Long way to the Top - ACDC feed the people

Who let a commercial interest get their grubby hands on the Old City Square of Melbourne? Outrageous. Its time to claim the space back.

The Old City Square can be seen in a glorious rock video clip with ACDC decrying the ‘long way to the top if you wanna rock and roll’. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9iOk8PqkKs
This would be the perfect site for an Urban Food Garden and Market. Eat seasonal food grown and sold in the middle of the city. Maybe not so outrageous! – and a perfect foil to the hard edged extractionism of Fed Square.

http://cityfoodgrowers.com.au/cityfoodgrowing1.php

Vicki from our office did a design thesis on Urban food markets…I’ll see if I can find a link to it.
Sean McArdle, SBE, 9923 2345

Biomimicry is a field of integrative study in which biological systems, processes, and elements are examined to draw analogies for application to human design challenges.

Jane Toner, Senior Associate at SBE, said that biomimicry seeks to embrace nature’s genius for adaptation to the earth’s various environments by finding solutions that contribute to creating conditions conducive to life on this planet.

“With millions of species of organisms existing in a wide range of climates and environments and billions of creative human minds, the possibilities for drawing on nature’s genius are endless,” said Jane.

Biomimicry is an interdisciplinary approach to problem solving in which biologists, architects, engineers, chemists, designers, and more combine their expertise with the knowledge of nature’s evolutionarily refined organisms to progress the fields of building design, technology, renewable energy, and beyond.

Jane has recently returned from a trip to Arizona where she is studying in a Biomimicry Specialist Certificate program. The central concept behind biomimicry is that nature has already solved many of the problems we’re dealing with today, and that animals, plants, and microbes are the world’s greatest architects, designers and engineers.

“Biomimics ask the question: How would nature do that?” Jane said. “Biomimicry takes some of nature’s best ideas, and applies them to solving human problems. This could be something like looking at how termite mounds maintain a constant temperature in spite of extreme external temperatures and then applying the learning to design energy-efficient ventilation systems in buildings such as the one designed by Mick Pearce in .”

“The fact that nature has been evolving and adapting to conditions on earth for 3.8 billion years means that biologically-inspired designs have a positive outcome for a sustainable environment,” said Jane. “We need to harness that knowledge for a more efficient and sustainable future.”

Related Links
• Ask Nature: www.asknature.org

• Biomimicry 3.8:  www.biomimicry.net/letter.html

• Eastgate Centre Building, Harare, Zimbabwe: www.asknature.org/product/373ec79cd6dba791bc00ed32203706a1

We do this by reducing our electricity demand to below 5kWh/day; we have adopted energy conservative habits and buy energy efficient appliances and lighting. We don’t “freeze in the dark” – a visitor to our home would see the usual array of gadgets, but only one TV, fridge etc.

We have a 1 kWe solar PV array on our roof. The annual output for a photovoltaic (PV) panel in Melbourne is 1275kWh per kWe, this is an average of 3.5 kWh per day ranging from around 2kWh in Winter to 5 kWh/day in summer.

So in summer, we generate more power than we use, with the excess exported to the grid. We were lucky enough to get the 66c/kWh feed-in tariff when it was available, so we end up with a credit on our electricity bill. The last time I paid a power bill was in 2009!

Energy conservation + Renewable energy = powerful combination

Steve Moller
steve.moller@sbe.com.au

In order to avoid these scenarios, advanced heat transfer analyses should be undertaken. This allows for a detailed investigation of specific construction details and will identify potential problems early on. The following pictures show how these analyses look.

The picture shows a typcical standard balcony detail. It can be seen that significant heat transfer occurs especially at the top of the window-slab connection (bottom of the picture).

A thermal break has been introduced between the lab and the balcony. The analysis shows how this greatly reduces the heat transfer and thus reduce energy consumptions as well as the risk of condensation.

For further information about how thermal bridges can be avoided in order to minimise condensation and enhance comfort and energy efficiency, please contact SBE’s engineering group (03 9923 2345).

Christoph Begert

christoph.begert@sbe.com.au

SBE used <Virtual Environment> software to model the building at design stage and to calculate the potential for sustainable design initiatives to reduce both the energy used in the operation of the building and the associated greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). Our modelling predicted that the Automotive Centre of Excellence (ACE) – Stage 2 building has the potential for a 45% reduction in GHG.

The ACE will consolidate all of Kangan Institute’s automotive training on one site which, together with new state-of-the-art technology and equipment, will ensure it is a unique centre of automotive learning, research and development. Stage 2 incorporates a range of specialised automotive workshop and teaching spaces, as well as office and administration facilities. It enhances and complements the Stage 1 building completed in 2006.

SBE Senior Associate Sean McArdle described the building as a convergence of sustainable design with automotive design – as a car engine and form are tuned and honed for maximum efficiency, so too was the building.

