controlled remotely via a phone app!