2005 November

DAVID WHITFIELD explains how the built-in modulation and control capabilities of modern condensing boilers should be utilised to achieve more efficient underfloor heating systems.

When capital cost exceeds the available budget it is time to practise best-value optioneering — namely, investing in the right solution, not in just doing the project really well. ANDY GREEN explains.

DEREK DUFFILL describes a cost analysis that shows how integrated building controls slashes both capital and running costs.

The energy consumption associated with an air filter can be 10 times its initial costs. COLIN HITCHdiscusses the implications.

Life-cycle costing is an important element in value-engineering exercises that seek to minimise whole-life costs. STEVEN HENRY suggests that life-cycle-costing exercises for lighting are becoming increasingly complex.

MIKE NANKIVELL has doubts about some perceptions of value engineering — and suggests that products on the Carbon Trust’s Energy Technologies List offer the route to value.

TERRY FARTHING explains how applying a system approach to designing and selecting fan-coil units and their associated equipment automatically leads to delivering value engineering.

Those distinctive orange Belimo direct-coupled actuators that abound in so many building-services installations and characterised control valves offer the potential for value-engineering opportunities.

COLIN PAVEY highlights the benefits that are making underfloor heating the system of choice for commercial and public-sector buildings.

Radiant tube heating is among the most economical forms of space heating on the market. It is clean, energy-lean and responsive. HOWARD MARFLEET looks at the options and applications for radiant heating.

With financial support available for both commercial and domestic projects, TERRY SEWARD examines the technology of heat pumps for space heating.

John Roper of Sir Robert McAlpine has been named Construction Manager of the Year. He won the award for his work leading the team that bid for and built the Paul O’Gormon Building for the Northern Institute of Cancer Research at Newcastle University.

This new training centre in Southampton has the capacity to provide plumbing and electric courses for a hundred people at any one time. It has been set up by New Careers Skills, a nationwide training provider for mature career changers, and Apprenticeship Training.

SummitSkills has moved into permanent offices in Milton Keynes. The executive team, development managers and support staff are based there. The team of operations managers continue to work from offices around the UK.

Samsung appoints air-conditioning distributor

Denco has moved to a new, purpose-built factory and headquarters near Hereford. The move marks the 60th year of this air-conditioning manufacturer and building-services-engineering company, which has a turnover exceeding £40 million and employs over 500 people worldwide.

Mitsubishi Electric has signed a new 3-year agreement with air-conditioning and refrigeration wholesaler Dean & Wood to help the manufacturer provide choice in how customers purchase its products. By supporting customers directly or through Dean & Wood, Mitsubishi Electric believes it offers the market a service that places the choice with the customer.

GSH has won a 3-year facilities-management control with the operator of Amsterdam Airport, Schiphol Nederland BV. The contract covers ‘hard services’ at Terminal 3, Schiphol Plaza and piers E, F and G — totalling 275 00 m2 of floor space. The two key priorities are to maximise plant operating efficiency through excellence in technical engineering and maintain a comfortable passenger environment.

Following the recent acquisition of the Invensys advanced-building-systems business by Schneider Electric, Derek Duffill, managing director of TAC Satchwell in the UK, has set out the new organisation’s business strategy in this country.

Growth in new construction orders in the public sector in the year to September were more than offset by sharp declines in the private sector — according to figures from the DTI.

Two leading associations representing contractors have signed a commitment to work together on a range of key health-and-safety matters to improve safety on site. They are the Heating & Ventilating Contractors’ Association and the Electrical Contractors’ Association. They jointly represent nearly 4000 member companies.

The rejection by the European Parliament of proposals that would effectively have banned the use of HFCs for air-conditioning and refrigeration applications has been welcomed throughout the industry.

Who at the beginning of October would have dreamed that the European Parliament would, by the end of the month, have been voting on an issue that could have seen the end of HFC’s (F-gases) being used for air-conditioning and refrigeration?

Tests carried out for Nu-Heat by BSRIA on the effect of carpet on the performance of underfloor heating have shown that much heavier carpets can be used than is generally recommended.

Following serious damage to the Wellington Hotel in Boscastle, Cornwall, by flash floods in August 2004, the heating and hot-water requirements are served by a Hamworthy Milborne 502 wall-hung modular condensing boiler with an output of 100 kW.

A bank of four Broag Quinta wall-hung condensing boilers serve the space-heating system for a new mosque in Bradford. They were supplied complete with cascade kit for the 30 m-square Madni Jamia Masjid, which has been built and furnished in stages over the last three years as the money was raised.

Coverad, which makes and fits LST radiator and pipe covers, has expanded its service for cleaning radiators and covers to all existing and new customers, regardless of the make of cover or radiator type. The cleaning system was developed with estates and infection-control departments in top UK hospitals.

A low-surface-temperature (LST) fan convector has been developed by Biddle Air Systems in response to customer demands for a fan convector with a surface temperature no greater than 43°C.

Fitzgerald Lighting’s ‘Lighting and safety solutions specifier’ covers the company’s comprehensive range of luminaires, lighting controls and fire-detection systems.

