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hellothe presentation you are about to see describes recent research work undertaken within thesustainable building design programme at the department of architecture, university ofstrathclyde. the work aims at drawing together both theoreticaland practical components of architectural design in a way that can inform and supporta self-reflective approach within practice around the development of (or refinement of)particular principles and processes that can be applied by the practice in designing buildingsthat consume fewer resources, use less energy, and enhance the lives of their occupants.the best architecture has always been about these things of course, but the increasingprominence of the “sustainability agenda”

in both architecture and urbanism today suggeststhat a more widespread shift in design decision-making within practice may well be underway, whereindesign priorities are changing to reflect a new reality in part constructed on variousdefinitions of what sustainability is, of aspects ecological architecture, environmentalism,green architecture, low energy zero-carbon design.these terms, with sometimes conflicting values, are variously adopted to describe a sustainableapproach. the word “sustainability” is increasinglyused within the vocabulary of architecture but its popularity is coupled with a conceptualambiguity. on one hand it suggests balance and settinglimits while on the other there is an implied

expectation of development (often alignedwith economic development). the most widely accepted definition of sustainable developmentis that provided by the un brundtland commission in 1987, as “development that meets theneeds of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meettheir own needs”. of course the notion of “meeting needs”is a complex and relative issue but those collective needs must consider - how we canprovide adequate shelter for the estimated 9 billion people who will, within the nextgeneration, occupy an increasingly inhospitable natural environment. the big challenge for those involved in shapingthe built environment in the 21st century is to achieve this while ensuring that ourarchitecture and our cities can continue to

be instruments in our progressive evolution.our collective ambition should be, not just to cope with crises, but to develop as a speciesin harmony with our environment - to move towards forms of synthesis and equilibriumbetween the built and natural environments. and if, as is being suggested, a tangibleshift towards “sustainability” is indeed what is happening in architectural designpractice an important question for those of us in academia is how is this being informed(or underpinned theoretically)? how do designers choose which of a variety of interpretationsto align with? there are issues of identity at the core ofthis. from a wide spectrum of values and approaches, ranging from technology-based to ecology-basedresponses what are the design principles and

processes that are currently being adoptedand embedded by practice? and how do architectural practices position (or re-position) themselvesin response to this spectrum in a way that can inform their future work and support theirdeveloping design ethos? the presentation addresses these questionsin summarising a process of structured engagement that has taken place over the last year orso between researcher carol moultrie and a number of local practices.finally i would like to take this opportunity of thanking the practitioners who gave theirtime generously to the study and hope that it has been a useful experience for them andoffered them an opportunity to reflect on how their own distinctive approach to architecturaldesign is responding to the social, environmental,

and economic complexities inherent withinsustainability. hello, this work has involved me engagingwith practitioners from hypostyle, page & park, assist, gaia, archial, haa design & arup,and the presentation provides an insight into their sustainable design approaches and reflectionson the study. all the practitioners will describe their practice sustainable design ethos andunderlying principles. the case study buildings are both new-build and retrofit, and fromsocial housing, private developer housing, commercial office and educational sector,and provide an opportunity to see the principles & processes in action. one of the case studybuildings, arup’s retrofit and extension to scotstoun house is shown in more depthwith interviews from haa design & arup. but

first the framework for the presentation.key text from leading ecological architects and an environmental group identify a sustainabilityspectrum. exemplar buildings are blueprints that are shaped by their principals are shownalongside. sim van der ryn championed low-energy and ecological design in the 1970s and wasa pioneer in integrating ecological principles into the built environment. in ecologicaldesign, van der ryn & cowan set out 5 principles formulated by their many years of researchin practice. the application of these principles involved an engagement or integration, andsharing of knowledge across many sectors. the concept of an individual dwelling thatcan be self-sufficient with regard to its own energy and resource needs, by for exampleharvesting rain and recycling waste, was described

in the seminal book ‘the autonomous house’by brenda & robert vale. some years later in green architecture design for sustainablefuture, the vales went on to describe 6 principles as a basis for the green design process.“the importance of designing buildings that are resilient to climate change, mitigatedamage to the environment, and are capable of adaption leads to a crisis planning scenarioin adapting buildings & cities for climate change, a 21st century survival guide”.the author of the book sue roaf, describes the need for buildings to be resilient toclimate change and be designed for longevity with low embodied energy.a holistic approach to sustainability reaches beyond buildings to encompass sustainablecommunities and lifestyles. the environmental

