PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
Guntermann Engineering has engineered hundreds of mechanical and electrical projects for clients over a broad range of building usage’s, sizes, and types of systems. Typically, we work directly for owners, but sometimes team up with Architects, to provide construction bid documents for the HVAC, plumbing, sprinkler, and electrical building systems. A partial list of Projects is shown in "Projects".
PERSONAL EXPERIENCE
Mr. Guntermann has often been described as an “engineer’s engineer”. He has 40 years experience with energy and his twenty-four publications provide a proven track record that he has been an innovator and at the leading edge of the industry. These include a futuristic look at the energy supplies in his 1) landmark paper 1976 paper “The Mystery of Future Energy Prices”, 2) a 30 year update in his 2006 “The State of Energy: Then, Now, and in the Future”, and 3) a 2009 follow up “The State of Energy: Then, Now, and in the Future – Revisted”. They have shown a clear record of “speaking truth to power” which has ruffled feathers with the electric utility, oil and gas industry as well as the renewable energy industry.
In between his prescient articles on
energy, Mr. Guntermann’s published articles deal with the details of all
aspects of energy conservation which are highlighted by his ground
breaking work in 1982 on the Santa Anna General Mail Facility.
Utilizing DOE 2.1, he performed over 350 runs to optimize the energy
consumption in the 350,000 square foot building. The final building
utilized optimum insulation, light colored surfaces, skylights, high
efficiency lighting, daylighting and occupancy controls, and a low
static high efficiency HVAC system that was described in his article
“Optimized Chilled Water Air Conditioning”. The building’s cost came
in twenty-five percent below budget and was the U.S. Postal Facilities
most energy efficient building at that time in terms of Btu’s per square
foot per year. Even though the purpose of the study/design was to
provide the most energy efficient building using state of the art
systems including solar, the owner was surprised that the final design
was based on standard off the shelf “optimized” systems.
With the mid 1980’s change in political climate and lower energy prices,
Mr. Guntermann changed his emphasis from energy conservation to basic
MEP engineering where he has continued to design energy efficient
systems that are cost effective, meet building codes, and operate
properly.
1943-1961
Born in Chicago, Ill on June 25, 1943, he moved to Lake Geneva, WI at the age of four where he grew up. He was an Eagle Scout and Captain of the High School Golf team for four years and was runner up for the State Sectional and Regional tournaments in his senior year.
1961-1967
He attended and put himself through the University of Wisconsin at Madison from 1961 to January 1967 where he received his BSME. He was in the Phi Gamma Delta social fraternity.
1967-1974
From college he joined the Trane Company’s sales force in Early 1967,
attended their 6 month training program in Lacrosse, WI, spent 6 months
additional training at the Toledo, OH office, and then moved to their
Fort Wayne, IN sub office. After several months, the other sales
engineer left and Mr. Guntermann was given the chance to run the sub
office for three years which included the sales and installation of many
large chiller projects. In 1971, management of the sub office was
transferred to South Bend, IN Trane office where the South Bend manager
agreed to grow the office. Over the next three years, Mr. Gunterman was
in charge and helped grow the office from himself and a part time
secretary to two other sales engineers, two serviceman, and two
secretaries. He also distinguished himself during this period by
winning two “Top Ten” Trane national sales awards. He became interested
in new product development during this time and corresponded with the
factory over several new ideas. He was asked to go back to corporate
headquarters and be Assistant to the President, Tom Hancock. Under
pressure from his South Bend manager, he declined until the office
personal were more experience. Later the offer was removed, and Mr.
Guntermann interests in engineering in lieu of sales led him to leave
Trane in 1974.
1974-1978
Mr. Guntermann started his first company, Energy Economics, where he
performed research and development on heat pumps, in which Trane Company
was not interested. This was during the 1973-1974 energy crises. At
the time, the thinking was that we were running out oil and natural gas
and what else was there but a total electric economy using coal and
nuclear power with end use efficiency improved by heat pumps. During
this period, Mr. Guntermann determined that the total electric heat pump
scenario was not viable and switched from his heat pump development to
the national energy problem which he felt changed everything. It is
during this period that he wrote and published numerous articles
including the “The Mystery of Future Energy Prices”. He testified
before DOE and FEA committees and also met with a top official in the
Ford Whitehouse.
During this period, Mr. Guntermann started the Fort Wayne, IN chapter of ASHRAE, was its first President, and led it to be the top rated Points of Excellence chapter in the country. He also became a registered Professional Engineer and performed engineering and construction management services for several small projects.
During this period the economy was in a deep recession and circumstances changed his political views and he decided to leave the very conservative state of Indiana.
