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Wates Construction
Ltd
Project:
Breathing Space
Value: £6.9m
Duration:
54 Weeks
Contractor:
Wates Construction Ltd
Architect:
Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council
Engineer: Rotherham Metropolitan Borough
Council
Project
Manager:
Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council
Client: Rotherham Metropolitan Borough
Council
Description
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Breathing Space is a highly sustainable
building, and a pilot scheme to provide the hub
for the largest respiratory rehabilitation
programme in the country. The project is the
result of a partnership between the Coafields
Regeneration Trust (CRT), Rotherham Primary Care
Trust (PCT) and Rotherham Metropolitan Borough
Council. The centre is the leading facility for
chronic respiratory disease in the country.
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Breathing Space is particularly innovative
because of its focus around environmental and
sustainable design principles, and due to the
building's respiratory health care purpose, it
requires careful specification of building
products. The materials used include low
emission products, and those which emit limited
amounts of solvents which may seriously affect
the health and progress of patients. The
building consists of treatment rooms, practice
areas, gymnasium, and atrium.
How
Breathing Space Works:
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Natural Ventilation
A convection current system is used where hot
and cold air is circulated throughout the building
via the central atrium. The design is based on the
north light principle to maximise natural daylight
without solar gain. In cooler weather, the north
light windows open allowing cool air to 'fall in'
and mix with rising warmer exhaust air, creating
fresh tempered air within the atrium space.
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Breathable Walls
The control of relative humidity and air quality
is a very important factor for patients with
respiratory illness. To help disperse natural
vapours, the walls are designed to be micro-porous
so as to be vapour permeable. This is achieved by
using a structure of interlocking clayblocks faced
with lime plaster coated with a hydroscopic paint.
The blocks are made to closer tolerances than
traditional concrete blocks, and they are laid with
a 2mm bed joint. This construction method allows the
walls to absorb the moisture when the relative
humidity begins to rise and gives the moisture back
when the relative humidity beings to fall. The wall
acts as a sponge, absorbing moisture and restricting
the amount of moisture in the air.
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Geo-thermal Heating
The building's underfloor heating system
utilises constant heat pump from deep within the
earth. This geo-thermal heating works by pumping
glycol/water down 100m boreholes where heat is
absorbed and returned to sophisticated heat exchange
systems in the plant rooom where low pressure heat
water is distributed throughout the building in
underfloor heating pipe work.
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Solar Panels - Hot Water
The solar panels will be used to pre-heat the
cold water supply before it is heated by the gas
fired hot water boiler. This reduces the natural gas
energy required when solar power is available. The
hot water for the building is supplemented by solar
panels mounted on an A-frame arrangement on the
dining room roof.
Photos
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