group bioregional and the world wildlife fundhave developed the “one planet principles” to enable sustainability to be embedded intoany process. “one brighton”, designed by architect fielden clegg bradley is a mixed-useresidential development and is one of the first to use the one planet principles, andis aiming to be both zero-carbon and zero-waste. as a summary, a principles matrix shows thealignment of the key texts reviewed. the matrix indicates that a core set of principles alignacross all four sets. additionally the one planet principles outline social economicprinciples that are applicable to resident lifestyle choices, for example with respectto food and fair trade. the process model developed for the case studyanalysis has the environmental brief at its

core. the environmental brief encapsulateseconomic, social and environmental principles as well as functional requirements, and iscontinuous throughout the design process. integrated environmental strategies are setat an early stage, influenced by parameters to meet the design intent. with the emphasison passive design as a way of reducing energy loads in buildings, computer modelling toolssuch as ies are used at the design stage. evaluation systems such as bream are an increasingclient requirement at the design stage with post-occupancy evaluation testing the designintent and closing the loop. the sustainable design process matrix maps the principles,environmental brief, parameters, environmental strategies, evaluation, and tools & techniqueson to the riba outline plan of work. it indicates

a spread from setting sustainable principlesat the outset (stage a), to post-occupancy evaluation of a building in use (stage l).the principles & process model is used throughout the study for review and discussion.we begin the practice interviews with hypostyle architects, and their case study building,miller street in hamilton. clyde valley housing association ran a limited competition in 2001with partners “communities scotland” and “hamilton ahead” to design a sustainablesocial housing development that would contribute to the continuing urban regeneration of hamiltontown centre. hypostyle architects won the competition and started design work in 2003.the completion was in 2006. i’m here with gerry henaughen, directorof hypostyle architects. hello gerry.

hello carolyn can you describe your practice’s sustainabledesign philosophy ethos, and do you have a set of principles in place?yes, we have a policy, a sustainable policy, a 2-page document that outlines a holisticapproach to sustainability and the practice’s holistic approach to sustainability, and its3 principles which are social, economical and environmental. we’re developing ourprinciples further, that’s a long term thing. i think the thing that we’re finding isthe analysis of how the client approaches and responds to our principles, i think theresponse of the client sometimes is based on more the economic side of things ratherthan the social and environmental side of

things, so the principles we’re trying todevelop at the moment is to try and almost educate the client from a social and environmentalpoint of view, because although those principles, although they’re set for the practice, thebest response comes to them from the client because if you don’t have your client onboard then it becomes much harder to develop a sustainable design at the end of the day.i think the policies themselves help our staff but they’re a better benefit almost to theclient. can you describe the environmental brief forthe project? yes, the environmental brief was essentiallyto design around 28-30 flats on a very tight urban site to sustainable principles whichlooked at environmental issues and energy

issues at the same time.can you describe the design intent of miller street?the design intent is essentially to create an environmental barrier on this transitionsite between the suburban area to the south side and the more urban area to the northside of a very busy main road. what were the environmental strategies forit? the environmental strategies for that werereally to look at it from 2 aspects, both a passive and an active aspect. from a passivepoint of view all the living spaces were south-facing and we’ve created an environmental barrierto the north. the north side of all the villa blocks essentially have kitchens, bathroomsor stair-course, so the living spaces face

south, they have solar gain. the north faceis super-insulated all the way along, the larger windows are to the south side. so that’salmost a very basic look at the passive ways we’ve looked at environmental strategy.from an active point of view we have solar panels on the roof which preheat the water.we also have, normally in a villa block of this type with 7 flats in it you would havedesigned an individual boiler to each flat, in this instance we have 2 communal boilersof the same size which heat all the flats in the property, so it’s almost a communalheating system to each property. we’ve tried to use recycled materials, that was one ofthe initial principles. it didn’t work out quite as well as we hoped at the start ofthe design process, we hoped to have a recycled

stone wall. it proves too expensive and wehad to use a reconstituted stone wall. we also looked at using a recycled steel frame.again from an economic point of view, we did quite a lot of investigation into it withthe structural engineer, and it again proved too expensive.the next practice is page\park architects and the case study building is carrochan,a new-build office for the loch lomond & trossachs national park authority. the competition briefwas for a building to be a community hub, flexible workspace, and to promote the sustainableprinciples of the national park. page\park were appointed in 2005 and the building wascompleted in 2008. i’m here with karen pickering, directorof page\park, hello.

