PROJECT
exteriors
Thermal Breaks Cut Balcony Heat Loss The PARC Retirement Living’s Oceana facility design insulates parapets and balconies with 2,000+ structural thermal breaks.
O
n the Johnston Road Corridor in the city of White Rock (Metro Vancouver area), PARC Retirement Living, Vancouver, British
Columbia,
is
implementing
innovative
building-
envelope technology and sustainable design throughout its Oceana PARC residence. PARC director of construction Bob Fritz stated, “We’re an owner/operator, so energy efficiency is very important to us, not only for our residents’ comfort, but also because of lower operating costs and lower heating and cooling bills.” As with two of PARC Retirement Living’s other Vancouver-area retirement residences, Cedar Springs PARC and Westerleigh PARC, Oceana PARC’s energy-saving measures include a planted roof with droughttolerant vegetation and a robust building envelope of 6-in., semi-rigid stone-wool insulation on the exterior and 3 1/2-in. fiberglass batt insulation inside the walls. The building envelope also incorporates 5,970 linear ft. of Isokorb structural thermal breaks that significantly reduce energy loss at the balconies. Additional energy-saving measures at Oceana PARC include heat-recovery ventilators, rooftop high-efficiency boilers feeding hot-water storage tanks, a hot-water recirculation system, exclusive use of LED lighting, and concrete parapets insulated from the heated building interior by structural thermal breaks.
A rendering of Oceana PARC and its two buildings highlights balconies, parapets, and shading eyebrows.
STOPPING HEAT LOSS
Thermal bridges occur where balconies, parapets, cano-
bridging concerns at its parapets, which the PARC team
pies, rooftop equipment, and other structural elements
mitigated by installing Isokorb Type CPA structural ther-
“On the Cedar Springs and Westerleigh retirement
penetrate the building envelope. Like heat-sink fins, these
mal breaks engineered for concrete parapet-to-roof-slab
residences, we installed Isokorb thermal breaks in the
penetrations draw heat from interior concrete and struc-
connections.
slabs at the balconies and eyebrows,” said Fritz. “In those
length of balconies/parapets, and other variables.
tural steel through the insulated envelope, dissipating
Supplied by Schöck North America, Princeton, NJ,
buildings we didn’t have conditions where we had
it to the exterior. In addition to increasing energy use,
and Ottawa, Ontario, the structural thermal-break mod-
upstand parapets. While working on the Oceana PARC
carbon emissions, and costs, thermal bridges chill the
ules comprise a longitudinal block of foam insulation
design, Schöck told us about a new thermal-break product
interior side of structural penetrations. This creates an
traversed by rebar that is cast into the slab on one side and
that specifically deals with thermal bridging at parapet
environment for condensation and mold growth, and
the balcony or parapet on the other, providing load-
upstands. And we have quite a lot of parapets on this proj-
results in uncomfortably cold floors adjacent to balco-
bearing support equivalent to that of monolithic exten-
ect. So, we incorporated those thermal breaks as well.”
nies—an issue of particular significance for retirement
sions of floor and roof slabs. The rebar crossing the foam
Two buildings comprise the Oceana PARC complex—
residences.
insulation is made of stainless steel for corrosion
a 23-story tower main building and a two-story auxiliary
resistance.
building. Containing 199 residential units, the tower
Of Oceana PARC’s 199 residential living units, 181 include balconies, which are insulated using Isokorb
Schöck finds that its concrete-to-concrete structural
building provides approximately 202,800 sq. ft. of gross
structural thermal breaks in the same manner as the
thermal breaks reduce heat energy loss at envelope pene-
floor area. The two-story auxiliary building adds another
Cedar Springs PARC and Westerleigh PARC balconies.
trations by as much as 90% and as much as 14% for the
8,600 sq. ft. of gross floor area, and connects to the main
However, Oceana PARC presented additional thermal
overall building, depending on the number of balconies,
building by an enclosed bridge. Also included is a two-
commercialarchitecturemagazine.com
NOVEMBER 2018
COMMERCI A L A RCHI T EC T URE
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