Renewable and Sustainable Energy Technology - International ...

The International Experience89As can be seen in the pictures, there are substantial glazed areas on the façade of thebuilding. This allows for the building to be filled with natural light, doing away with energyconsuming lights during the day and the overall atmosphere inside the commercial andoffice space is light and elegant. These windows and the glass barrier are triple glazed;creating a barrier for sound and protecting against summer and winter solar gain.The building also has an integrated ventilation system for heat recovery in the winter and tocool the building units at nighttime in the summer, as well as shading devices for keepingout the summer sun. These are easy to operate systems that are controlled by the tenants.Brightly coloured composite panel screens with side grilles project some 400mm from themain building. Behind them are ‘doors’ that can be opened at night to allow cool air toenter the building through the side grilles, without fear of burglary. A Berlin artist namedErich Wiesner designed the panel colour. This harmonious colour design, give the buildingits interesting characteristics that are then reflected in the colour scheme of the residentialestate behind the ‘Sonnenschiff’.ConstructionThe skeleton of the structure is reinforced steel. The staircases are fundamental to thestructural bracing and cross bracing of the building. Materials used in the construction andfinishing of this building included lightweight single plank walls, prefabricated, highly heatinsulated timber, that is, timber-metal components, or vacuum sandwich composites. Thelatter are 40mm deep, but achieve the same R-value as a 400mm thickness of insulation. It islargely ecological, healthy and recyclable building materials that are being used for the interior.The glass façades, glazed windows and doors are created of 3-pane heat insulation‘thermopane’ glazing and also meet the required soundproofing standards. 400mminsulation is used in the walls and 450mm insulation in ceiling space is used to prevent heatloss or gain.Energy EfficiencyThe ‘Sonnenschiff’, is built to ensure that it meets the Plusenergie ® -house standard, whichwas also used for the residential development that is described below. The high standard ofbuilding is the solution in achieving energy efficiency. For example the largest consumptionof energy in a building is due to the heating and cooling requirements of a building. This iseffectively kept to a minimum due to the highly heat insulated outer casing, the decentralisedventilation system with a highly efficient heat recovery, 3-pane heat insulation ‘thermopane’glazing and the passive-solar design.The next other major energy consumer is the heating of water. For the ‘Sonnenschiff’ theheating of water comes from combined heat and power plant (CHP) that uses local woodchip, which is backed up by gas. These district heating systems use some form of solid fuelsuch as wood chips and/or pellets and are considered to be sustainable as the fuel sourceis local and renewable.To further reduce energy usage for heating in winter and cooling in summer, pipes buriedin the earth preheat or cool the air to between 8 and 12°C before it enters the building.Therefore, the ‘Sonnenschiff’, is considered to exceed the standard energy savingsregulations by even more than the factor 10.