Monodraught SunCatchers, Windcatchers and Monovents bring natural ventilation and lighting to Penryn College students, and help Cornwall County Council achieve a BREEAM ‘Excellent’ rating.

Cornwall’s Penryn College is a ‘Building Schools for the Future’ Pathfinder project. Opened in September, a year ahead of schedule, the £20m, 8500 square metres college accommodates 1150 pupils aged 11-18.

St Ives-based Architect, Poynton Bradbury Wynter Cole (PBWC) and main contractor Carillion were presented with the challenge of providing a solution that could be built in a single phase to minimise disruption, and would achieve a BREEAM ‘Excellent’ rating, to meet Cornwall County Council’s brief.

To achieve outstanding environmental performance the ‘inside out’ architectural approach prioritised a combination of natural daylight and natural ventilation and cooling. Central to both schemes were a total of 42 Monodraught SunCatchers, Windcatchers and Monovents. As well as satisfying the environmental and cost criteria, specifying bespoke Windcatcher and Monovent designs ensured that these comparatively large units at 3300mm x 1800mm complemented the overall design concept.

To achieve the BREEAM ‘Excellent’ rating the design team had to resolve the often conflicting requirements of DfES Building Bulletin 101 (ventilation) and BB93 (acoustics). However, as the Penryn site benefits from a semi-rural location and low background noise levels, the team was able to adopt a natural ventilation solution for the majority of the school.

Windcatchers were chosen to ventilate the 8350 cubic metre sports hall and 2240 cubic metre main hall for a number of reasons, the most important being that these units could be designed and sized to meet the exact ventilation needs of the spaces, without relying on external elements. In the sports hall the system is designed to accommodate up to 220 pupils – a whole year group for the exam period!

In addition, the Monodraught Windcatcher units were used on Classrooms to provide effective night-time cooling – one of the key principles of the scheme’s natural ventilation strategy; and they are inherently reliable, containing few moving parts. Significantly, Windcatchers and Monovents also attract a high BREEAM assessment rating.

As the decision to use Windcatchers was taken early, PBWC and environmental engineers Hulley & Kirkwood were able to work closely with Monodraught, who provided a detailed analysis of the project. Mitie Engineering was the M&E Contractor.

Daylighting was also an important feature of the specification and good natural daylight levels are achieved using Monodraught SunPipes. Three 450mm diameter SunPipes were also installed in the staff/administration block main corridor, and two 530mm diameter SunPipes in the sports hall changing room lobbies.

At roof level SunPipes feature a UV-protected polycarbonate diamond dome that directs natural daylight into a silverised mirror finish aluminium tube. This intensifies and reflects the daylight and sunlight down from the roof into the building, where a prismatic polycarbonate ceiling fitting provides even light diffusion. The SunPipe system was favoured for its energy efficiency, effectiveness in both sunny and overcast conditions, and its ability to provide long term cost savings through reduced electricity bills and low maintenance.

Email: angela.dell@monodraught.com