hi thereso to begin, i ask the practitioners to describe their practice sustainable design philosophyethos and if they had a manifesto or set of sustainable principles in place.well, we’ve been developing our sustainable principles for quite a long time at page\parkand now we really feel as though they’re embedded in our whole design ethos in allof our projects. initially we did have just a few projects which had the ‘sustainability’label on them but now all of our projects, we give these principles. we have a sustainabilitychecklist in the office which all our architects work to, and we have a sustainability policywhich we all adhere to. so that’s not just how we design, but it’s also how we runour office, how we travel to the office etc.

so it’s very much now a very strong ethosin the office. we do also have a sustainability group and this group has an overview of allthe projects, and we kind of input within the design process. we have design reviewsand a person from the sustainability group will look at those design reviews, so there’salways that kind of check all the way through the development of a project.what was the environmental brief for the project? well we were lucky in that we had a very goodenvironmental brief from our client here. they really had a strong sustainability strategyand they wanted this building to represent what they wanted in that. so right from theonset we were part of a competition process to win the project and sustainability washigh on that competition agenda. so when we

won the project we started right from thebeginning, thinking of how we can make this building and how it could represent the nationalpark. the national park is made of trees and rock etc and slate, so we’ve made the buildingfrom the green timber frame, the natural stone, cladding on the front, the natural slate roofing,and also the timber cladding. and we found that during the development of the brief thatthings came out from the client which also influenced how we designed the building. thebuilding has now been complete for 3 years, so we can see that the physical nature ofthe building works and meets the sustainability brief, but what we’re finding now is thesocial sustainability of the building is also working and that’s coming to fruition now.the people who work here really enjoy the

building, the natural light, the natural ventilation,and they had this open-planned nature of working which they didn’t have previously. in theirold building they were in cellular offices and they were all quite insular. here, allthe departments can see each other and they can interact. they can meet within the street,which is a nice, light, airy space with top-lighting. so it really is a good place for them to workand i think has improved their productivity. the engagement process, was it of value tothe practice and could you see value to other practices for future research work?well, we found it very valuable because it enabled us to reflect on how we design ina sustainable manner, and check what we were doing. you kind of made us reflect on that.now i think from your point of view, how you

could maybe use your research to take to otherpractices, which don’t have such a strong sustainability policy, you could maybe marketthat and help that practice develop that, so you could really set up the template, andreally help them set up their own checklists and their own way of designing in a sustainablemanner. thank youthank you the next practice is assist architects andthe case study building is a combination of conservation, retrofit and modern interventionof 2 grade-a listed 19th century tenement buildings in the grassmarket, in edinburgh’shistoric old town. the client for the project was hillcrest housing association in collaborationwith edinburgh world heritage, energy saving

trust, communities scotland and edinburghcity council. the environmental brief was to refurbish the buildings for social housingin an energy efficient way to reduce carbon emissions. the design team led by assist architectswere appointed in 2006 and work started onsite in 2007, with completion in 2008.i’m here with andy jack, director of assist architects, hello andy.hi carolyn can you describe your practice sustainablephilosophy ethos; do you have a manifesto and set of sustainable principles in place?we have environmental policies in place and we have a whole series of drivers that weuse to ensure that the practice of architecture within assist is sustainable. this embracesan ongoing commitment to ongoing skills training.

