Client Office of Public Works
Location Navan, County Meath, Ireland
Value Confidential
An ambitious proposal to rectify poor construction of an existing building and to upgrade all systems to achieve future decarbonisation goals
About the project
As part of the proposed refurbishment of Kilcairn Office of Public Works (OPW), IN2 was appointed to carry out an energy upgrade analysis in order to align the building with decarbonisation and Net- Zero goals. The OPW Climate Action Plan was designed with energy reduction, carbon emission reduction, and the elimination of fossil fuels for heating in mind.
The retrofit of Ireland's commercial and public sector buildings is central to reaching Ireland’s 2030 and 2050 national decarbonisation targets, these being aimed at all buildings to have Net-Zero status by 2050.
In order to assess potential carbon and energy performance measures of the existing building a representative energy model was created using Dynamic Simulation Modelling (EDSL TAS software). This energy model is designed to represent the form, orientation, and fabric of the existing building and was dynamically simulated on an hourly basis over the course of a whole year, thereby predicting associated energy for heating, domestic hot water (DHW), cooling, lighting, and office equipment.
The fabric of the building was also assessed and included the insulation of exposed floors, external walls, rooves, and roof terraces. The assessment of the glazing also informed the natural ventilation strategy that IN2 proposed in order to reduce emissions associated with heating and cooling.
In addition to fabric improvements, IN2 considered various potential Building Services upgrades; namely the strategy of replacing the gas boilers which were still relatively new. This posed a problem as the OPW Climate Action Plan prohibits the use of fossil fuels in retrofitted buildings, and there should be a planned phase-out of fossil fuel heating in order to meet 2030 Net-Zero targets. Therefore, IN2 proposed replacing gas boilers with Air Source Heat Pumps (ASHP/s), with the added possibility to use ASHP/s for both space and water heating.
Analyses discovered potential significant upgrade measures that would offer considerable improved performance. Each of these measures were undertaken as part of the now-completed building, ensuring a 79% carbon emission reduction, a 78% energy reduction, and an improved BER rating of A2 with a predicted primary energy performance of 88 kwh/m².yr.
