Zurn was founded in 1900 in Erie, PA and originally manufactured a patented backwater vale. Today the company has grown to be a leading manufacturer of plumbing products and accessories.

Zurn EcoVantage

The company’s EcoVantage product line includes a mix of LEED-applicable and green-listed products to help minimize water consumption for commercial buildings and the HydroVantage series is the latest edition to Zurn's EcoVantage product offerings.

Essentially a flush valve designed to create energy during each flushing process, the Zurn HydroVantage ZGEN6200EV includes features like hydro-generated power, Environmental Trending Technology and 4.0 Sensor Technology, which combine to provide value and performance to deliver significant savings to the building owner.

Which is why the motto for this product is “Renewable energy, flush after flush”.

HydroVantage Hydro-Generator Flush Valve

Utilization of a hydro-generator flush valve compared to a battery-operated flush valve removes the operational costs associated with battery changing in automatic flush valves. It has similar installation costs to battery-operated models, which tend to be less than those connected to building power. The HydroVantage includes a true manual override button to supplement the unit's internal sensors. The flush cycle starts with a higher initial flush rate to evacuate the bowl, and drops off to optimize the design of the power-generating turbine over a wide variety of pressure and flow rates. The hydro-generator, energy cell and back-up battery provide a self-sustaining system for approximately 10+ years of maintenance-free operation.

The generator converts the rotational energy of the turbine to electrical power, which is used to charge the units internal rechargeable battery. As mentioned above, the HydroVantage includes Environmental Trending Technology, which continually monitors ambient light levels and traffic patterns to maximize energy savings while reducing false flushing action. The unit's internal sensor sampling rates automatically decrease with each hour of inactivity (developing traffic patterns for the space). And the ambient light sensor places the flush valve into a sleep mode as light levels in the space drop, saving energy by deactivating the infrared sensors from checking for occupants. When light levels raise, the default sampling rate resumes. These factors allow the HydroVantage to use previous restroom activity to predict future patterns.

Troubleshooting and environmental trending can be accessed via laptop and Zurn software. Both urinal and water closet flush valves for new and retrofit applications (which can utilize the existing stop and vacuum breaker tube assembly) are available. This product includes a five-year manufacturers warranty as well.

HydroVantage and LEED

While not necessarily contributing to LEED EAc1, energy savings could be realized through use of this product when compared to battery-operated models or those connected to building power. And LEED Operations and Maintenance (O+M) savings on the side of battery replacement will surely be tangible to the building owner.

The contributions to LEED certification from this product would be on the water-savings side, with flush as low as 1.28 gpf for water closet valves and 0.5 gpf for urinal valves. Contributions to overall water savings would be realized in LEED Water Efficiency prerequisites and credits, WEp1 and LEED WEc3, respectively.

 

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