we have in-house accredited passive housedesigners, we have in-house rias accredited sustainable architects and a whole raft ofin-house skills that are always applied appropriately on an individual basis to each project thatwe take on. the use of this knowledge and skill base ultimately is to provide a balancebetween innovation, practical solutions, and cost-effective solutions for our client. iwould say that is most probably a reasonable summary of how we would approach a projectat the beginning. can you describe the design intent for gilmoursclose? the design intent had a variety of drivers.the first, low carbon. low cost to hillcrest housing association’s tenants. planninggain in terms of conservation, respecting

its location, and also the environment ofhow the project was procured, where multi-partners worked together providing different typesof resources, from financial, through grants, to support though expertise and knowledge,that without the partnering environment the project would have been very difficult.what were the parameters in environmental strategies?in all these situations one strategy alone won’t work. you’ll find that a combinationof different strategies would need to be applied here to be successful. with an existing building,the first thing that has to be put in place is to improve the thermal envelope of thebuilding as much as possible. this was done at gilmours close, providing u-values of walls,roofs, windows & floors in excess of the new-build

standards that were required at the time.we felt that this would provide a thermal envelope which we would then be able to addressin terms of introducing micro-renewables and various forms of passive solar strategiesand forms of heat recovery. the feedback that we are getting at the moment is anecdotal,and we have to take it on board the fact that we’ve been through one of the severest wintersthat we’ve had on record. that the modelling that was carried out in terms of heat losses,sizing of ground source heat pumps, the amount of heat recovery from our mechanical ventilationheat recovery unit and the sun spaces were all modelled on an outside temperature of-6c. during the course of the recent winter, for days on end we were experiencing night-timetemperatures falling below -10c and much lower.

therefore the system has been presented withquite a challenge and we are keen to find out how it has performed.and the thermal images that you’re showing us, what do they prove?the thermal imaging was carried out by edinburgh world heritage and their analysis has confirmedthat compared to the buildings round about, there is a significant improvement in theinternal envelope resulting from the work we’ve done, which is again important tobe able to have evidence to suggest that what we thought in theory is actually working inpractice. this is the whole part of the process so we can find out what has worked and buildon that, and areas which may have not worked so well, we need to look at these. the ongoingresearch that we’ve got with the mackintosh

school where we will monitor the buildingswith data-loggers over a period of about 2 or 3 weeks, recording 24 hour temperatureprofiles, humidity profiles, air quality profiles. that detailed information will then be usedto see how the other strategies of ventilation, sunspaces and the heat-pump, how they haveall worked together. are they working as we hoped they would? have they worked betteror have they worked worse? it will also be associated with daily diaries of how peopleare using the building, particularly with a slow response technology, the likes of theground source heat pump which requires time to build up heat within the property. is thatmatching with how people are using the building? and have they adapted their lifestyles tothe type of energy that’s used for heating

their flats.has the engagement process with myself and the university been of value to your practice?yes, it’s been very valuable in that the history of assist is very much embedded inuniversities. assist initially was a research unit of strathclyde university, and we havetried to maintain links with academic institutions including strathclyde and other architecturalschools through our practice. the schools should always be at the forefront, evaluatingwhat practice is doing, reporting back on what they’re doing right and what they canmaybe do better, so this is an essential part of our approach to continual improvement andthe research that you’re doing carolyn is very welcome.the next practice is gaia architects and the

case study is the carrochal school on theardmamurchan peninsula. the client, highland council, wanted a pilot sustainable schooland set high aspirations. gaia architects were appointed to develop the brief in 2004,and subsequently to provide architectural services. the building was completed in 2009.i’m here with project architect sam foster, hi sam.hi carolyn can you describe your sustainable design philosophyand do you have a manifesto and set of principles in place?yes, we do have a manifesto which was originally set up by the principal of the practice, howardliddell, when he set up in 1984. that manifesto still applies equally today as it did backthen, it’s on our wall, we see it every

day. but from that we’ve developed 6 principlesfor guiding each of our projects. and those principles are minimising pollution, enhancingbiodiversity, using resources effectively, creating healthy environments, supportingcommunities, and the 6th most important one is what we call ‘ managing the process’which is making sure that all of those 5 things and the targets in those 5 criteria actuallyhappen. can you describe the design process for carrochal?well we did use those 6 principles all the way through and it was a very good project.the first thing we did was look at the community side of things, and we made sure that thestaff, the children and the community of the existing school were heavily involved in thedesign process. and through that design process

we came up with a very simple layout for theschool, and that layout had a very welcoming central core with classroom wing facing southoff to the left as you come in, and a community wing up to the right to give you that flexibilityof function. the layout itself was designed to be as compact as possible and the shapeof it was optimised so that it was as efficient and compact as possible, because we were tryingto make it as efficient as possible. the way we did that was to maximise the insulationand maximise the air-tightness, so reduce the amount of draughts lost through that.we have a lot of roof lights, we have a lot of windows which are there to provide a lotof daylight so we don’t need artificial lights. and that’s complimented by a naturalventilation system so we’ve got low-level

