Great Glen House, Inverness08/11/2007When it opened in July 2006, Great Glen House in Inverness, the headquarters of Scottish Natural Heritage and the Deer Commission in Scotland, was accredited as being the greenest building in the whole of the UK. It achieved the highest ever BREEAM rating and set a new standard for low energy buildings.
The building takes advantage of arguably the most renewable energy source available to all - the sun - and employs passive solar and wind effects to achieve a naturally ventilated office space that provides an excellent environment for effective working.
In the building, the glazed atrium is naturally heated at high level by the sun to set up a chimney effect that draws cooler air through the offices. The concrete ceiling slab also acts as a daytime heat sink to absorb any excess heat generated by solar gain or by the occupants and their computers. At night, after warm sunny days, windows on the north side of the building open at high level , and cool air is pulled over the underside of the concrete slabs to cool them down.
For the designers, Keppie Design, the building sets a standard that brushes away the widely held perception that sustainability is a theoretical subject, is only applicable to smaller buildings, and is not cost effective. Great Glen House was designed with an attitude that old habits can be broken, and that sustainability can be achieved by applying basic principles about saving resource and using what is free and cheaply available nearby. It used state of the art technology where appropriate, combined with common sense and low-tech solutions.
As a result, Great Glen House has been awarded a number of accolades, including most recently the BCO Award for Best Corporate Workplace 2007.
