Huge reductions in gas consumption have been achieved by English Partnerships, now part of the Homes & Communities Agency, following the replacement of the heating system with a high-efficiency multi-boiler cascade system from Buderus. The new installation is a cascade system of four Buderus GB162 100 kW boilers.

Replacing its old oil-fired boiler house with four packaged plant rooms made offsite by Armstrong will cut nearly £250 000 off the energy bill for the Hutton Hall site of Lancashire Constabulary, giving a payback of less than a year. CO2 emissions will be reduced by 744 t a year. Offsite manufacture enables the new system to be installed within an extremely tight timescale, so that staff were not without heating and hot water in the winter months.

It is now clear that meeting carbon targets for the UK’s building stock will rely heavily on increasing the efficiency of existing buildings. Robin Putman explores the importance of effective maintenance and targeted refurbishment

Oventrop valves were selected by building-services consultants Bianco Sale to facilitate a fast-track refurbishment project in Tunbridge Wells to convert the offices of an insurance company into a health centre for Assura. When complete, the medical centre will accommodate several general practices, diabetic suite, renal unit and a pharmacy.

An upgrade of the lighting at Everards Brewery in Leicester has reduced costs by about £15 000 a year. The project, designed by Chalmor, involved replacing existing lighting and introducing lighting controls to minimise energy wastage. The control system takes account of activities in the building to provide the most cost-effective solution.

The unsatisfactory heating provided by radiators for Mickleton Village Hall in County Durham has been solved by replacing them with Caspian fan convectors from Smith’s Environmental Products. The hall hosts a variety of private and business functions, as well as theatre shows, musical and parish council meetings. The bar area doubles as the village Post Office during the week.

The first project to receive 100% grant funding to install a Dimplex ground-source heat pump is Rendcomb Village Hall near Cirencester. Dimplex was supported in the project by its installer partner Ecovision Systems, which helped with securing grant funding, speci­fying, installing and commissioning the SI 14 ME system.

David Lettis sees the growing restrictions and ultimate ban on the use of R22 as stimulating positive opportunities for building owners/occupiers and the air-conditioning industry.

In selecting a replacement boiler for an existing heating/hot water system, the application of modern high efficiency boilers to old systems needs careful consideration to maximise the system efficiency, reliability and performance, to achieve expected savings, says Bob Walsh.

Lighting energy consumption is expected to be halved at the head office of Ipswich Building Society following the installation of new lighting using intelligent lumin­aires from Cooper Lighting. The head office of this building society previously used switch start category 2 modular fittings with four 36 W lamps. They have been replaced with Cooper’s Intellect Digital Combiform Plus semi-recessed luminaires, which deliver a combination of direct and indirect illumination.

Refurbishment offers much scope for upgrading the performance of building-services systems and avoiding the cost of replacement — As Marcus Sawkins explains.

The ground-source heat-pump installation for the new building inside the burnt-out shell of Ramsgate’s historic library building extracts its heat from the ground using collector pipes that were hydraulically pushed rather than drilled boreholes. This approach is said to be quieter, quicker, create less mess and cheaper than rotary drilling.

A £3.1 million rehabilitation facility in the centre of Harlow created from an uninhabited Grade 2 listed building has its heating and hot water provided by boilers donated by Potterton Commercial. Parent company Baxi Commercial Division was approach by CRASH, the construction and property industries charity for homeless people about donating the boilers.

If the UK is to meet its emissions targets, the refurbishment of the existing building stock has a vital role to play. Ant Wilson takes a look at the key considerations

Sanyo Air Conditioners has developed a new approach to converting existing R22 air-conditioning systems to use R410A. The cost of such a conversion is reduced by about 30% by using existing refrigerant pipework. The Renewal system can be used with virtually all types of R22 systems from leading manufacturers. On most installations, existing wiring can also be used. Any flare connections are replaced to enable the system to accommodate the higher working pressures of R410A. There are also significant ongoing savings in energy costs.’