1979-1984
Mr. Guntermann then joined the Austin Company’s Detroit office in 1979 where he worked on several projects. After six months, he was transferred to the Cleveland, OH corporate headquarters where he joined their corporate Technical Services Division as an Energy Conservation Specialist. His responsibilities were twofold:
Staff Consultant ‑ Assist the ten Austin US district offices with energy conservation studies, engineering, energy audits, and sales. Mr. Guntermann worked on numerous large projects including a major study and design to provide future energy conservation guidelines for the US Postal Service's Santa Anna General Mail Facility. This became their most energy efficient GMF in the country, based on metered Btu's per sq.ft. per year. This project was an early “Green” building.
Research Assistant ‑ Stay current to the state‑of‑the‑art in all phases of mechanical, electric power, and lighting design. This included supporting activities with National ASHRAE committees and other functions, as well as developing life cycle costing programs and utilizing several design and energy analysis computer programs. He also published several related magazine articles.
The Austin Company is a large Design/Build company whose top management was structural engineers with little understanding of energy conservation. They had hoped to sell more $250,000 studies similar to what was done for the Santa Anna General Mail project and they were opposed to incorporating the Santa Anna’s revolutionary design concepts into other designs. These are now the basic concepts in many new “Green” building designs. Further, they were opposed to setting up a separate group to perform energy conservation. Companies like Johnson Controls have incorporated the ideas put forth in the published articles, but Austin Company was not interested. With the declining prices in energy and the Regan administration attitude to conservation, this became a dead end job.
1984-1985
In 1984, Mr. Guntermann again became an independent consultant performing energy conservation studies for the State of Ohio and U.S. Postal Facilities as well as performing design consulting services.
In 1985, Mr. Guntermann attempted to reconcile his 10 year marriage after a 1977 divorce by going to Lynchburg Virginia with his ex-wife who had become a born again Christian. When it did not work out, he accepted a position with Ziel-Blossom & Associates in Cincinnati, OH. After two months there were problems with personnel.
1985-1986
Mr. Guntermann decided to relocate to New England and accepted a position with J.P. Salmini Co, a small design/build contractor in Milford, CT where he was hired as a design engineer by the Vice President, but the President wanted a sales engineer.
1986-1987
He joined R.A. Goodell Assoc, a ME consulting engineering firm in Glastonbury, CT in 1986 where he worked for a year. Even though he was approached about a partnership, concern over the now deceased owner’s drinking problems caused him to resign.
1987-current
In 1987, he started his own consulting engineering firm in Milford, CT, performing MEP consulting services for a variety of clients. He has continued this business since then, but relocating to New Haven, CT around 1995. He originally built his firm up to five staff, but New Haven was not successful for him and he was unable to obtain large projects with either Yale or New Haven architects.
He downsized his operations and has worked on selected projects, performing all of the MEP engineering functions as well as AutoCAD. In addition to engineering, Mr. Guntermann has construction managed two industrial projects and has recently been working on a third with the design of a large ammonia refrigeration system in Malaysia.
In addition to designing buildings that are energy efficient, Mr. Guntermann has designed buildings that operate properly and he has also been involved with trouble shooting numerous existing MEP systems. His equipment/system experience was obtained from his early years with the Trane Company’s Fort Wayne, IN where he was “in charge” and both assisted with service work and managed a service agency. This experience also allows him to understand the problems and limitations with designs of unconventional building energy systems to be sure they perform properly and meet their energy efficiency goals.
Instead of building a consulting business, over the last 10 years, he has invested in a retirement fund consisting of his collection of Chinese antiquities.
Mr. Guntermann continues his consulting engineering work today. He has also continued his writing which he considers important and a way of giving something back; this has recently included spending five months on the recent articles and two lectures.
NATIONAL ACTIVITIES
Past Member National ASHRAE Committees:
ASHRAE Journal Committee ‑ 2 years
ASHRAE Energy Calculation Committee ‑ 4 years
ASHRAE Life Cycle Costing Committee ‑ 4 years
ASHRAE Natural Heating, Cooling, and Lighting Subcommittee ‑ 4 years
ASHRAE Simplified Energy Calculation Subcommittee ‑ 3 years
Past Member Illuminating Engineering Society ‑
National Energy Management Subcommittee ‑ 2 years
LOCAL ACTIVITIES
New Haven Chamber of Commerce
Past Member Transportation Committee
Past Member Government Affairs Committee
Member ‑ AIA Affiliate
Member ‑ Connecticut Chapter of ASHRAE
Past Member – Member Board of Director
Past President of Fort Wayne, IN ASHRAE Chapter
Past Member ‑ New Haven Rotary
Past Vice President
Past Member ‑ Milford Rotary
Past Member ‑ Milford Chamber of Commerce
Past Member of Board of Directors
Past Chairman of Legislative Active Committee