and high-level windows in the classrooms whichare operated by a combination of the users and the building management system to keepthe building nice and healthy. in order for us to have a very energy-efficient healthybuilding, we decided to use a construction system called brettstapel, which is a glue-freesolid timber construction system. and this was the first example of its kind in the wholeof the uk, so it was very exciting for us and for the client. and that’s delivereda lot of positive things for us, but one of the best things is that we’ve ended up witha very small heating demand, and that heating demand is met by a wind turbine up on theback of the hill just behind the school. and the brettstapel provides the timber aesthetic,how did you decide on the finishes and the

colour?the brettstapel itself provides the internal finish to a lot of areas in the school suchas the entrance, parts of the corridors, parts of the classrooms, and the brettstapel isvery good because when you use it on a ceiling you can put what’s called an acoustic profilein. and that helps to reduce the reverberation times in the classrooms, which assists inlearning. as well as the brettstapel, which is very good at helping to control moistureand provide and provide reductions in the thermal fluctuations, we’ve also used untreatedmaterials like clay plaster and other bits of untreated wood, linoleum, solid oak floors,and all of these are chemical-free materials which are very good for the indoor air quality.and all of those materials were complimented

by a comprehensive colour strategy that wasapplied through the school. the colour strategy was originally developed for the inside andthe outside of the school, but for one reason or another we just used it internally. andthe colours that have been chosen aren’t arbitrary, they’ve been selected very, verycarefully by a very good colour consultant to enhance wellbeing and increase social interaction,and provide very comfortable spaces for the children, the staff, and visitors to comein and use. and we’ve even had very good feedback from people coming in saying whocalm the spaces feel because of the colour. what other feedback have you been getting?how is it working? we have been employed by highland council,the client, to carry out a post-occupancy

evaluation on the school for 2 years sinceit was completed, and the school was completed in may 2009. so we’re still carrying outour post-occupancy evaluation just now. each of the classrooms has feedback monitors, we’vegot relative humidity, we’ve got carbon dioxide, temperature and daylight meters ineach of the classrooms so that the pupils and the staff can see what’s going on. that’sbeen very, very useful because all of that information is also fed into the buildingmanagement system so we can record what’s going on in terms of those 4 parameters, andwe can see whether the temperature is going up too high, the relative humidity is toohigh or too low. and so far the feedback has been quite good, we’ve found out that therelative humidity is staying generally between

40-60% which is good for human health. temperaturesaren’t going too high, they’re not going too low. carbon dioxide importantly is notgoing too high either, so the feedback has been ok, it’s not been too bad. we’requite proud of what we’ve achieved so far. so have you experienced any issues?there have been one or two. all innovative new projects have teething problems and we’vefound not so much that the brettstapel has given us a problem, that’s been very robustand we’d recommend it for certainly other education projects, where they get a bit ofstick, but we found that the clay plaster we used to ammealuate the relative humiditylevels, it’s not as robust as plaster. so where it’s been applied at lower level it’sbeen bashed and in hindsight we are only using

clay plaster now on areas above the damagezone, up to above 2 metres we use clay plaster. energy-wise it is performing quite well, thereadings from the energy meters are suggesting that it’s performing within the top 25%of schools throughout the uk. the next practice is archial, and the casestudy is craigwood homes, a development of 36 eco-houses for the private market and 12affordable homes. the rural greenfield site north of inverness is part of a larger master-planto develop the town of dingwall. archial have been developing proposals with the clientoer group since 2006. i’m here with project architect neil harperfrom archial. hello there. hi therecan you describe your sustainable design philosophy

and do you have a manifesto and set of principlesin place? in relation to craigwood, we’ve been workingwith a sub-division of archial called ‘archial sustainable futures’ to help us inform thebest practice that we follow. their and our policy is based on a document which was developedat the world architects congress in chicago in 1993 which helps set out a policy of bestpractice to follow on a day-to-day basis. and for craigwood what was the environmentalbrief? the environmental brief on this one was tocreate a contemporary house which avoided the attachments of ‘eco-bling’ that aresometimes found on projects of this type, but really to get the fundamental design principlesof the house right. to create a house type

