| Kilmartin Property Group |
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The Cube is a major office development for the Kilmartin Property Group located at the top of Leith Street, Edinburgh.
The £14m building consists of 5500 sq.m. of office space with underground car parking. This project achieved a BREEAM rating of Excellent under BREEAM Offices 2006. The low energy consumption of the building was a key commitment of the design team and this was ensured through extensive thermal, daylight and energy modelling throughout the project. The building services design includes the following: Fresh Air for occupancy is provided via supply and extract Air Handling Units. To minimise energy use the outside air is tempered only and run-around-coils are used to maximise the free heat and cooling available from air returned from the occupied spaces. The office spaces are heated and cooled via in-ceiling fan coil units which incorporate high efficiency EC motors. The heat for the building is provided via high efficiency, condensing boilers with low NOx emissions. At the times when cooling is required, this is provided via a high efficiency, fully modulating air-cooled chiller unit incorporating state of the art turbocor mini centrifugal oil-free compressors, the chiller also incorporates an integral refrigerant leak detection system. The chiller unit is also a very low noise type this avoiding the possibility of disturbing adjacent neighbours. To reduce water usage, the cold water supply to toilets in controlled via solenoid valves linked to PIRs. Low flush WCs and a user detection system for the incoming mains cold water are also employed to further reduce water usage. Artificial lighting is fully addressable and digitally controlled via a lighting control management system. The lighting control system is also daylight linked providing automatic dimming down to 1% of output, ensuring maintained lighting levels are achieved throughout the office space. All areas, including office areas, are also controlled via presence sensing PIR devices with auto shut off and local user overrides. The office space luminaires all utilise high efficiency, high output T5 lamps. A fully integrated automatic controls/BMS system is installed to carry out the time scheduling, monitoring and control of the various mechanical services plant items. The controls strategy is designed to make the most efficient use of energy, whilst providing comfortable conditions within office spaces during seasonal ambient conditions. The controls strategy is also designed to aid operation and maintenance of plant items.   |