OnePointe Solutions

Question: What do you think is something we get excited about?

Answer: Completed laboratory designs, especially if it's a food lab. Anyone hungry?

Biosafety cabinet vs fume hood is one of the most consequential decisions in lab design, and one of the most commonly miscast.

A fume hood contains chemical vapors via 80 to 100 fpm face velocity exhausted outside the building — it has no HEPA filtration and offers zero protection against biological aerosols.

A biosafety cabinet uses HEPA filtration at 99.97 percent at 0.3 micrometers to contain biohazards — and the recirculating Class II A1 and A2 subtypes are not suitable for volatile chemistry unless they are hard-ducted.

Our guide walks through what each device contains, the three BSC classes, the four Class II subtypes (A1, A2, B1, B2), what ANSI/ASSP Z9.5-2022 and SEFA 1 require of fume hoods, NIH DRM placement rules, and the most common ways labs get this wrong. Primary sources only — NSF/ANSI 49, CDC BMBL 6th Edition, WHO LBM 4th Edition, ANSI Z9.5, SEFA 1, and the NIH Design Requirements Manual.

Read the full guide:

Biosafety Cabinet vs Fume Hood 2026: Choosing Right Biosafety cabinet vs fume hood — the 2026 technical refresher to our 2021 primer, with NSF/ANSI 49, CDC BMBL, NIH DRM, and ANSI Z9.5 anchors.

304, 316, or 316L. What do those numbers have in common? A: stainless steel in labs.

And if you're specifying stainless, below is a quick guide help:

304: dry casework, handwash sinks, and the broad majority of lab sinks — stocked off-the-shelf or custom made, what most projects get by default.

316: BSL-3/4, vivarium washdown, and wet-lab casework where chloride exposure justifies the upgrade. 316 sinks are typically harder to procure.

316L: continuously welded assemblies in USP , USP , ISO 5 cleanrooms, and cGMP — a weld-zone refinement, not a default upgrade over 316.

Our 2026 stainless steel lab cabinets guide pulls grade and finish requirements from SEFA 8-2023, ASTM A240/A480/A380, the NIH ORF Technical Bulletin, and the CDC BMBL. Find out where stainless belongs, where it does not, and what to specify in your next casework section.

Full guide on the blog: https://www.onepointesolutions.com/blog/stainless-steel-lab-cabinets/

Every fume hood specification eventually arrives at the same fork in the road: constant air volume, or variable air volume?

The decision shapes four things that matter to anyone signing off on a Division 12 spec:
→ Capital cost (VAV valves, sensors, controls add roughly $3,500-$6,000 per hood)
→ Operating energy (LBNL puts U.S. fume hood operating cost at ~$4.2B/yr across 750,000 hoods)
→ Control complexity (commissioning, ASHRAE 110 AI testing, sensor drift)
→ Daily behavior of every researcher in the room

That last item is where most VAV business cases quietly fall apart. Vendor savings models assume sashes are closed when hoods are idle. Real audit data shows compliance rates well below that assumption — and the "open sash penalty" can wipe out projected energy savings entirely.

Our new 2026 specifier guide walks through:
• How CAV and VAV systems actually work (valves, sensors, alarms)
• What ASHRAE 110-2016 (R2025) and SEFA 1-2026 require for AM and AI testing
• Real-world energy data from LBNL, I2SL, and university audits
• Sash-management programs that determine whether VAV actually pays
• When CAV is still the right answer in 2026
Written for specifiers, EH&S officers, and facility managers who need a defensible decision on day one of design.

Read the full guide: https://www.onepointesolutions.com/blog/vav-vs-cav-fume-hood-controls/

VAV vs CAV Fume Hoods 2026: Energy Tradeoffs VAV vs CAV fume hoods: a 2026 specifier guide to face velocity, sash management, energy savings, and the standards your spec needs.

The term "fume hood" actually covers six fundamentally different machines: bypass, low-flow, ductless, perchloric, radioisotope, and walk-in. Each one is engineered for a different chemistry profile, governed by different standards, and prone to a different mis-application that shows up in EH&S incident reports year after year.

Our new guide walks through all six with the SEFA 1, ASHRAE 110, and ANSI/ASSP Z9.5 references that should be in every spec — plus a side-by-side selection matrix and the four-question framework we use to match hood to application.

Read the full guide:

Lab Fume Hoods 2026 Guide: Types & Selection A specifier's guide to the six lab fume hood types: bypass, low-flow, ductless, perchloric, radioisotope, walk-in. SEFA 1, ASHRAE 110, ANSI Z9.5.

Lab casework can start from roughly $150 per linear foot at the low end (plastic laminate) to $1,200 or more at the high end (stainless steel 316) — a spread of nearly 5x on one of the largest line items in any lab build. Yet most specifiers default to whatever material the last project used.

Our new guide breaks down the four major casework classes — painted steel, stainless, phenolic resin, and HPL — with SEFA 8 performance data, typical cost ranges, failure modes, and the lab types each material actually fits. Includes a side-by-side decision matrix and a chemical-profile spec framework.

Read the full guide:

Lab Casework Materials 2026 Guide Lab casework installed cost ranges from $150 to $1,200+ per linear foot — a 4.5x spread on 15-25% of total lab construction cost. Compare painted steel, stainless 304/316, phenolic resin, and HPL laminate with SEFA 8 specs, failure modes, and a lab-type decision matrix.

Here's a stat that stops every facility director in their tracks:

A single fume hood running 24/7 uses more energy than 3 average American homes.

Not 3 apartments. 3 full houses. Per hood. Every year.

Multiply that by however many hoods are in your building and you'll understand why labs are 4–5x more energy-intensive than a typical commercial building — and why fume hoods are where the biggest sustainability wins hide.

The three moves that matter:

- VAV controls — exhaust adjusts to sash position. Savings: 40–70% (some retrofits hit 85%).
- Low-flow hoods — safe containment at lower face velocities. Savings: up to 40% vs. conventional CAV.
- Sash discipline — a cultural change, not a capital project. Immediate payback.

Full breakdown — including a per-hood cost calculation and a phased implementation plan — on our blog. Link below 👇

What's your team doing to cut lab energy consumption? We'd love to hear the tactics that have worked.

The True Cost of Running a Fume Hood If you manage a laboratory, the single most expensive piece of infrastructure in your building probably isn’t your mass spectrometer, your autoclave, or

Here's a stat that stops every facility director in their tracks:

A single fume hood running 24/7 uses more energy than 3 average American homes.

Not 3 apartments. 3 full houses. Per hood. Every year.

Multiply that by however many hoods are in your building and you'll understand why labs are 4–5x more energy-intensive than a typical commercial building — and why fume hoods are where the biggest sustainability wins hide.

The three moves that matter:
- VAV controls — exhaust adjusts to sash position. Savings: 40–70% (some retrofits hit 85%).

- Low-flow hoods — safe containment at lower face velocities. Savings: up to 40% vs. conventional CAV.

-Sash discipline — a cultural change, not a capital project. Immediate payback.

What's your team doing to cut lab energy consumption? We'd love to hear the tactics that have worked.

Tis the season to be thankful. 🍂

At OnePointe Solutions, we're getting ready to feast and spend time with our loved ones for Thanksgiving.

As we prepare, we wanted to share that our office will be closed November 28-29 for the holiday. We'll be back and ready to assist you on December 2nd with all your laboratory design needs. ⚗️

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone! 🍁