St Cuthberts, Clondalkin – Rapid Build Housing

The development of 63No. new rapid build housing units as part of South Dublin County Council’s social housing portfolio development.

Delap and Waller were responsible for the design and periodic inspection of the Mechanical and Electrical Building Services and Sustainability Consulting Services including the development of TGD Part L Compliance Reports, Preliminary and Final Building Energy Rating Certificates for the development.

To achieve a BER rating of A2, the dwellings were designed with the principles of the energy hierarchy, whereby energy demand is minimised through a fabric first approach, before highly efficient services and renewable technologies are introduced. The glazing design was optimised to encourage high levels of natural daylight, whilst minimising excessive solar gains in the summer. Thermal bridging calculations were carried out for each dwelling to further passively minimise heat loss. Solar Photovoltaics were introduced once the fabric specification had been maximised to achieve an A2 rating.

DW prepared sample house layouts and PBERs as part of the D&B submission stage including detailed coordinated layouts for one house type, detailed site services and public lighting layouts.

Upon award of the contract and working as part of the design and building contractors design team, the project design was completed in approximately two months, with construction works completed in approximately one year. The emphasis at all times was on the rapid nature of the construction which required efficiencies in the design and inspection process (benchmarking of design and construction for ITT sign-off, dedicated workshops to review technical submittals and proposals etc.).