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November 2004
CONTENT
Page
MESSAGE FROM CHAIRMAN OF CIBSE HONG KONG
BRANCH 2004/2005
1
CONGRATULATORY MESSAGES
Message from CIBSE President
Message from CIBSE Chief Executive
Message from the Founding Chairman of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Message from Immediate Past Chairman of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Message from Past Chairmen of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Message from Chair Professor of Building Services Engineering Department,
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
2
3
4-5
6
7-11
12
CIBSE HONG KONG BRANCH
The Committee Members of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch 2004/2005
Activities of the CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Young Members Group of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Brief History on the Formation of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
14-15
16-19
20-22
23
BUILDING SERVICES DEVELOPMENT IN HONG KONG
Review and Foresight
The Development of Building Services Engineering in Hong Kong
Review of Building Services Development in Hong Kong
Education, Research and Development
Development of BSE Education in Hong Kong
Research Works on Building Services Engineering in
Academic Institutions of Hong Kong
Public Sector
Hong Kong Science Park – Phase 1
The Development of Sustainable Design of Building Services Installations
for Disciplinary Forces Buildings
A Sustainable Design Solution of Building Services Installations for
Public Health Laboratory Center
Development of Building Services Engineering in Public Housing Estates
Private Sector
Two IFC
Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre
Tseung Kwan O Hospital
Sustainable Development of E&M Off-Site Fabrication in Hong Kong
Design Air-conditioning System for SARS Wards
Cyberport Development at Telegraph Bay, Hong Kong
24-32
33-40
41-47
48-51
52-57
58-63
64-69
70-75
76-92
93-96
97-101
102-108
109-111
112-127
The idea for producing this booklet germinated during discussions among members of our
previous CIBSE Hong Kong Branch Committee 2003/2004 led by our Immediate Past
Chairman, Ir Victor Cheung, and in April 2004 our current Committee endorsed the
production of this memorable issue commemorating the 25 th anniversary of the
establishment of our Hong Kong Branch. I am very grateful for the support our Hong Kong
Branch Committee members and of course our Hong Kong Branch members have given in
contributing to the production of this commemorative booklet.
The editors have collated a very comprehensive set of papers covering interesting
development of building services engineering in Hong Kong in the private, public and the
academic sectors of our profession. I congratulate the editors and authors for their excellent
work and I hope that through the various papers, we would all have a very useful reference
for our members in the Hong Kong Branch as well as CIBSE members elsewhere.
My sincere thanks to all the members who have taken part in making this memorable issue
successfully realized.
Ronald S. Chin
Chairman
CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Committee 2004/2005
A measure of the international recognition of any organization is its number of overseas
members and the amount of activity they generate. CIBSE is very proud and pleased to be
part of the Building Services community in Hong Kong, which has contributed so much to
the creation of many of the world’s outstanding buildings over the last 30 years.
The skill, knowledge and ability of your engineers owe a great deal to the structure of
education and training, which has always been of the highest standard. However, this has
been matched by a commitment and enthusiasm to share that learning with others, and the
CIBSE Hong Kong Branch has played a leading role in this for 25 years.
On behalf of the Institution I wish to congratulate and thank all those who have supported
the Hong Kong Branch ‘s activities in the past and those who continue to provide a vital and
valuable service to our members. I wish you every success in growing your membership in
these challenging, but interesting times as you move beyond the SAR area and expand your
activities over the next 25 years.
Yours sincerely
Graham Manly
President
CIBSE
I am delighted to congratulate you on the occasion of the 25th Anniversary of the Hong Kong
Region of CIBSE. As you know we greatly value the Region’s contribution to the aims and
objectives of the Institution.
On my visits to Hong Kong I have always been impressed by the enthusiasm of your
members for CIBSE and despite Hong Kong’s geographical separation, the Region remains
an integral and vital part of the Institution.
Over the 25 years, Hong Kong has grown to become CIBSE’s largest region numerically.
For that, we owe a considerable debt to the tireless efforts of you and the committee
members who have served throughout the period. Growth in membership shows no sign of
abating, particularly with the dramatic economic expansion in Southern China. I am
confident that the coming years will further increase the Region’s importance to CIBSE and
to building services worldwide.
I am delighted that I will be in Hong Kong in November, during your 25th Anniversary Year,
with our President elect Donald Leeper, to attend the Joint Symposium, and to underline
CIBSE’s ongoing support for the work of the Hong Kong Region in promoting education,
research and standards.
Kind regards
Julian Amey
Chief Executive
CIBSE
In this year 2004 and looking back at 25 years of achievements, the CIBSE Hong Kong
Branch can, with justification, celebrate its 25th anniversary.
Over the past 25 years the officers, committees and branch members have pursued a
programme of professional learned society activities such as taking part in conferences
(with others), holding technical paper lecturers, site visits, CPD training and peer reviews.
