One City Park is a new commercial office facility located in the centre of Bradford. It is the first new office building constructed in the city in 25 years and offers approximately 56,000 square feet of Grade A office space across five floors. The building was completed in August 2023, well in time for the Bradford City of Culture 2025 celebrations.
One City Park is a newly constructed, energy-efficient building with high specifications. It has achieved a gold rating in both the SmartScore* and WiredScore** assessments, as well as an excellent rating from BREEAM***. G&H was appointed by Caddick Construction, the main contractor, to provide the mechanical, electrical, and public health (MEP) design and build services, which contributed to meeting these standards. Their designs and calculations led to the installation of additional photovoltaic (PV) panels on the roof to enhance energy efficiency, the use of air source heat pumps for heating and cooling the building, and the addition of ten electric vehicle (EV) charge points in the car park.
In addition, G&H installed a total of 41 eco-cistem® units, 12 units per floor, to significantly reduce the building’s freshwater usage. The eco-cistem™ product utilises grey condensate water for flushing toilets. It works in conjunction with the building’s air conditioning units, which produce varying amounts of condensate water that typically goes directly into the waste pipe. In an eco-cistem™ installation, this grey water is redirected to a specially designed toilet cistern to be used for flushing the toilets.
The eco-cistem™ unit features a patented 18-litre, twin-chamber cistern that can store up to 12 litres of condensate grey water above a standard 6-litre chamber dedicated to flushing the toilet. The unit prioritises using grey water for flushing and only pulls in fresh water when no grey water is available, ensuring an efficient flush each time with no reduction in performance when condensate levels are low.
The eco-cistem™ product was monitored on site and savings measured showed that an estimated 600,000 litres of fresh water will be saved annually when the building is fully occupied.
David Davis, Pre-Construction Director at G&H explains: “The eco-cistem™ units are an ideal way to use the grey condensate water produced by the air conditioning units. We based the measurement on the calculated cooling load for the building which was being offset by the fan coil units in the ceiling void. Using our bespoke calculator we were able to input data including the anticipated condensate produced annually, number of flushes and cost of water. This resulted in an anticipated return on investment of less than three years and contributed valuable BREEAM points to the project with little additional cost.”
*SmartScore certification recognises and promotes technologically advanced smart buildings that deliver exceptional user experiences, drive cost efficiency, meet high standards of sustainability, and are fully future-ready. This includes smart building systems, cyber security, sustainability and more.
**WiredScore – This is the global standard for technology in the built world. It focuses on the quality and resilience of the digital connectivity in the building including the telecommunications, risers, mobile and wifi connectivity.
***BREEAM stands for Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method. It is a sustainability assessment for buildings and infrastructure and measures a building’s environmental impact and performance throughout its lifecycle. https://breeam.com/about/how-breeam-works
