The pandemic helped create some amazing opportunities for contractors like Tony Kocurek, owner of Energy Balance &, Integration (EB&I), an Albuquerque, N.M.-based TAB business. In 2020, EB&I found innovative ways to assist TAB contractors with helping customers maximize their HVAC systems, not only to deal with extreme climate issues in Albuquerque, but also as a result of the pandemic.
Tony’s TAB work has helped a wide range of businesses — from hospitals to casinos — optimize their HVAC systems to meet job requirements. Kocurek says that because of COVID-19, there is a heightened awareness and concern around the transferring of contaminants in closed environment.
“I think what you’re going to see are systems that are going to be much smaller, much more isolated and contained, so that a given area will have its own fresh air and exhaust. You might have six, seven, eight different kinds of those systems in a casino now, where before you had one big huge outside air system blowing air in. We’re now going to try to keep that cross-contamination of air flows, when you have a lot of people together in one location, as low as possible. I think you’re going to see design changes throughout casinos. I think throughout the world you’re going to see this,” says Kocurek, who also serves as SMACNA National secretary–treasurer.