Furthermore, branch social events have been held and much appreciated. The Branch has
played a useful role in support of members and in particular younger members, who by
attending the above functions can meet more senior and experienced members who they
might otherwise never get to meet. Such contacts all add to their social and working
confidence. These contacts are also appreciated by senior members willing to share their
knowledge and experience with others.
The Branch also provides opportunity for members to take part in its management by
joining committees and taking on the responsibilities of office. This is all very good for
personality development.
When we consider the vast amount of construction projects carried out in Hong Kong over
the past 25 years, clearly the local members of CIBSE Branch have been very busy. With so
much work and responsibility there is a genuine need for the unifying influences that the
Branch organization, backed up from Headquarters in London, and in collaboration with
the Building Services Division of HKIE can provide long way that support continue.
Today, however, we celebrate 25 years of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch activities and as I was
privileged to be its Founding Chairman in 1979 and it makes me very proud to see how the
Branch has grown in maturity over 25 years, I wish the Branch and all its members a
productive, happy and successful future.
Ian A.G. Phillis
Founding Chairman of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Since the formation of Hong Kong Branch in 1979, it has sustained phenomenal growth
from about 80 members to over 2500 today, making us the biggest region outside UK. Our
achievements are built upon the strong dedication of our past chairmen and committee
members who had devoted their valuable time and effort in organizing numerous technical
and social activities for members.
The objectives of CIBSE are to promote the art, science and practice of building services
engineering for the benefit of all and to advance education and research in building
services engineering. Over the past 25 years, our members have been playing an
important role in the development of Hong Kong by applying their skills in creating and
maintaining comfortable, healthy and safe working and living environments in buildings for
the well being of the occupants. Nowadays, building services engineers are facing greater
challenges not only in providing a high quality built environment but also in energy
conservation, and preservation of the environment for the benefit of our future generation.
Such challenges create enormous opportunities.
I would like to thank our past chairmen and committee members for their contributions in
building up the Branch. I wish the Hong Kong Branch continued success in future.
Victor Cheung
Immediate Past Chairman of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
The 25th Anniversary is a special year for the CIBSE-Hong Kong Branch, looking at the
achievements over the past twenty-five years in Hong Kong.
The CIBSE-Hong Kong Branch was dissolved in 1991/1992 due to various reasons.
Between 1992 and 1998, the CIBSE in Hong Kong was managed by the Hong Kong
Advisory Panel in lieu of the Hong Kong Branch. In early 1998, the Panel took the initiative
and advised the CIBSE Headquarters in the UK to re-establish the Hong Kong Branch for the
benefit of the Hong Kong members. The proposal for the reformation of the Hong Kong
Branch was endorsed in principle by the CIBSE Headquarters in November 1998 and the
new Hong Kong Branch commenced operation in December 1998.
The organizational structure of the Hong Kong Branch has undergone some significant
changes. Driving these changes are the requirements of wider construction industry. The
Hong Kong Branch identified the need to reorganize the Branch Committee, with a new
committee made up of building services engineers from different backgrounds. Senior
members were invited to join the various activities organized by the Branch e.g. acting as
professional interviewers, giving technical talks and organizing seminars etc. New
members were introduced into the Branch Committee to look after key activities such as
communication, publication and technical functions. A sub-committee for young members
was also formed to support the core functions of the Branch. This sub-committee provided
links to the building services student societies in the different Hong Kong universities and
encouraged students and young members to participate in Branch activities.
In order to achieve the aims and objectives of the Branch, the Hong Kong Branch Committee
has encouraged and promoted better communication between the Headquarters and the
Branch as well as with other relevant learned societies in Hong Kong. This has led to closer
collaboration among them in organizing various joint functions and activities. The success
of the Branch activities has been reflected in the positive response from Hong Kong members.
With all the support and reinforcement of resources in the Committee, the Branch has
elevated the profile and status of Building Services Engineering in the society as a whole.
We look forward to the further development and success of the Hong Kong Branch in the
coming years.
K. O. Yeung
Past Chairman of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
“In the yeeear…twenty-five…twenty-five…” blast the radio in the car, fueling the vibe with
its prophetic verse punctuating what this future world would be.
The setting sun on my right, I was cruising on the elevated Route 3 towards TST. Abeam
Mongkok, the silhouette of the otherwise panoramic beauty of the harbour gradually floated
to front. Buildings, tons of them each stalking tall bracing to catch the glamorous rays, all
struggled to focus into glitters. In vain their efforts strained what with the skyline curtained
with a tint of gray.
I, too, thought about what this future world would be.
For several decades the construction in Hong Kong thrived in leaps and bounds. Paced with
it emerged the recognition and advancement of building services engineering.