that is cheaper to run on a day-to-day use.and how did you work this through the design intent?well, basic first principles of the site are that we face south which is ideal for a houseof this type. as well as the fantastic views out towards the cromarty firth and the blackisle which the site offers, that helps us set up a quite unique plan. we’ve flippedthe living accommodation to put all the principal living areas like living rooms, dining roomsand kitchens, where the family really comes together, putting that up on the top floorof the house. with the actual gradient of the sloping site allows you to view over thehouse in front. we’ve also looked at 3 levels of specification for the house. we didn’twant to tie the client down to any one spec

at this early stage given the length and durationof the project. so we’ve looked at a house-type which we can adapt, both in size and alsoin terms of its specification, whether that’s something that meets & exceeds building regulationsat the moment, or something that leads all the way up to ‘passiv-haus’ certification.and how was this tested? in-house we have ies software, which is environmentalsoftware which allows us to test every aspect of the building, from the way in which it’sbuilt up, and the wall constructions, roof constructions, windows, doors, u-values, thewhole lot. it can all be tested and refined to meet the expectations of the client.and is this part of the marketing strategy? in a way yes, unlike a lot of developers we’recreating a prototype house, a show-home which

will actually be lived in, potentially bythe family themselves. one of the members of the client group has suggested the ideaof moving in with his family for a year into the first prototype house, showing commitmentto the buyers and also to allow us to fully test the environmental credentials, and confirmin real-time the testing that we’re carrying out at the moment. so it’s quite a uniquemodel in that respect and all of this information will be fed back to their main website whichwill allow potential buyers, as they’re keeping an eye on the project, to see howthese houses are actually performing. and we’d hope that they’d perform as well,if not exceed the performance that we’re expecting from them.and they can visit the house?

they can, the client has even suggested thatif buyers are interested in taking up one of the plots then he would offer them thechance to stay in the house with his family overnight, to experience a day & night livingin a house which is quite unique and quite different to your ordinary ‘cookie-cutter’style housing. i’m at the office of arup, scotstoun house,to talk to the designers and end-users about the retro-fit and extension to the modernistbuilding. scotstoun house was designed in 1965 and is located in the semi-rural outskirtsof dalmenny in south queensferry. in 2005 historic scotland listed the building as gradeb due to its iconic modernist design. the design team was led by haa design who providedarchitectural, interior design, workspace

consultancy and landscape services. structuraland services engineers, environmental and sustainability consultants and project managerwere all arup. the qs was neilson binnie mckenzie. construction started in 2009 and the officewas operational once more for arup in june 2010. the main contractor was ashwood scotlandwhat was the brief for the project? as you’re aware, the building is 45 yearsold, the original building. the building had become inflexible. it was tight in space forworkstations, the area itself was 1000 square metres. the original building could accommodate90 workstations, we now have 140 workstations. the planned aim basically to bring new lifeto the original building and to extend the facilities, and these facilities are new meetingrooms, new entrance area, nicer breakout areas

and better facilities for the staff themselves.i’m now joined by sarah-jane stewart, a mechanical engineer and bream assessor witharup, and sustainability co-ordinator for the project. sarah-jane, how would you describearup’s sustainable design philosophy and do you have a manifesto set of principlesin place? arup have got a design & sustainable buildingsstrategy which we set out just before we started on this project. the principles are very high-reachingso it’s a set of goals to aim for at the start of each project. the key goals are carbonneutrality, self-sufficient by collecting and re-using water, built using sustainablematerials, able to cope with future climate change, able to provide benefits to the localcommunity and also sustainable in operation.

these are the key targets that you shouldtry and achieve in all projects. can you run through how these were achievedat scotstoun house? in scotstoun house we started looking at theactual building itself, because it’s an existing building we had to upgrade the insulation,we had to put in much better windows, we put in a whole load of light pipes so that wewould get daylight across the floor-plate, we also installed a biomass boiler to providepart of our heating load for renewable energy. in relation to “self-sufficient by re-usingwater”, it wasn’t possible for us to install a rainwater collection tank, so all of thewater appliances within the building are all low water use. in relation to “built usingsustainable materials”, we re-used the building