Newey & Eyre’s 128-page specialist guide to lamp and control gear highlights the extensive range of specialist lighting products that are stocked by the company.

The LonWorks Installation Handbook has been updated and amplified. It provides a practical introduction to decentralised LonWorks automation networks and described in detail its implementation in the most varied systems found in building automation, with particular reference to electrical installation.

With light-emitting diodes (LEDs) rapidly gaining popularity in architectural lighting schemes, BSRIA has published a guide giving their main performance characteristics so that lighting designers, specifiers, installers and building users can better understand the opportunities they provide.

Technical data and application descriptions for insulating pipes for HVAC applications feature in a 56-page guide from Pittsburgh Corning, which makes Foamglas cellular glass insulation.

CIC has published a new form of collateral warranty. It is for use with design-and-build contracts, where a collateral warranty is to be given by a consultant that has been employed throughout by a design-and-build contract, to the contractor’s employer.

Armstrong Holden Brooke Pullen has launched a web-based product-selection software package. ACE Online covers Armstrong Group’s complete range of products — including pumps, expansion and engineered products to fire pumps and packaged systems.

Following recent research reporting that the number of office workers employed past retirement age is set to double within a decade, Thorn Lighting has sponsored a study into how lighting could help make the workplace a better and healthier setting for the aging worker.

Among the features of the Daikin air-conditioning system for an animal hospital in the West Midlands is the avoidance of cross-infection by positive fresh-air supply and extract ventilation. This is provided for the consulting rooms, pre-op room and operating theatre by Daikin VAM heat-reclaim ventilation units installed in the false ceilings of the new premises of Rosewood Animal Hospital at Coseley.

An Ethernet-based communications system developed by Wigan Borough Council and energy-systems supplier Ambiflex is enabling the borough to control energy consumption in its buildings through its own Intranet. Several of Wigan’s Ambiflex systems have paid for themselves in energy savings within six months.

Using Kooltherm pipe insulation and insulated pipe-support inserts in the £80 million redevelopment project at Broadgreen Hospital in Liverpool has minimised the space taken up and reduced fixing costs.

Exploiting free cooling as part of meeting the cooling requirements of an electronics assembly plant in Co. Durham is reducing energy requirements by 35% compared with using a conventional air-cooled liquid chiller.

The capabilities of Toshiba’s SHRM2 VRF air-conditioning equipment to serve large-scale applications is being demonstrated in a office building in West London. Accredited installer Metainy Building Services Group has installed nine systems to serve one floor of a 3-storey prestige office block. The fully glazed existing building needed a new system that could respond rapidly to high solar gain, without working time being lost during the refurbishment.

Mitsubishi Electric’s heat-exchanging R2 VRF air-conditioning system has been proving itself at the innovative Gateshead International Business Centre, which was designed and built to provide one of the most energy-efficient office spaces in the north east of England.

Sanyo’s gas-fired GHP chiller system has been installed to provide heating and cooling for the new Nobu restaurant in Berkley Street in the Mayfair area of London. It was supplied by MacQuay UK, which has become the first British distributor to supply one of these systems.

Fans from Airflow’s iCON range have been installed in the bathrooms of the newly opened easyHotel in central London for their aesthetics, ability to deliver powerful ventilation and the incorporation of an iRIS shutter to help reduce external noise.

Seaton Court, the new buildings of Land Registry Information Systems in Plymouth, is one of the few projects in the UK to achieve a maximum score on the environmental-performance index of BREEAM. Designed by TPS, the design and project-management division of Carillion Business Services, Seaton Court provides office accommodation and other facilities for up to 500 Land Registry staff.

Contractors are gradually shaking off their traditional suspicion of off-site fabrication, and now they must it embrace it as the best way of meeting quality, cost and performance goals, says ROBERT HIGGS.

The whole building industry will be affected by the revisions to Building Regulations Part L2 — Conservation of Fuel and Power, and the European Energy Performance of Buildings Directive. Many of the changes these laws will bring are unfamiliar to designers, builders, building services contractors and building owners alike. RICHARD HIPKISS explains the implications of the new laws and offers advice on compliance.

The whole building industry will be affected by the revisions to Building Regulations Part L2 — Conservation of Fuel and Power, and the European Energy Performance of Buildings Directive. Many of the changes these laws will bring are unfamiliar to designers, builders, building services contractors and building owners alike. RICHARD HIPKISS explains the implications of the new laws and offers advice on compliance.

The performance of the construction industry far exceeds its apparent investment in research and development. ANDREW EASTWELL shares his views on why — and how — construction research should be funded in the future for the benefit of the UK as a whole.

Building-services contractor Briggs & Forrester has completed the £2.2 million installation of mechanical and public-health services for the new 800 000 m2 B&Q warehouse in Worksop.

Buro Happold has been appointed environmental and building-services engineers for the Crescent Arts Centre in Belfast. This project aims to become the premier multi-disciplinary centre for community arts in Northern Ireland.