Having The Edge


We look at the latest crop of sustainable buildings that are using smart technology to the full.


fx

Words by Cathy Hayward

Today's sustainable buildings are designed with smart technology that could transform how occupants interact with their surroundings and how managers measure environmental performance.

Take, for example, The Edge, a new 40,000 sq m office for Deloitte in Amsterdam's Zuidas business district. It has been rated the world's most sustainable office building by the Building Research Establishment (BRE).

The global assessor of sustainable buildings awarded it a BREEAM new construction certification of Outstanding and a score of 98.36 per cent for its sustainable design and use of innovative smart technology.

A light-filled atrium is the nucleus of The Edge building in Amsterdam, designed by London-based PLP Architecture and rated as the world’s most sustainable building, by BRE
A light-filled atrium is the nucleus of The Edge building in Amsterdam, designed by London-based PLP Architecture and rated as the world's most sustainable building, by BRE

In terms of sustainability design it ticks all the boxes. It is completely energy neutral. Following a partnership between The Edge's developer OVG with the University of Amsterdam (UvA) and the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences (HvA), an area of 4,100 sq m on the university's rooftops are fitted with solar panels, while the south facade of The Edge building is also fitted with solar panels on all surfaces that are not windows.

Meanwhile, aquifer thermal-energy storage (approximately 130m below the ground) generates all energy required for heating and cooling the building.

In The Edge’s spaces taken by Deloitte, the building’s principal occupier
In The Edge's spaces taken by Deloitte, the building's principal occupier

But The Edge is also bursting with smart technology, which includes being the first building to utilise Philips' ethernet-powered LED connected lighting. All of the light fixtures are equipped with their own IP address that 'talk back' to the Building Management System, and each workspace has a chip with sensors that measure humidity, movement, lighting, temperature and CO2. Employees can use an app on their smartphones to regulate the climate and light in the vicinity of their individual workspaces.

There's no doubt that automation helps the building run more efficiently and improves the user experience, but where the smart technology really impacts on occupants is in the way it allows for a degree of personalisation.

The Edge
The Velocity Building in Weybridge, Surrey, designed by Area Sq and Alphacello, has won a BREEAM rating of Excellent

'The Edge is a very good example of what I would call holistic design, so yes there is a lot of technology in there, but the key point for calling it a smart building is that it uses technology that allows different aspects of the building and the people to interact,' says BREEAM director Gavin Dunn. 'So, it's not just technology for technology's sake, but enabling the key interactions between the different building systems and also the way the building is used.'

The Velocity Building in Weybridge, Surrey, designed by Area Sq and Alphacello, has won a BREEAM rating of Excellent
The Velocity Building in Weybridge, Surrey, designed by Area Sq and Alphacello, has won a BREEAM rating of Excellent

This encompasses everything from clever things such as the coffee machine telling the maintenance team when it's running out of ingredients, to the use by the cleaners of an iPad showing them which parts of the floor space have been most intensively used during the day and where they should clean more intensively. It's been estimated this is saving 40 per cent to 50 per cent on the facilities management bill -- a lot of money.

Tim Oldman, CEO of Leesman, the world's largest measure of workplace effectiveness, has predicted that the uptake by designers of smart technology, fuelled by the 'internet of things', will fundamentally alter the way the performance of buildings is measured, the quality of the occupier experience and how facilities managers will be able to use technology to support the quality of business services.

The Velocity Building in Weybridge, Surrey, designed by Area Sq and Alphacello, has won a BREEAM rating of Excellent
The Velocity Building in Weybridge, Surrey, designed by Area Sq and Alphacello, has won a BREEAM rating of Excellent

But technology alone, Gavin Dunn argues, isn't enough to guarantee design success. 'From the earliest concept of that building, very non-tech elements were built in that have made it very sustainable, including the orientation and layout of the spaces,' he says.

According to Ron Bakker, founding partner at London-based PLP Architecture that designed The Edge, that OVG, PLP and the building's principal occupier, Deloitte, worked together from the outset on the design-enriched creative process. This resulted in the creation of the 'nucleus' for the building: a light-filled atrium interspersed with bridges and exposed lift cores, which works as a social hub visible from the surrounding offices, all arrayed as an amphitheatre around it.