itself, we also re-used the garden wall andwe selected materials that have got a green guide rating of a. in relation to “ableto cope with future climate change”, we designed the drainage system so that it woulduse sustainable urban drainage techniques. so we’ve got porous paving and we’ve gotswales. in relation to “community” aspects, we developed the design with consultationwith the local community and historic scotland. and we also installed bird-boxes, bat-boxes,and various ecological improvements. and finally we looked at “sustainable in operation”,because there’s no point in designing a low-energy building and the lights are lefton all the time. so when the sun comes across, all of the lights on the floor-plate dim downso that you just have sunlight providing the

light. we also provided controls for the biomassboiler and when there’s no-one in the building, none of the systems are on. these are goingto reduce it further. how were the targets met in the design process?we set out the targets very early on at brief-stage, and we had a target rating of “very good”which we agreed with the planners in relation to bream. we also had a 10% renewable targets,also agreed with the planners, and an energy performance certificate of a. and becausewe’d monitored this throughout the design process and tried to better it constantly,we got a lot higher than we originally targeted, so the final building got an energy performancerating of a+, it used 15% renewables from the biomass and we also got a bream “excellent”rating, so we did a lot better than we’d

originally targeted for an existing building.and how would you describe the design process? the design process had to be collaborativeand holistic, and all of the solutions had to be developed closely with the architect.the ventilation strategy, it’s all naturally ventilated, the day lighting strategy, howto update the fabric but meet historic scotland’s needs. so we worked very, very closely withthe designers, haa. thank you sarah janeyou’re welcome i’m now joined by gillian lockyer, associateand project architect with haa design. how would you describe haa design’s approachto sustainability? haa have been designing sustainable buildingsfor a number of years, and using bream for

about 7 or 8 of them. although we don’thave a set of set principles or guidelines, we have an inherent approach to sustainabledesign, and we tend to tailor each of our designs individually to our clients as opposedto having a fixed set that we use to. in saying that, we have been looking more recently atdeveloping a set of guidelines or general principles, however that’s more been drivenby the changes in the industry and client awareness, than actually changing the waywe design within our own systems. and for scotstoun house, how was sustainabilityembedded into the process? sustainability was embedded from day 1. theclient made it very clear that sustainability was an issue with the project, and thereforewe started on a platform of sustainability

and through constant collaboration, conversationand dialogue developed solutions to the problems at hand.how would you define the parameters for this project?probably the most challenging element was the fact that’s it’s a grade b listedbuilding, not only that, it’s also a “modernist” building. that prevented standard things interms of sustainability for added insulation. so it was a bit more of a creative approachto what we could do. it was also very keen that we had to provide a good, flexible environment,and also that it was not sustainability at any cost. the items that we put in or themeasures that we used had to have intrinsic value, they weren’t “tokenist” issues.and can you describe briefly the remodelling

of the building?effectively we retained the existing building, we put it back to open-plan, we inhabitedthe internal courtyard and closed it off. we then built an extension building off toone side of it which housed most of the core facilities and additional meeting spaces & socialspaces, good places to break-out. and the material choice that was your remit?it was our remit, again the listed building and the listed status impacted on this also.the materials were c hosen for a number of elements. 1) again we were asked to echo theexisting building and the grade b listing, so we have similar elements of timber, concrete,steel, lots of glazing, large open windows. it’s set against some very simple whiteplasterboard and white finishes, and dark

carpets. so effectively we’re creating avery classic base which can have different fit-outs added on as the years go past.thank you gillian thank you very much.i’m here with wayne butler, mechanical & services engineer with arup.so wayne, can you tell us about the key environmental strategies of the project?a key issue for the project was to make sure that the thermal comfort for the occupantswas optimised, something that we do on all of our projects. for this building it waskey to make sure that the heat gains were minimised first for the building, so we spentan awful lot of time doing daylight analysis to get the arrangement for the solar tubescorrect. by getting that arrangement correct,

the artificial lighting would be turned off,so there would be no artificial light & heat getting into the space. we also invested quiteheavily in a high-performance glass for the perimeter of the building. again, that wasto reduce the solar heat gain in to the space. and finally, we put in an active thermal-masssystem. that system allows us to absorb heat from the building in the daytime, and releasethat night-time with night-time cooling system through motorised ventilation levers. thisapproach is shown on the first slide of the presentation, and it shows the way that thebuilding uses buoyancy forces for natural ventilation, and the high-performance glazingand the solar tubes. the next slide shows a plan of the building, and what i’ve donefor this is to summarise the thermal analysis

