Net Zero in Operation – A Welsh masterclass for sustainable school development
A thought-provoking technical feature by Building magazine highlights ISG’s South Point Primary School project and the company’s longstanding relationship with the Vale of Glamorgan Council.
Data is the unlikely hero in this thought provoking technical feature by Building magazine focusing on ISG’s South Point Primary School project and the company’s enduring relationship with the Vale of Glamorgan council. Over a decade in the making, ISG has been transforming the Vale’s early years education provision, with a template design school model that has been iteratively improved through the use of post-occupancy data analysis to ultimately deliver the first Net Zero in Operation Welsh School.
Capturing the very essence of collaborative partnerships that foster innovation and support a continuous drive to optimise building performance for occupants and the environment, this article charts the journey from the Vale’s initial concept to build in a different way that reduces waste, costs and time – through to a potential challenge to the Welsh government’s ‘free access’ policy. Jane O’Leary, ISG’s sector director for education, also examines how this standardised and data-led approach opens up major opportunities for domestically based manufacturers to capitalise on a predictable demand-led market for key construction components.
"We looked at the art of the possible because this was about evolution, not revolution. We had a design that worked and didn’t want to change that because teaching and learning is the most important element."
Jane O'Leary, Sector Director - Education, ISG
If the goal of education is the advancement of knowledge and the dissemination of truth, then the work being done by Vale of Glamorgan council on net zero buildings deserves an A* grading. It declared a climate emergency in 2019 with the goal of achieving net zero by 2030 and, at the same time, said it wanted to influence and encourage others to do the same.
The council had already implemented a standardised primary school design with contractor ISG in 2014 and, by studiously applying the lessons from this to subsequent projects, has now delivered an operationally net zero school with the evidence to prove that it really works.
An essential read for everyone that believes collaboration and long-term partnerships deliver better outcomes for customers, society and our planet. Find the full Building article here.
This is not ISG’s first exemplar net zero project that Building has covered in detail – see here for a report on The Entopia Building – a multi-award-winning deep office retrofit for Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.
