Tilbury Douglas will lead the construction of what it has described as the UK’s first purpose-built “biophilic” primary school – with net-zero carbon emissions.
The new St Mary’s Catholic Voluntary Academy in Derby – part of the St Ralph Sherwin Catholic Multi Academy Trust – is being built under a pilot scheme for the Department for Education.
Work on five single-storey pavilions, connected by a central canopy, is scheduled for completion by late 2023 to replace the original school, which was destroyed by arson in October 2020.
The new school will also feature an entrance building containing an assembly hall, chapel and communal areas.
Tilbury Douglas Engineering will deliver a natural ventilation strategy and air source heat pumps alongside renewable energy in the form of photovoltaic solar panels. It claimed that this will be the first primary school project in the UK to apply them.
Other ongoing net-zero educational schemes include the £50m Yeovil College from Bam Construct, a £57m secondary school in West Sussex and Galliford Try’s Marjorie McClure Special Needs and Disability School in Bromley, south London – which was named this week as one of Construction News’s 10 projects to watch in 2023.
Tilbury Douglas regional managing director Simon Butler claimed the biophilic approach, which emphasises connections between the built environment and the natural world, “will enhance [the] pupil experience and influence the next generation of school design”.
At St Mary’s, this means using materials such as i-FAST structural insulated panels and timber cedar cladding from Innovare Systems.
Other companies working on the scheme include project designers Hawkins Brown, Ares and Cundall.
The value of the job has not been disclosed.
The use of timber reflects its popularity as a means for the construction sector to reduce its embodied carbon footprint. The latest data from Timber Development UK, released on 15 December, described “long-term stability” in the supply chain despite “significant import volatility in 2021 and 2022”.
From January to September 2022, solid-wood imports were down 25 per cent year-on-year, although hardwood imports rose by 17.8 per cent.
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Ben Vogel