Environmental adaptation of Desigual’s corporate headquarters in Barcelona

Motivation

The new headquarters of the Desigual company are found [EL1] the site known as the Nova Bocana or “new entrance” in the Port of Barcelona. The 20,600 m² building has 5 storeys with fronts facing mainly northeast and northwest. The interior of the building has an open plan design in order to create a comfortable, cooperative working atmosphere.

Results

Based on an exhaustive study of the basic and executive projects, fourteen improvements were proposed. Taken together, these modifications had the potential to reduce primary energy consumption by 50% compared to the base building. The main tasks that ERF performed in planning these proposals were:

• Study of sunlight and shade.
• Study of natural light use.
• Dynamic simulation of the building’s energy performance, and energy audits of more than 20 proposed improvements: changing the type of window panes; proportion of windows; control of natural lighting throughout the floor; adjusting set temperatures; use of a heat exchanger to generate part of the heating required; night-time ventilation in summer; use of CO₂ sensors to regulate ventilation; etc.
• Proposals to improve air conditioning systems
• Use of renewable energies
• Proposals to improve water saving and reuse
• Proposals to promote sustainable mobility
• Use of low-impact materials
• Cost-benefit analysis of improvement solutions with estimate of environmental and economic impact.

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