I am delighted to announce that I will be working with the WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature, not wrestling!) into 2014. I will be blogging more about the kind of projects I am going to be involved in over the coming months, but to start, I visited their new Living Planet Centre in Woking this week to meet some of the team….
This wonderful building boasts some fantastic sustainability features:
Top 10 sustainability features
1. Air ducts and heat pumps allow us to tap into the constant temperatures beneath the ground to heat or cool the building.
2. The curved timber ‘diagrid’ roof and the glass on it optimise natural light throughout the building. That reduces lighting demands.
3. We’ll generate our own electricity from the sun with carefully positioned solar panels on the roof. We expect this to cover up to a fifth of our electricity use.
4. The appliances we use will be among the most energy efficient around. We’ll monitor the building’s energy use carefully, and display this data within the building.
5. We’ve used recycled materials where we can, and all wood comes from responsibly-managed forests certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC).
6. We’ve planted shrubs, trees and flowers, and put up boxes to attract birds and bats. By encouraging biodiversity we want to bring the natural world onto the site.
7. We’re collecting rainwater and reusing ‘grey water’ from showers and hand basins, to flush toilets and water our plants.
8. In the construction of the building, we made sure as little waste as possible was sent to landfill. We aim to carry on recycling and composting and minimising the amount of waste we send to landfill.
9. We’re always looking for ways to reduce our air travel, and improved video conferencing facilities will really help.
10. We can be reached easily by public transport and we’ve provided plenty of sedum-covered bike racks (and showers!) to encourage staff to cycle.
I had a guided tour before I met some of the team… what a wonderful working space!
They also have a wonderful new classroom and have just started welcoming school visits…..
Another installation caught my eye… this wonderful collection of old WWF collection tins. These guys detect movement and spin round to follow you! It looked fantastic!
I am obviously delighted to have the opportunity to be working with such an iconic organisation… watch this space to find out more about the partnership over the coming months! Thank you to Kate, Cherry and Kellie for such a great meeting fired by combined enthusiasm!
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