The refurbishment of a 1960s office block in Cambridge includes energy-efficient climate control using equipment from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Europe. Lockton House is now served by a combination of VRF and split systems supplied by FM Air and installed by Adcock Refrigeration & Air Conditioning.

The refurbishment of existing buildings has to play a key role in the drive towards reducing the UK’s carbon emissions — as David Davies explains.

The winner of the category for the UK’s finest refurbished or recycled workplace of the inaugural BCO London and South East Awards ceremony includes AET’s Flexible Space underfloor air system as a key part of the building-services installation. Blyth + Blyth specified the underfloor system as part of a building-services contract worth £38 million.

Dimplex heat pumps have been installed as part of a £1.2 million refurbishment of Miskin Manor, a Grade 2 listed hotel and leisure club in Wales. The refurbishment combines facilities upgrades with technology to reduce energy costs and environmental impact.

When an increase from four to six in the number of operating theatres in a day-surgery unit was followed by an irreparable breakdown of the aging chiller plant, Watkins Hire was quick to install a 170 kW rental chiller. The management team of Princess Royal Hospital in Bromley immediately began the procurement process for a replacement chiller, but needed temporary cooling as quickly as possible to cover the 20 weeks need to for a new chiller to be delivered.

Energy-efficient refurbishment can be made to pay for itself from day one, as Hugh Jones explains.

A director of Automated Building Control Group has called for more attention to be paid to building-management systems and environmental controls when refurbishment projects are being planned. Paul Morall explains, ‘More often than not, we are called in at the 11th hour to put right problems that the refurbishment has created, such as partioned rooms that are too hot or too cold, too noisy or too dark. These basic errors can create tremendously inefficient energy utilisation and the overloading of mechanical services.’

With so much equipment using R22 still in service in the UK and the imminent deadline on the use of virgin R22 for servicing, the question of what to do next is thrown into sharp relief.

At least 40% of all refrigeration and air-conditioning equipment in use in the UK operates with R22. With the phase-out deadline for virgin R22 rapidly approaching, and an expected shortfall in the availability and price of reclaimed R22, what are the options for air-conditioning installations using chillers? Steve Warnock reviews them.

HeatExchangerSpares.com has set up a dedicated maintenance department to service all leading brands of plate heat exchangers. A maintenance contract guarantees a least two visits a year, discounts on spare parts, preferential service call-out and detailed service report. The company says that it has witnessed many techniques being used to try to reduce the build-up of scale in plate heaters used to generate domestic hot water, which only slow down its build up.

The refurbishment of Luton Hoo for the Elite Hotels Group includes large numbers of radiators, towel rails and associated equipment from MHS Radiators. The company has supplied 5219 sections of its classic cast-iron Ionic and Burlington radiators, 120 Carat flat-panel radiators, 114 towel rails and 240 sets of valves. MHS also supplied Carat radiators and electric towel rails to The Warren, the stable block and the golf complex.

A mini-CHP unit generating 12.5 kW of heat and 5.5 kW of electricity is at the heart of a wide-ranging project to reduce energy bills at Blackburn Cathedral. The Baxi Senertec unit is part of the £210 000 first phase of an energy-reduction strategy that will ultimately include a biomass boiler. It is expected that the energy consumption of the cathedral will be reduced by nearly 30%, amounting to about £15 000 a year.

Constant high-pressure hot water on demand for the refurbished Sanctum Soho Hotel in London, described as London’s first rock ‘n’ roll boutique hotel, is provided by an Aquatech Pressmain pressure booster set. The system was specified by consulting engineer John Benton of Maleon for the hotel, which is the brainchild of nightclub owner and entrepreneur Mark Fuller.

JS Air Curtains has supplied a bespoke Rund air curtain for the newly refurbished reception area of the offices of Cadbury in Birmingham. The area was becoming cold from air ingress through its main door, and the air curtain was designed to tie in with the architecture of the entrance. The slate-grey air curtain is 2 m long and has a round design. It is supported above the entrance door by matching slate-grey supporting posts.