'The atrium was with us from the very beginning, with the idea that there were opportunities for collaboration and chance encounters,' says Bakker. 'That set the diagram of the building to be something that had one very large space that everything was related to visually and physically.'

The Velocity Building in Weybridge, Surrey, designed by Area Sq and Alphacello, has won a BREEAM rating of Excellent
The Velocity Building in Weybridge, Surrey, designed by Area Sq and Alphacello, has won a BREEAM rating of Excellent

This also fitted with Deloitte's aim of promoting active working habits, so no one in the organisation has a desk but works flexibly in a variety of workspaces, including workbooths, focus rooms, concentration rooms, sitting desks, standing desks, balcony desks, and from a range of work stations within the atrium itself.

The reaction from Deloitte has been very positive. A spokesperson comments: 'The Edge is the most sustainable office building in the world according to BREEAM scores. The design, based on the path of the sun, combined with smart and advanced technology, makes it a state-of-the-art building that generates more energy than it consumes. The Edge offers its users a pleasant workplace, in every sense of the word. The sophisticated design, the technological innovations and the activity-based workplaces create a comfortable living environment that increases employee satisfaction.'

To help occupants find their ideal workspace, and link up with colleagues, the mobile app also allows users to locate their colleagues and find free desks.

The success of the building is not only shown in the high BREAMM rating and inclusion in a number of awards shortlists, but also in Deloitte and other tenants, including OVG, finding it a draw in itself when recruiting talent. 'It's not just because there's a robot vacuum cleaner going around at night,' says Bakker. 'People can plan their diaries more carefully because they can consider what workspace they need and they can discuss their workspace needs with the building through the application and organise their workload accordingly. And people like being there and having chance encounters with people from other organisations throughout the building.'

Cannington Court, Somerset, where new-build shares a site with a 900-year-old priory building
Cannington Court, Somerset, where new-build shares a site with a 900-year-old priory building

As the Edge shows, sustainability is no longer confined to delivering a 'green build' but includes a design that keeps the comfort, health and productivity of its end-users in mind. With the technology moving quickly to provide high levels of personal environmental controls, sensing and data tracking, sustainability is not just about the green agenda anymore, it is about creating shared values and promoting the social and ethical considerations of a workplace. Mat Byway, MD of sustainability consultant Alphacello, says: 'Sustainability is about being in balance and looking after all aspects of the organisation, not just "we want to look green", but that we want to protect and enhance occupant health and improve employee productivity.'

The Edge is much more than smart technology: it has a smart design, and although it is at the forefront of innovative architecture, there are other smart buildings around which integrate building, technology and energy systems. These can encompass building automation, life safety, telecomms, user systems and facility management systems which provide vital information that enables the building owner or occupant to better manage the building or space. This goes for fit-outs as well as completely new builds like The Edge.

Cannington Court, Somerset, where new-build shares a site with a 900-year-old priory building
Cannington Court, Somerset, where new-build shares a site with a 900-year-old priory building

'Sustainability is an integral part of good architecture and it is the architect's job to make the best use of the opportunities presented by each project,' says Byway.

'With the emergence of advanced Building Management Software and BIM [Building Information Modelling] there are a number of smart elements that we can improve during fit-out, from smart lighting that can not only switch lights on and off at optimal times and vary light levels, but range from carrying out a comparative analysis of the impact on heating and ventilation energy use, to smart HVAC.'

Office design and fit-out specialist Area Sq worked with Alphacello on a fit-out of new offices for Cargill, a global provider of food, agriculture, financial and industrial products and services at the Velocity Building in Weybridge, Surrey, with a BREAAM Excellent rating.

Cannington Court, Somerset, where new-build shares a site with a 900-year-old priory building
Cannington Court, Somerset, where new-build shares a site with a 900-year-old priory building

During the fit-out features were incorporated with the wellbeing of the users in mind, from ensuring as much natural lighting and ventilation as possible to enabling them to control local temperature with zonal wall-mounted controls linked to the building's BMS.

Area Sq and Alphacello have also carried out fit-outs for a major London-based hedge fund and law firm. To a design by award-winning architecture practice Allford Hall Monaghan Morris, the challenge here was to retain the Grade II listed facades and vaults, while comprehensively redeveloping the block in line with sustainability best practice.

