Sunderland primary care centre scoops 'green' awards

Published: 22-May-2012

Low-energy building a flagship for carbon reduction in the NHS

A recently-opened primary care centre in Sunderland has been singled out for praise, picking up two environmental awards for sustainability.

Low-energy ventilation specialist, Breathing Buildings, and building services consultants, Mott MacDonald, picked up the CIBSE Building Services Best Practice Award at the Construction Excellence North East Awards 2012 for their work on the Houghton-Le-Spring Primary Care Centre. The centre also won the CENE Legacy Award for Sustainability .

Designed by P+HS architects, the facility was built to be highly energy efficient, winning an innovation credit in the BREEAM assessment and becoming the first healthcare building in the UK to be awarded an ‘outstanding’ rating.

The centre boasts a 50m-long thermal wall running along the spine of the building. This is split into 49 individual shafts to separate the ventilation for individual spaces and therefore reduce the potential for infection transfer within the building.

Commenting on the awards, Shaun Fitzgerald, co-founder and managing director of Breathing Buildings, said: “This was an exciting project to be involved with and it clearly demonstrates our wealth of expertise and our ability to deliver low-energy ventilation solutions in extremely challenging environments.”

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