results for the worst-case corner for thebuilding, which is the south-east corner. the next series of slides show the resultsof our thermal analysis software. the way that we approach it is to look at the comfortof the buildings rather than just the temperature within the space. so that looks at thingslike the air movement path, range in temperature, what the people are wearing and what they’redoing, and the relative humidity. and by optimising those, then we can improve the comfort ofthe people. so the slides go through from 9 o’clock in the morning until 3 o’clockin the afternoon of a comparison between a “building regs compliant” building, andwhat we did for scotstoun house. so on the left hand side of this screen is the 2buildingregs compliant” building, and scotstoun

house is on the right hand side. now, to explainthe colours on the graphics, we would want to be in the green or yellow range of conditions,which is a percentage of people of who are dissatisfied. so at 9 o’clock you can seethe conditions for both models are pretty well identical and ideal. as you then rollthrough to 10 o’clock and 11 o’clock, you can see n the left side of the screenthe conditions for the “building regs compliant” building are starting to creep up into the20-30% range. so that would start becoming slightly uncomfortable for the occupants.as you roll through the rest of the slides, you’ll see the scotstoun house model onthe right hand side stays within the optimum range, whereas the “building regs compliant”building is starting to become quite uncomfortable

for the occupants. since we’ve occupiedthe building we’ve now monitored the conditions throughout the building, and the last graphicshows a sample of a couple of weeks during the summer period when we had just moved into the building. the red line shows the external temperature for the building, and the blueline shows the internal conditions. so you can see that the internal temperature wasranging between 20 – 23c, whereas the external temperature was going up as 25c at times.so that shows quite nicely that the thermal mass in particular is working really wellwith the night-time cooling strategy. conditions in the office have been comfortable for theoccupants. i find scotstoun house a really enjoyableplace to work. i’ve got my own workstation

so there’s nobody interrupting me there.it’s a nice, quiet environment, however if i’ve got clients coming in we can sitdown in one of the meeting rooms, or sit down in one of the informal breakout spaces andhave a coffee. my favourite thing is the ability to cycleto work, because it’s a good, sustainable way to get to work. it’s a good way to startthe day and we have the ability to do that here. we’ve got quite nice storage facilities,we’ve got a nice shower area, we’ve got our own lockers, our own personal shower room& changing room. i also like the comfort levels within the office. the temperature is quitestable, the fresh air, co2 monitors. it’s a pleasant place to work.it was a very emotional building to me. i

started work here as a graduate in 1978, andit was a super building when i first came here and arup were very, very proud of it.and i think one of the best things about the extension and alterations, it’s worked verywell together. firstly it’s engaged with the walled-garden in an improved way. we’vegot better workstations, much more open-plan and superb breakout spaces, and the meetingrooms are excellent. i’m also proud of the fact that we’ve used our own environmentalskills to create an environmental building that we can be proud of.as way of a summary and for comparison and cross-referencing, a principles & processsummary is given. it shows applicable principles from the key text along with components ofthe processed model.

now to summarise. the practices reveal commonapproaches as well as divergences in their principles & processes for sustainable buildingdesign. though not all have a defined set of principles in place, all have transformedtheir design process to embed ideals of sustainability. there’s no one common metric for sustainabilityand the spectrum is wide. the key texts show us the principles can be more than a usefulchecklist, and can define an ecological approach. the first creative step is given as an alignmentof practice ethos with established architectural principles across the sustainability spectrum.this ongoing research work supports the proposal that partnerships between academic researchand architectural practice are fundamental in developing informed approaches to the sustainabilityof the built environment.

in an increasingly competitive professionalworld the ability of practices, that may otherwise be committed to sustainable design and architecturalquality, to afford time to independently reflect on decision-making processes and to developprinciples that inform an ethos could be necessarily limited.we propose here that a method of evaluating a practice’s approach against well researchedsustainable design philosophies, with practical application, could help them move forward.and that a structured dialogue between researchers and practice representatives, can supporta self-reflective approach, and an alignment of systematic principles and processes withthe distinct design philosophy of the practice involved.thank you!

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