SportPark: sparking inspiration
A £9 million four-storey office block development has just received Passivhaus certification and is Loughborough University’s first building designed to Passivhaus standards. SportPark Pavilion 4 is the latest development on a site that houses the UK’s highest concentration of sports organisations.
Loughborough University is committed to decarbonising its estate to meet the Government’s zero carbon target by 2050 – and plans to have made significant progress towards that goal by 2040. Going beyond Passivhaus requirements, the University chose to fit SportPark Pavilion 4’s entire roof with solar panels, to further reduce its energy demand.
SportPark’s new Pavilion 4 will provide sports organisations with the unique opportunity to secure environmentally future-proof accommodation, tailored to their needs. The building project has been supported by the Leicester and Leicestershire Enterprise Partnership (LLEP) as part of the Getting Building Fund which allows for investment in local, shovel-ready infrastructure projects to stimulate jobs and support economic recovery. The LLEP supported the SportPark expansion with £6million and further funding support has been provided through the Loughborough Town Deal.
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Sustainability is a pillar of our economic growth strategy and, in funding SportPark Pavilion 4, we enabled development of a superb building at the highest standards of energy efficiency.
Andy Reed OBE, Co-Chair, LLEP
Key stats
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Design
The Pavilion 4 extension had to tie in architecturally with the design of the previous three pavilions completed in 2009. The project therefore involved moving from environmental best practice in 2009 to a modern-day Passivhaus. In practice, this meant a much greater focus on thermal bridging and airtightness, and a move to balanced supply and extract heat recovery ventilation. The earlier buildings were innovatively naturally ventilated using an automated window opening, but this system was sometimes difficult to use, and could not deliver low winter heating demand.
A summer comfort strategy was an integral part of the office building's design, with inward-opening natural ventilation louvres and use of brise soleil externally, as well as exposed thermal mass, night ventilation and coolth recovery. Window sizes and positions were carefully optimised based on the architype provided by the earlier pavilions, and total glazing quantity was slightly reduced. The design team aimed to deliver a climate-resilient building able to deal with the projected higher temperatures it will experience during its intended operational life.
Construction
Overall U-values
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Floor: 0.088 W/m2K Concrete slab with rigid phenolic insulation. |
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Wall: 0.162 W/m2K Concrete, with external wall mineral wool system. |
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Roof: 0.092 W/m2K Concrete deck with rigid PIR insulation. |
Building performance
Designed energy performance
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Airtightness n50 (≤ 0.6ACH @ 50 Pa)
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0.29 @ 50 Pa
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Space Heating Demand (≤ 15 kWh/m².a)
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13 kWh/m².a
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Heating Load (≤ 10 W/m²)
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9.9 W/m²
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Primary Energy Renewable (PER) Demand (≤ 60 kWh/m².a)*
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67 kWh/m².a
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Primary Energy Renewable Generation
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47 kWh/m².a
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*+/-15 kWh/m².a allowance if offset by energy generation. See Passivhaus criteria.
SportPark 4 will be used as a 'living laboratory', as part of the University’s building energy research. Joel Callow, Director of Beyond Carbon Associates, commented: “The construction team has worked closely with Loughborough’s researchers to ensure highly detailed measurement of the performance of the building over the coming years. This will allow us to draw down even more data on energy efficiency, giving vital feedback. This information can then be used to inform the design of the next generation of zero carbon buildings at the University".
Key team
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When SportPark was completed in 2009, it achieved BREEAM Excellent which put it in the top 10% of environmentally rated non-domestic buildings. Pavilion 4’s Passivhaus accreditation sets the benchmark for quality and low energy building efficiency across the University estate to achieve our zero-carbon agenda for 2050.
Martin Channell, Assistant Director, Capital Projects and Programme Management, Loughborough University
Join us at UK Passivhaus Conference 2023
Discover further educational case studies adopting Passivhaus in our educational buildings campaign or join us as we showcase pioneering Scottish schools on day one of the 2023 UK Passivhaus Conference in Edinburgh.
On the 16th and 17th October, we will be exploring the adaptability of Passivhaus, its implementation and benefits over a diverse range and scale of projects around the UK, and its potential applicability throughout Scotland!. Be sure to register early for the site visits!
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Further information
Passivhaus for Educational Buildings
8th June 2023
Get involved with the UK Passivhaus community
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