W: www.b4ed.com


Longer lives for sports shoes and play facilities


Playtop with Nike Grind is a unique playground surfacing made of up to 91 per cent recycled rubber that is, in some cases, 30 per cent cheaper than conventional play surfacing materials. Nike Grind is the rubber from pre-loved


sports shoes, which is recycled and used to create eight striking Playtop surfacing colours. The result? Vibrant, resilient, safer playground surfacing that is made from up to 91 per cent recycled rubber and encourages children to become more engaged in active play. The Playtop with


Nike Grind range consists of eight colour options, all of which are made from at least 70 per cent worn-out sports shoes and recycled rubber products. The black blend is made from an impressive 91 per cent. In every square metre of Playtop with Nike Grind, there is rubber from up to 22 sports shoes. The range is available in black, green,


red, blue, plum, sand, brown and flame. All of the Playtop with Nike Grind blends are fully compliant with all international


standards for critical fall height to ensure that they expertly balance comfort, endurance and protection – core components of any play facility. In fewer than two generations,


children’s involvement in physical activity has declined by an astounding 20 per cent with projections predicting a further decline of an additional 15 per cent by 2030. As worrying figures claim this generation of children will die on average five years earlier than their parents due to a lack of physical exercise, Playtop believes a stronger investment in active play within school facilities could make all the difference. This latest generation of


playground surfacing provides a great story that children can relate to, combining sustainability with durability for an improved play experience. To see all the facts, visit www.


designedtomove.org For more information on the Playtop with Nike Grind range, visit www.playtop.co.uk


Sustainable expansion for Kingsbury


delivered within a school year with on-site construction taking 15 weeks. Based on a lightweight steel frame, with insulated wall and roof panels, the building was completed for £200,000. Headmaster Simon Coton said:


ABOVE: the new building at KIngsbury


Needing space to accommodate new sixth-form places, Kingsbury School in rural north Warwickshire opted for a fully insulated structure from Smart Space which is compliant with simplified building energy model (SBEM) calculations. To meet the school’s operational needs the new building, comprising three classrooms, was


“Sustainability is a key element of this project so we sought tenders on this basis. Smart Space came back with a competitive proposal that balanced the use of innovative technology with more conventional approaches to give us a functional and highly efficient building within budget.” To meet the sustainability target,


special features include: a secondary internal lining with 40mm insulated foam board, an insulated floor slab, underfloor heating and primary heating from an air-source heat pump. A high-efficiency boiler provides domestic hot water and lighting is by energy-efficient LEDs.


New research into sustainable business strategies challenges the perception that sustainable buildings are more costly to construct. A team from Sweet Group and BRE applied cost data from real construction projects to three case-study buildings – an office, secondary school and community healthcare centre – to produce detailed capital and operational cost information. Their report, ‘Delivering


Sustainable Buildings: Savings and Payback’, presents the actual costs of a range of individual sustainability strategies and the additional costs (if any) of achieving various levels of overall building sustainability in terms of BREEAM sustainability ratings. In addition, it reveals the associated payback to be gained from reduced utility costs. The study investigated


the capital costs of measures to improve sustainability, including readily usable no- or low-cost measures, along with those which must be built into the project early on to minimise their costs. The researchers concluded


that achieving the lower BREEAM ratings can incur litle or no additional cost. Targeting the higher BREEAM ratings incurs some additional cost, but this is typically less than two per cent. The investigation of life-cycle operational costs showed that any additional cost can be paid back within two to five years through utility savings.


MYTHS ABOUT SUSTAINABILITY BUSTED


SPE CIAL


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49