“In addition to dealing with the challenges of blending stages 1 and , particular attention was given to optimising the indoor environment quality of the workshop and teaching spaces. The correlation of good daylight and ventilation with improved learning outcomes was well understood by the educators at ACE.”

SBE relished being part of the integrated design team with a vision for incorporating sustainable design excellence established early in the process. Multi-disciplinary collaboration resulted in a “whole building design’ approach to ensure the environmental systems of the building work in harmony rather than being “bolt on” items of green technology.

Notable environmentally sustainable design features included enhanced natural ventilation and night purging, night sky cooling, batiso activated slabs, chilled beams, a green roof and a substantial photovoltaic array. The passive cooling system developed for the building is particularly innovative.

“Rain water is collected in a 240,000 litre tank and during summer nights, the collected rain water is sprayed on the roof, where it is cooled by a combination of radiation to the night sky, which is effective on clear nights and by evaporation,”  explains McArdle.

“Once the water has cooled by running over the roof, it flows back to the underground storage tank through the gutter and downpipes recharged with coolth ready for the next cycle.”

Measurements from Stage 1 indicate that water temperatures between 11 to 15°C can be achieved this way, for the cost of running a pump. This stored cool water is used for cooling during the day. Chilled water loads have been reduced by 53,160 kWh (46%) with corresponding savings in chiller energy of 16,012 kWh and 21 tons of GHG per annum. A secondary benefit was a reduction in the size and number of chillers needed for the facility.

Having reduced the heating and cooling demands by such a large degree, ACE stage 2 now uses proportionally more energy on lighting than it does air conditioning, further indicating excellence in efficiency.

Contact Sean McArdle at SBE for more details. 03 9923 2345, sean.mcardle@sbe.com.au and www.sbe.com.au

The study produced some results which were expected and others which were not so obvious. Low spacing and high frequency of apertures produced an even distribution of light along the space below as well as a higher daylighting level. The opposite was true of designs with a low frequency and high spacing. It was also found that higher daylighting levels occurred in regions of the floor that had a greater number of apertures in front of them.

These and other results were taken into account when deciding upon the final design for the project. The final result was an optimal saw toothed roof, i.e. one that admitted the greatest amount of daylight for the lowest number of apertures.

If you’d like to here more about the process and outcomes of daylighting design please call Wayne Lobo at SBE on 03 9923 2345

Over the years, SBE has been successful in obtaining funding for a large number of our projects, allowing the inclusion of sustainable design initiatives that might very often be culled in the “value engineering” process for not meeting with traditional payback equations.

Our funding success stories include: water recycling projects at a number of aquatic centres (Harold Holt, Leisure Link, Pelican Park Recreation Centre), ground source heat pump system integrated with cogeneration for an aquatic centre (not realised), and support for achieving a 5 Star Green Star office building for the Bordo Office-Warehouse.

Most recently we assisted in obtaining funding for the refurbishment of 321 Exhibition Street, Melbourne, through the Federal Government’s Green Building Fund. This allowed the project to install a tri-generation plant as part of the refurbishment, resulting in the potential to reduce GHG by 3,612 tonnes each year. This would improve the NABERS base building rating from 3 Stars to 4.5 Stars (or possibly 5 Stars). SBE is currently preparing a case study to detail the results.

To support the 1200 Buildings program, the City of Melbourne has established the Sustainable Melbourne Fund to provide financial assistance to specific projects enhancing the environment, community and economic benefits for the city. This includes helping building owners obtain finance for retrofit works that will reduce energy use, save water and lower carbon.

From the Sustainable Melbourne Fund website:

“…Sustainable Melbourne Fund’s investment program provides loans of up to $500,000 for up to six (6) years for individual projects that minimise impact on the environment and deliver improved economic outcomes for the people of Melbourne.

“…Sustainable Melbourne Fund is seeking new opportunities to invest in local sustainability projects, particularly in the areas of water, energy and waste; business ventures and new technologies that deliver environmental and economic benefits.

Funding is also available for existing building upgrades: The financing mechanism is underpinned by legislation that allows the Melbourne City Council, in partnership with Australian financial institutions to enter into voluntary environmental upgrade agreements with building owners to finance environmental upgrades for non-residential buildings.

Part of the environmental upgrade charge can be transferred to tenants with the tenants’ consent. The objective of this requirement is to overcome the split incentive barrier to sustainability initiatives in retrofits with costs and benefits shared by the building owner and the occupiers.”

Related links:

1200 Buildings        www.melbourne.vic.gov.au/1200buildings/Pages/Home.aspx

Sustainable Melbourne Fund     www.sustainablemelbournefund.com.au/invest  

Please call Steve Moller or Chris Begert at SBE’s Melbourne office on 9923 2345 for more information or if we can be of assistance.