Our Building "Green Building" Features

Our Building Green Features Last updated 14th August 2014

"Why, I must ask, does being 'green' mean building with glass and steel and concrete and then adding wind turbines, solar panels, water heaters, glass atria - all the paraphernalia of a new "green building industry" - to offset buildings that are inefficient in the first place? - HRH Prince Charles.

At UWCSEA we are great fans of BCA Greenmark  and as far as possible design and build our buildings to a platinum standard (version 4) but the pursuit of points always comes second to practical and common sense features.  This page will be constantly updated as we add and confirm features:
Linked from the following blog posts:

- Our Green Building
- Green Building - Business as usual


WATER

- All water fixtures and fittings will obtain the maximum 3 ticks under the WELS scheme.

- 1 rain water retention tank and 1 water detention/ retention tank for rainwater and air conditioning condensate water water tied to an ABC feature (its a surprise!)

Update 27/09/14 - We have now managed to firm up the design for the water system - Plumbing is usually rather dull but we have managed to add another system to use rainwater and AHU condensate waste water to run 100% of the flushing system of the building which makes it much more exciting.  We found the funding to do this work but studying the levels of the building again, surveying existing sewer lines in more detail and managing to tie to the existing lines using gravity. Saving us a big tank and ejector pump in the original proposal.

ENERGY

- Use of sunpipes for car park daylighting
- No landscape or other decorative lighting.
- Innovative air conditioning design for the office spaces
- Design for Exam hall roof to enable 100 % daylighting in the space.
- Natural ventilated toilets and staircases - No extraction fans.
- Combination sensor and timer systems for lights in infrequently occupied spaces




THE BUILDING
- Toilets and staircases externalized to aid natural ventilation
- ETTV <40 (work in progress)
- Exact North-South orientation with no windows on East and West facades
- Low window-to-wall ratio
- Extensive green walls




Changes made during the design and construction due to energy or operating cost concerns.

- Redesign to ensue the removal of sumps and therefore pumps in the carpark drainage system
- Redesign to eliminate holding tanks and pumps from the sanitary systems to instead connect to existing sanitary lines.
- Consolidation of emergency support systems including sprinkler pumping systems to eliminate extra pumps but expanding capacity of existing tank and genset upsize instead of seperate systems.
- Resdesign  of standard light fittings to allow for easy retrofit to LED in common areas if price improves.
- Modification of electrical system and roof to accommodate future solar PV opportunities.
- Changes to aluminium window extrusion profile to include thermal breaks (Common in cold countries but not in hot ones!)
- Design and addition of redundant gray water piping for future coupling to recycled water systems
- Detentions tanks for drainage