Last month’s National Apprenticeship Week (3 to 7 March 2014) saw a flurry of press releases coming our way. They covered apprenticeship schemes, awards and comments on staffing the industry. Apprenticeships in the construction industry and interest in careers in the industry are clearly alive and well.
This year sees major developments in the Government’s Renewable Heat Incentive, as explained by Sarah Redwood, deputy director RHI head of scheme, Renewable Heat Incentive at the Department of Energy & Climate Change.
Over a hundred Baxi employees joined forces at the customers support centre in Warwick to take telephone donations for this year’s Sport Relief. The team answered 2311 calls during the charity’s live entertainment show on BBC1 television and took £67 549 in donations. The grand total raised was over £51 million.
The February Glenigan Index for construction activity was 10% up year-on-year, driven by continued rises in private non-residential starts and new infra-structure. The office sector, in particular, continues a rapid rate of expansion, with project starts up by 52% compared to a year ago. Industrial project starts were up by 16%, as manufacturing output and investment into new capacity increases.
Two CIBSE Board members — Graham Manly, OBE, and Tadj Oreszczyn, director of the UCL Energy Institute — reflect on the past decade and what can be done to improve the next 10 years.
Renewable energy is just one off-the-shelf solution that helped Mitsubishi Electric steadily improve the energy performance of its headquarters building at Hatfield, as Martin Fahey explains.
Built in 1906, this historic building in the Soho area of London has utilised AET’s Flexible Space underfloor air-conditioning system to update it from a heated-only building to fully air-conditioned commercial office space — whilst retaining the aesthetic values of the architecture of the period. The refurbishment of the building at 76-88 Wardour Street was a joint development by Legal & General and Walbrook Land.
Airedale International supplied the cooling solution for a new £2.25 million high-density energy-efficient data centre at the University of Portsmouth, which has a PUE (power usage efficiency) of 1.14 (load dependent). Working in partnership with Sudlows, Airedale was selected for its ability to offer a complete solution.
Controlling the energy-efficient operation and comfort of the renovated 1 Kingsway in London is a Sontay SonNet wireless sensor system. Completely rebuilt behind the original 1920 Portland-stone facade, the building has nearly 10 000 m2 of Grade A sustainable office space and seven high-specification apartments. It has achieved a BREEAM ‘Excellent’ rating.
This development of four refurbished stone-built holiday homes in the village of Church Houses in North Yorkshire is serviced by a bespoke communal heating system based on a Danfoss ground-source heat pump. The installation meets local planning requirements for the use of renewable energy.
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