This project is exemplary in its use of materials unfamiliar in conventional office developments, its quality of circulation spaces, very fine details and finishes, and its sustainability credentials.

It is a BREEAM Excellent building and sustainable & smart features include:

  • Highly effective building envelope, reducing normal heating and cooling requirements;
  • Landscaped courtyard incorporating flowers, vegetation, grasses and habitats for insects, birds and bats;
  • Solar panels that provide carbon savings of up to 12 per cent;
  • Low-energy air conditioning that uses 33 per cent less electricity than a standard solution;
  • LED lighting that uses 25 per cent less energy than more typical installations;
  • Intelligent lighting that reacts to the quantity of daylight and automatically brightens or dims.

And though it is a successful smart building, it is one that retains its green credentials long after the designers left and the occupiers moved in.

'You've got smart buildings and you've got smart use of buildings,' says John Forrester, senior vice-president and chairman for the British Council for Offices conference. 'You can create a great office design, but if the occupier comes in and allows 25 sq m per person instead of 10, and keeps the lights on all the time, you destroy the rating the building will achieve, which is why you need a partnership between designers and clients. By doing so you can create a building that does all things to all people at any given time, based on the human utilisation of the space itself.'

This was the case with the partnership between EDF Energy and BDG architecture in the creation of the former's new UK training centre on the site of a 900-year-old priory at Cannington Court, Somerset. The site covered some seven buildings, two of which are listed and one of which is Grade I. In addition to the new-build interventions, where sustainable development was easy to control, the project also saw the implementation of a sustainable energy-generation centre using geo-thermal, solar thermal and solar voltaic energy generation.

Cannington Court gets 50 per cent of its energy from the site, and much of this is distributed as low-temperature hot water from the geo-thermal source. To ensure all the heating across the site is effectively managed, a BMS is prerequisite, but given its unique heritage, the location of the building's sensors and detection systems also had to be sited very carefully, as drilling just one hole for a cable through a historic timber beam requires listed-building consent.

The result is a site that embodies every form of modern building technology to deliver smart heating, lighting and security control, enabling the campus delegates to have a seamless experience of technology-based training within an architectural environment that spans some 900 years.

Occupant comfort in terms of heating, ventilation and lighting is a recurring theme of any smart and sustainable design, but given that one of the most successful working areas at The Edge is the atrium, despite it being open to other floors, access to an attractive well-lit and attractive looking environment is an integral element of smart design.

A BCO survey of UK office workers found that high percentages of respondents were dissatisfied with their office design and were specifically unhappy with their workspace if there was a lack of colour (80 per cent), a lack of greenery (64 per cent) and a lack of art (61 per cent). Says Byway: 'Beauty, colour and biophilia are all examples of ways in which the design of the built environment can contribute to positive multisensory experiences that can be both aesthetically pleasing and calming.

Cannington Court, Somerset, where new-build shares a site with a 900-year-old priory building
Cannington Court, Somerset, where new-build shares a site with a 900-year-old priory building

'Biophilic design integrates nature and natural elements, materials and forms into interiors that connect the occupant with nature. But it doesn't just stop at plants; you can include enhancing views over nature from the office, access to daylight, and using natural materials in the actual office fit-out, such as wood and hessian-backed carpet.'

So along with offering occupants a visually stunning interior, the new Cargill offices are designed with access to outside views beyond the actual workspace. To achieve this, all workstations intended for non-transient workers are within 7m of external windows or benefit from an outside view -- and the view is visible within a 65-degree rotation from the normal working position at those workstations.

This not only reduces eye strain by ensuring access to long-distance views but there is a psychological benefit experienced from having a view of a naturally lit space.

So, a combination of inspiring design and common-sense building management, as shown by this and other projects, can help ensure that a smart, sustainable build stays that way. Says Dunn: 'If you look at the actual performance of buildings in terms of environmental health, the best ones are built sustainably to start with, and are built with a level of technology and systems within them to service those requirements.

'But the key bit, which is why we have discussions about performance gaps, is making sure people who have to use the building can do so in way that takes advantage of those benefits.'








Progressive Media International Limited. Registered Office: 40-42 Hatton Garden, London, EC1N 8EB, UK.Copyright 2024, All rights reserved.