Given the hullabaloo that surrounded the design of CH2 back
in the green pioneering days of the mid ‘noughties’ it is tempting to
experience a sense of engineering schadenfreude
when reading Exergy’s report into the building’s performance six years down the
track. To do so though would be misguided and do a disservice to the client and
designers who had the vision and resolve to create a building that sought to
push the boundaries of engineering practice.
Using a term borrowed from the car industry, CH2 can be
considered a ‘concept building’. Just as concept cars are built to experiment
and inform the design of the next generation of vehicles so this building has
provided a showcase for the design of sustainable commercial buildings, some aspects
of which have flourished in its wake and others of which have withered. It was
always going to be thus.
The findings of the Exergy study bring to light a stark
issue that engineers grapple with constantly – that of simplicity versus complexity.
Again we might draw on a comparison with the car industry here. The cars we
drive have gone down the complex technology route to arrive at a point where
even the most basic of servicing is beyond the skill set of the owner. That
works because volume of production has allowed systems to be fine-tuned to a
point of high reliability and servicing is easily accessed. In building design
we do not have the luxury of volume to hone solutions and we cannot simply
drive our systems down to the service centre for attention. So the buildings we
design need to be robust and assured in their operation. As City of Melbourne
have discovered looking after a concept building is problematic for the owner
and, more so even than normal, regular servicing and tuning is a pre-requisite
for optimum performance.
Innovation in the construction industry is a challenging
business and concept buildings are few and far between. Most projects in the
office sector have a commercial imperative and innovation opportunities are
hard to realise. It is evident that the most enduringly successful aspect of
the CH2 design is the introduction of chilled beams which around the same time
were implemented at 30 The Bond in Sydney and subsequently became the office
standard for high end new office space. And the most notable characteristic of
chilled beams is their simplicity.
CH2’s complex array of interwoven thermal systems cries out
‘trying too hard’. I can just imagine the designers sitting and pondering every
possible interplay between systems that might theoretically eke out a few extra
kilograms of carbon saving. In reality though it has turned into an all too
familiar story with the complexities of the system having gone beyond the
capability of the control system to achieve and maintain optimum performance
over a sustained period of time (if indeed it ever did).
With the on-going attention and tuning that has been
proposed I am sure that the performance of the building can be improved to a
credible level. After all, despite the green ‘bling’, the fundamentals of what
have been created are sound.
Whilst there are no doubt many learnings
that can be taken from CH2 the over-riding lesson is clear; elegant simplicity
eats complex technology for breakfast.
Tw: @andrewpettifer
