The White House
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Brief
L’atelier were instructed by West Faulkner Associates to provide an Energy Performance Certificate for 259m² office building in Surrey, & were subsequently requested to recommend measures to improve the rating for the building.
Project Description
The White House is a Grade II listed 3 floor office building. Originally constructed in the 17th Century, it has had a number of modifications and refurbishments over the years. In 1985, many insulation improvements were made to the roof, floors and walls, adhering to the building regulations in place at that time. A new condensing combination gas boiler was installed in 2000, which provides both heating and hot water.
Lighting throughout the building was a combination of individual compact fluorescent bulbs and tungsten halogen up-lighters, the latter being the main type use on each floor.
Following the site visit and assessment in October 2008, the energy model for the building returned a disappointing G159 rating. The client requested some guidance on improvements to the property and by testing a number of scenarios we established some interesting results.
The building owner Mr David West commented:
“The building was extensively refurbished to the standard of insulation current in the Building Regulations of the 1980s and it was therefore something of a disappointment to find that an Energy Performance Asset Rating of only G159 was achieved when assessed by L’atelier. However, at their suggestion, by the relatively simple expedient of changing the tungsten lamps for CFLs, the Rating has been improved to C69 which should have a beneficial effect on the building’s investment value.”
Lighting modifications, particularly to the larger areas of a building, can have a significant effect on the EPC ratings as well as reducing both energy bills and the carbon footprint of the property.