The building is home to Szencorp, a group of companies dedicated to property development, energy and water efficiency, and renewable energy.

According to Managing Director Peter Szental, 40 Albert Road showcases best practice sustainable development in buildings. 40 Albert Road was refurbished over a period of two years and completed ready for occupation in 2005.

Green retrofits

Szental points out that apart from new building projects, 98% of the building stock is already in existence. This means that while creating new sustainable buildings is important, the retrofitting of existing buildings should also be a priority.

40 Albert Road creates its own energy on site using a combination of the wind, sun, gas and fuel cells. In fact, the building is on track to begin to export energy back into the electricity grid by early 2007. Rather than shutting out the elements, 40 Albert Road harnesses them by using daylight, thermal mass and natural ventilation to help minimise its energy use.

Sensors track whether areas are being occupied so that air conditioning and lighting responds accordingly. “Other buildings have done this with lighting,” says Szental. “But this is the first time it’s been done with lighting and air conditioning.Waste is a terrible indictment especially given how precious energy is and the damage that can be done by greenhouse gas emissions.”

Already, a year after refurbishment, performance data has proven an 82% reduction in water usage, to less than 200 litres of mains water per day. Grey water from showers and basins is reused, along with captured rainwater to flush toilets – toilets are one of the largest water users in a corporate building. There are also strategies in place to minimise water use such as waterless urinals, electronic taps and low-flow showers. Energy usage has been cut by over 60% – in the last year the building consumed 85 megawatt hours (MWh), compared to 192 MWh the year before.

Szental believes the A$4.5 million investment in refurbishing the building will be recouped in as little as five years by the cost savings from lower water and energy bills alone.

Measurable sustainability performance

Szental says that while the building has been complete and operational since 2005, they are still focused on finding ways to improve outcomes. To help with this, there is a computerised metering and monitoring system to track energy and water usage. This information is provided online so that at any time, anyone can log on and see real-time data on how the building is performing. Monitoring systems not only automate and regulate water and energy use, they can confirm to building occupants that a sustainable design is actually delivering.

The process of creating and living in the first operating 6 Green Star-rated building in Australia has yielded many lessons which continue to shed light on what ‘green’ really is. For example, the system of natural ventilation was designed to cool the building by bringing fresh air in from outside. This seemed like a straightforward and healthy option. However, they found that incoming air from outside wasn’t nearly as clean as the pre-cleaned air that comes through the airconditioning system. Szental adds, “We also invested in interiors with low volatile organic compounds to improve indoor air quality, but if we open the windows the dust makes that a moot point.We’re still finding a solution but, in the meantime, we’re developing material on what works – and what doesn’t.”

Developing systems and skills

“I believe very firmly that sustainable development is a really good business model.We’re adding value and we’re not having to take the traditional,much more wasteful, approach which is to knock down a building then rebuild it.We’re redeveloping the building in a more sustainable way, doubling its value in the process, and creating a suite of services which we are now merchandising – so we can help others to benefit from what we’ve learned.”

As part of its core business, Szencorp group company Energy Conservation Systems is called on to provide advice in upgrading other buildings. It has been commissioned to provide heating and cooling systems derived purely from the sun for two Queensland hospitals. It is also part of a consortium of various companies to potentially develop one of the first green buildings in China.

As it stands, the building has attained a 6 Green Starrating from the Green Building Council, a 5 Star-rating from the Australian Building Greenhouse Rating and won numerous awards including the United Nations Australian Association World Environment Day Green Building Award and the Banksia Built Environment Award. But Szental is quick to point out that the journey has only just begun and, within the next year, the Szencorp group has even more ambitious plans up their sleeves. The initiatives are to become carbon-neutral, achieve zero waste-to-landfill and plans are afoot to make 40 Albert road completely energy self-sufficient so it can be taken off the grid entirely.

www.ourgreenoffice.com