Office building in the „BayWa-Areal Zwanzig Zwanzig“ equipped with aquatherm black– Living, living, working – this is what connects the „BayWa-Areal Zwanzig Zwanzig“ in Ludwigsburg. Over the past four years, the residential construction company Strenger has transformed the former BayWa AG company property into a modern urban quarter.
Five residential buildings with a total of 113 apartments and two office buildings have been built in Ludwigsburg‘s Weststadt. The district name combines the history of the international energy, agricultural, and construction company BayWa with the completion date of the residential complex in 2020. A district square separates the residential buildings from the commercial areas in which service providers and start-ups have settled. For the companies, the advantages of the area are obvious: Logistically, it convinces with its good connection to the LudwigsburgH auptbahnhof, the city center, and the motorway; the well thought-out architectural concept is not only sustainable and resource-saving, but also impresses with its architecture.
For example, Office Building 2: Office space of 200 to 3000 square metres has been created on around 9000 square metres over three floors and with a KfW 55 standard. Depending on tenant needs, these can be divided individually – from open-plan offices to individual offices, everything is possible. The client attached great importance to healthy building materials as well as green facades and flat roofs. Bike sharing ensures a healthy and cost-neutral way to get around on short distances. In addition, the costs for heating and cooling the rooms should be as low as possible – without sacrificing comfort. That is why Michael Engelhart, Managing Director of the Engelhart planning office in Weißenhorn, planned the aquatherm black surface heating and cooling system in a perforated acoustic ceiling. „I have been familiar with the system for several years and like to use it again and again, for example in my own offices,“ says Michael Engelhart. „The reasons are, for example, the faster and easier assembly than with other systems and the simple technology.“
18% ENERGY SAVINGS FROM THERMAL RADIATION
Im BayWa-Bürogebäude gab es einige Herausforderungen, die im Bereich Beheizung und Kühlung gelöst werden mussten. „The large number of – sometimes small – rooms made planning difficult,“ says Michael Engelhart. „Numerous rooms should also have a constant 24 degree Celsius, as they are used as treatment rooms. Therefore, high heating loads must be covered. Together with the planning support of aquatherm, it was possible to meet all requirements.“
aquatherm black made of the corrosionresistant plastic polypropylene does not heat the air, but the floor, the walls, the furniture – everything that is in the rooms. For this purpose, the system is installed in the ceiling and gently heats it to surface temperatures of up to 26 °C. The energy is now released into the room as heat radiation. Where the heat radiation hits objects, they are heated. The measured air temperature with this type of heating can be about 3°C lower than with convection heaters due to the uniform heat radiation of the room enclosing surfaces – the thermometer shows 20°C and it feels like 23°C. This promotes well-being and also saves around 18% energy.
Installation in the ceiling also offers systemic advantages for passive cooling: Unlike conventional air conditioning systems, which extract heat from the room through ventilation operation with air movement, climate ceilings mainly dissipate the cooling load from the room by means of radiation. With the exception of the partly hygienically necessary air exchange through this process, draughts are excluded or reduced to a minimum.
High heating and cooling capacities
Due to the small installation distance of the register pipes and the resulting high surface density per square metre, aquatherm black can be operated with lower flow temperatures than conventional heating or higher flow temperatures than other cooling systems. In combination with its fast responsiveness, this enables particularly efficient and energy-saving operation under changing conditions.
Polypropylene – a by-product of crude oil processing – is one of the two most important standard plastics. Life cycle analyses in accordance with ISO 14040 are used to investigate the effects of raw material production on the environment. Studies have shown significantly lower CO2 emissions from polypropylene pipes compared to other raw materials, especially steel. aquatherm, headquartered in Attendorn, has been processing this raw material, which is characterised by a long service life and very good environmental compatibility and recyclability, for around 50 years. Most of the plastic waste generated from the economic and production process is recycled internally and partially processed into new products.
The system was installed by Artukovic Akustikdecken GmbH in Stuttgart. For Managing Director Diana Artukovic, it was the first project with a product from aquatherm. „We didn‘t know aquatherm black before and initially had concerns about installing the system,“ she explains. „However, the surface heating and cooling system convinced us within the shortest possible time: Thanks to the support of aquatherm, we learned how to process the material polypropylene very quickly and we were particularly impressed by the speed of assembly. We are already looking forward to further joint projects!“
