Essex Business School

Essex Business School is the UK’s first zero-carbon business school. The use of timber significantly contributed to this exceptional achievement.

Essex Business School

19 May 2017 Construction

Essex Business School has a reputation for excellent teaching, ground-breaking research and exciting business collaborations. The building is the UK’s first zero-carbon business school and the use of timber significantly contributed to this exceptional achievement.

The new school comprises of a curved three-storey building, a geodesic single storey lecture theatre and winter garden, all of which were constructed from PEFC-certified glulam columns, glulam floor beams, wall cassettes and CLT floor deck with Ethylene Tetra Fluoro Ethylene (ETFE) used on the winter garden roof.

Whilst the winter garden provides a striking entrance and meeting space for the School, it also acts as an environmental buffer zone supporting the passive ventilation and heating strategy of the main teaching building.

Other sustainable features include a ground source heat pump system, photovoltaic panels, smart meters and rainwater harvesting. Using timber also helps save energy over the life of a building, as its cellular structure provides outstanding thermal insulation: 15 times better than concrete and 400 times better than steel.

The use of 1,277.97m3 of PEFC-certified glulam and CLT at the School will have removed approximately 1,022.37 tonnes of CO2 from the atmosphere and helped achieve its aim of a BREEAM Excellent rating.

The details

Main contractor: Morgan Sindall 
Client: University of Essex
Architect: BDP
CLT/Glulam and Superstructure Engineer: Engenuiti
CLT/Glulam Sub-Contractor: B&K Structures

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