The most environmentally-friendly commercial development in the South-West has achieved BREEAM outstanding at design stage, with its innovative ventilation strategy playing a large part in achieving the high level of performance.
Gilberts of Blackpool, Britain’s leading air movement specialist, is responsible for attaining the ventilation success at Filwood Business Park in Bristol. Gilberts was able to balance a fresh internal environment with minimal ingress of noise from the busy roads around the site.
The £11m business park, which has won the Eco Green Building of the Year*, is the key element of Bristol’s regeneration scheme for Knowle West. Some 13,000 sq ft of office and 25,000 sq ft of workshops for SMEs has been designed by Stride Treglown, ch2m and constructed by Midas Group for Bristol City Council.
All the buildings feature Gilberts’ Mistrale natural ventilation solution, using single sided ventilation in a cellularised arrangement. Gilberts’ innovative Type WPZ/50 high performance louvres coupled with its Mistrale VN/75 high efficiency insulated dampers and 220 deep attenuators modulate fresh air drawn in at low level, with the used internal air exhausted at high level. As the air movement is constant, 24/7, the internal temperature remains within the preset constant: any heat built-up during the day is purged during the night. Air leakage is as low as 5m3/hour/m2, with a U value down to 0.93W/m2K.
“The aim of the project was to construct a scheme that would have a high environmental performance: it has achieved BREEAM ‘outstanding’ at concept stage, and is on track to achieve this at construction, making it one of the best performing buildings for energy efficiency in the country,” explained James Horner of Stride Treglown. “The ventilation strategy, whilst absolutely key to this, presented various challenges, including addressing potential noise ingress through any open windows from the busy surrounding roads. Gilberts provided a total solution for us.”
All Gilberts’ systems are engineered to order, and comprehensively tested, in the UK. The company’s Mistrale VN/75 ventilator unit delivers the best combined performance for U values and air leakage of its type, and surpasses current and medium-term future Regulatory requirements. It is also one of the slimmest ventilators available, enabling easier integration into the façade with minimal requirement for boxing in etc.
Founded 50 years ago, privately owned Gilberts is unique in having its own, on-site (85,000ft2) manufacturing facility, producing engineered solutions, with an in-house test centre. Technical expertise is supported by bespoke software developed in partnership with the University of Strathclyde, addressing air movement and flow simulation/ computation fluid dynamics.