23 November 2006

Education

School Buildings and Energy Efficiency

Ciarán Cuffe asked the Minister for Education and Science the proportion of school buildings that have double glazed windows; if she has plans to provide energy labelling or building energy rating certificates for school buildings as provided for under the European Building Performance Directive; and if she will make a statement on the matter.

Minister for Education and Science (Ms Hanafin):

The information sought by the Deputy is not readily available in my Department.

However, my Department is reviewing renewable options for energy generation in schools through a number of research projects including, Tory wind turbine project, Interreg solar hot water heating projects and Biomass wood pellet / wood chip boiler and solar projects. My Department would encourage schools to consider the use of wind-generated electricity which is available nationally through the National Grid. This in effect allows the school to benefit from the environmental and lower cost benefits of wind generated electricity without being exposed to operating and maintenance issues and reliability of supply.

The Tory Island project involves the supply and installation of two wind turbines to provide electrical energy to serve the existing community facility and Vocational School situated on Tory Island.

With respect to energy programmes that would compliment environmental work currently taking place under the green flags initiative for the past eight years the Planning and Building Unit within my Department have been using a process called the DART approach (Design, Awareness, Research, and Technology) to develop sustainable and energy efficiency in educational buildings. The policy is driven by technical guidance documents, informed by building unit professional and technical staff, external partnerships and updated by continued energy research and development.

Rather than develop a unique focus on energy design my Department has taken a more holistic approach and have developed their technical guidance on energy efficiency in school designs as an integral part of the suite of technical guidance documents. These guidelines encourage the design team to take a complete design team approach from project conception is encouraged.

The incorporation of low energy design has been done on a hybrid basis by maximising natural resources and utilising technologies. This involves focusing on areas such as natural ventilation, passive solar design, day lighting and reducing infiltration, enhanced insulation, lighting and heating controls and water efficiency.

The focus to date on sustainability in schools has been to reduce the energy demand in schools. This has proven quite successful with modern day schools typically using three times less energy than schools built ten years ago and also using less than half the energy than what is termed as good international practice for schools.