NEW BENCHMARK FOR ULTRA LOW ENERGY SPORTS FACILITIES

RAVELIN SPORTS CENTRE AT UNIVERSITY OF PORTSMOUTH

The project, designed by FaulknerBrowns Architects in close collaboration with consultants Max Fordham, provides facilities for both the University of Portsmouth and the wider city. The centre combines a swimming pool, sports hall, fitness facilities and teaching space in an open and transparent building, to visibly promote health and wellbeing on campus. The design is fossil fuel-free and has demonstrated an operational energy consumption of less than 100 kWh/m2/year – a level of performance which no other equivalent sports centre in the UK has yet demonstrated.

Making activity visible

Ravelin Sports Centre provides a 25m eight-lane swimming pool, an eight-court sports hall, a 175-station fitness suite, multifunctional studios, climbing and bouldering facilities. The centre also includes two flexible squash courts, a ski simulator, teaching facilities and office space. The building aims to make these facilities visible and welcoming.

At ground level, the building is open and animated by uninterrupted glazing, providing views into the active spaces. These views provide a vibrant addition to the campus and streetscape, making the activities inside highly visible to engage students and passers-by. From within, the glazing blends the boundary between inside and outside, to create uplifting and naturally lit settings for exercise.

Breaking down barriers to participation

At the entrance, there are no barriers or turnstiles – instead, people are encouraged to wander through the building and discover different activities. Glazed internal walls mean café visitors can watch swimming training and see the gym facilities available, while the main staircase leads people past an open climbing and bouldering wall.

The three key sports spaces each have a distinct architectural character while sharing a material palette. The sports hall is a tall, top-lit, timber-lined box and the fitness suite is defined by giant cooling fans within a timber-lined ceiling. The swimming pool is naturally lit from both the sides and above, with timber soffits marking the perimeter of the water.

Each key sports space is accompanied by „fringe“ spaces – areas overlooking the facilities, where people can dwell, socialise or study to help break down barriers to participation. The centre also includes changing areas that are accessible to all, with choices for different levels of privacy rather than separating all the facilities by gender.

Ambitious targets for energy use

As the first project to be completed in the university’s masterplan, Ravelin Sports Centre has set the standard for future campus projects, in terms of both architectural quality and their ambition to become carbon neutral. FaulknerBrowns Architects and Max Fordham collaborated closely from the very start of the project to meet ambitious targets for energy use.

Welcoming Gateway

Ravelin Sports Centre is open to local people as well as students, to create a welcoming gateway into the campus from the old town of Portsmouth. Located at the edge of Ravelin Park, the fitness suite, studios and sports hall are all positioned along the more urban side of the site, while the swimming pool overlooks the park, giving the feeling of swimming amongst the trees.

To achieve a transparent ground plane, the more constrained volume of the sports hall is elevated on the first floor. This level is wrapped in a band of terracotta cladding „baguettes“, in a randomly varying pattern of natural tones picking out the colours of surrounding buildings.

The sports hall volume extends above this, expressed in a skin of light and reflective metal panels which blend subtly with the sky.

The building’s low carbon features include:

• A compact building form and efficient external envelope, to minimise heat loss.

• Extensive natural lighting, including to the sports hall and swimming pool, providing sunlight which contributes to heating the pool for most of the year.

• Natural and mixed-mode ventilation for free cooling in the summer, alongside integrated ceiling fans in the fitness suite to generate air movement, reducing cooling demands.

• Heating from air source heat pumps and heat recovery, from cooling and ventilation systems and waste pool water.

• A bio-solar roof with a 1,000 m² photovoltaic array, generating 224 MWhs of renewable energy per year and reducing demand from the grid by over 20 %.

• Automatic system controls for heating, cooling, ventilation, and lighting to provide optimum, efficient conditions for all activities, occupancy levels and weather conditions.

• Recycling of pool water for changing facilities.

Intensive post occupancy monitoring and user feedback has been used to fine tune systems and controls for optimum comfort and energy efficiency. In the first six months since opening, this data has shown the building’s operational energy consumption is less than 100 kWh/m2/year, around one tenth of the energy demand of an equivalent typical sports centre, without compromising sport environments or user experience. This ultra-low level of carbon emissions from an all-electric building is compatible with a net-zero carbon future.

Location

Aarburg, Switzerland

Client

Gemeinde Aarburg

Architects (ARGE)

EpprechtArchitekten SIA HTL AG www.epprechtarchitekten.ch

Jenzer+Partner AG www.jenzer-partner.ch

Authors

Vanessa Vogler

Jonas Kallenbach

Markus Gutknecht

Photos

Balthasar Epprecht Official