Coventry University research has found that 40 per cent of primary school classrooms examined in a study did not have an adequate ventilation rate to combat the spread of Covid-19.
Complete with butterfly roofed extension, this fabric first renovation has turned a cold and uninspiring 1970s bungalow into a cosy A-rated modern home, with some clever design touches helping to open the house up to wide-angle views and dramatic coastal light.
Sometimes it takes the constraints of a challenging site to bring out the best possible design, and that was certainly the case for this Limerick City passive house, where the project team managed to deliver a unique, curving passive house in response to a tricky urban plot.
This issue features a new nursery school in Paris, built to the Passive House Institute’s low energy building standard.
In recent years, as energy efficiency targets for new buildings have tightened, attention has turned to cutting the embodied carbon of buildings by switching from materials like concrete and steel to lower carbon alternatives like timber. But if we are serious about solving the ecological emergency as well as stabilising the climate, we must look even further than embodied carbon, and think more deeply about the core values we apply to materials and buildings, and the manner in which we use them.
By Lenny Antonelli & AECB CEO Andy Simmonds
In 2017 the government promised it would deliver 50,000 homes over the next five years as part of its Rebuilding Ireland programme. But figures from the first four years show it has fallen well short, writes Mel Reynolds.
Leading Irish heating appliance manufacturer Grant has invested over €250,000 in enabling the use of hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) in traditional oil boilers.
The National Construction Training Centre in County Laois is aiming to meet the challenge of training the huge number of skilled workers needed for Ireland’s planned housebuilding and deep retrofitting programmes.