news from the BRE Group
published: 27/3/2014
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BREEAM Outstanding dragon centre to breathe life into Beijing Green Building Park
The iconic dragon shaped visitor centre designed for the Beijing Green Building Park in China (part of the BRE Innovation Park Network) was awarded a BREEAM Outstanding design certificate at an event in China earlier today
Designed by Ian Bogle of UK-based Bogle Architects, the 4070.5m2 centre will be the first of the Beijing Park's series of best of British buildings demonstrating world leading innovation and sustainability to be constructed on the 450,000 m2 site.
With its undulating form creating a front door for the park then blending into the adjoining landscape - suggesting head to tail of a protective dragon – the inspired building will welcome visitors, host exhibitions, provide an educational experience for all ages and a knowledge hub for exchanging green building ideas.
Created by Vanke, the world's largest private developer who are leading on the Beijing park project with BRE, the building scored 100% in the Energy, Water and Waste sections of the BREEAM assessment.
Five innovation credits were achieved for exemplary performance in the Energy, Transport and Pollution sections, with frequent local bus services, provision of priority parking spaces for car sharers, electric car charging facilities and cycle storage areas earning a 92% score for Transport. The building's total BREEAM score was an impressive 86.56%.
"This is a fantastic achievement," said Director of BREEAM Gavin Dunn, who will be presenting the BREEAM certificate to Vanke. "In China the dragon symbolises the ‘outstanding’ so it’s very apt that this building has achieved the highest BREEAM rating possible. It will be a terrific exemplar of British creativity, ingenuity that will raise the bar for sustainability in China."
Some of the key sustainable features, of the steel and concrete parametrically designed building, include a green biodiversity area on the roof and glass curtain walls on the north and south elevations to increase natural daylighting. Thermally active surfaces throughout provide effective energy transfer through radiation with the benefit of thermal mass, and suspended radiator ceiling slabs for heating and cooling along the roof spine form a unique architectural feature. Insulation is provided by subtly visible, high performance vacuum glazing and by a timber window frame curtain wall to minimise cold bridging.
"The building minimises energy use at all times however when it needs to use energy the main source for the building is waste cooking oil" explained architect Ian Bogle, "with a small amount of solar power used to offset the carbon emissions produced by transporting it. This approach has made the building truly carbon neutral and we are extremely proud that it has achieved such a high BREEAM score for our inspirational Client who have embraced the concept of design quality at every stage of the process."
Receiving the certificate General Manager of Vanke R&D Ms Wang Yun said ‘From the outset of this project Vanke wanted a centre that would be inspirational in its vision and scope as well as exemplifying the very best the world has to offer in terms of sustainability. This fantastic design ticks all the boxes – we are proud the building design has achieved highest score under the international BREEAM standard and we want to showcase it to the millions of visitors that will come to our park’.
Vanke have now started the enabling works for the Beijing Park and full planning permission for the visitor centre is being sought. A number other of demonstration buildings are also planned for the Park and are scheduled to start construction and open in the near future.
For further information please contact Linda McKeown, BRE, tel 01923 664569, email mckeownl;@bre.co.uk.
NOTES TO EDITOR
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