In sixties, for health and hygiene reasons, buildings were to be built with integral water
supply and drainage systems, but basically naked, in the context of building services. It was
no surprise to see wires and cables feeding power to tenants dangling across and beating
against the building façade happily alongside with their TV coaxial brethren, perhaps at
times catching one or two kites that went strayed. The essence in that era was necessity.
High rises were still few in early seventies but imperatives of the paramount need of fire
prevention and fighting and UPS systems was reinforced with the commission of the mass
transit. Pressurized staircase was also introduced. Safety took prudence. Late seventies
saw the sprouting of massive shopping arcades and tall monuments leading to the demand
of centralized and sophisticated control and services coordination. The luxury of comfort
and convenience was the theme. Eighties the boom that continued into the nineties. The
proposition of operation efficiency and environment concern started to take firm roots. The
emphasis of practice by and the role of building services engineers chartered along
prosperously with the progression. I am lucky enough to share and be part of the fruitful
transition.
The quest of achievement turned the entire length of the harbour coastline into an array of
revolutionary buildings, not the sort of bare skeleton of my youth. I dare to say much of the
stunning prodigy of those buildings was accentuated by the latent work of building services
engineers. Many of them would make even the most fastidious engineer proud.
When we pause for a moment to marvel at the skill with which engineers tackle the toughest
of tests, we should also spare a thought for what all these would lead us to. The very
embodiment of however innovative building services installations did not justify the inordinate passion of ever erecting buildings into a matrix of cramped galleries bisect by claustrophobic bus lanes. With congestion trapped between sheering walls, the condition deteriorated so alarmingly that it was barely fit for a healthy grown up to live, far less for the child,
the elder and the sick.
Visitors to Hong Kong in the past would have reasons to boat across the harbour and
browse amid the peak where they are home to placid and crystal clear scenery. The harbour
has changed a great deal since and the flow of the rolling landscape is now halted by a
dam of pillars. Waters became violent and air laden with weight. The price for urban
development should not be that sumptuous.
We may have to devote our nostalgic allure of the city to the section of library bookshelf
dedicated to its lore and memorabilia. But there are areas the fraternity of building services
engineers could restore some reputation of our venerable site if we elect to do so.
Like a young engineer coming of age, the Hong Kong Branch is now celebrating its 25th
birthday. At this juncture, it is time to reflect on not only our glory in the past but also our
footing in future.
The ancients took shelters atop the foliage and behind caves. It would be sarcastic in order
for them to enjoy the fruit of building services engineering they had to fell trees and
evacuate turf, their very own shelters no less. Unfortunately, we actually live this
irony.
Perhaps, we have to forsake our near total and parasitical reliance on opportunities
accorded by the ever profusion of new icons to perfect our skills. Instead we have to
redirect more of our efforts to revive and resurrect those old and existing ones. The task
force post SARS threat was a tragic example coming to the realization that building services
engineers could excel in taking a novel and leading turn rejuvenating existing assemblies to
combat future challenges. Not to wait for another tragedy to strike, Hong Kong Branch
should take vigorous and preemptive charge.
Many best things in our world are our own creation. And many of them would only evolve
into perfection over times. It is in the nurturing and maturing evolution process that quality
of our creation is maintained and duly appreciated, and respect for the creators earned.
They, of course, must be created to begin with, but there is no summary need to first find
ruins before we do. It is not right if things created, no matter good or bad would be
removed relentlessly, as we should not be the only beneficiaries. The benefit should also be
passed onto the generations following.
Perhaps, it was wrong to confine our skills only behind building façade. The definition of
building in building services engineering can take on a larger meaning. If our skills are
singularly restricted within a collection of columns and beams, then what use is to improve
those indoors when the ambient air is loathsomely contaminated? What guilt to hide feeling
comfort in coolness when the laws of entropy furnace fiercely your neighbour? What
mockery awaits us when we preach for energy efficient after much depleted in the tear and
build cycles? Our city can in fact be just a complex building, as well as the region, for that
matter.
Does it cross our mind that district-wise cooling and heating is a motion where the
traditional physical dimensions of a building no longer prohibitively relevant? Does it occur
to us that we could instill freshness and fragrance in it although we can not stop the wind
blows? Does it awakening enough that we should not dwell at crossroad continuing to
contemplate, lest the protective bubble imprisoning futuristic cities portrait in movies is not
fictitious after all? I shall leave it to our younger siblings to redefine our future peripherals
and to part the gray curtain bringing us back the twinkling stars. I await their reports at our
golden anniversary and beyond.
In the year 2525, I hope generations following could sing the song with lyrics at their
choices.
Choices of our making.
Peter Y. Wong
Past Chairman of CIBSE Hong Kong
Mr. John Burnett
Prof. John Burnett, CEng FCIBSE
Chair of Building Services Engineering,
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
AS FAR AS I CAN REMEMBER.....
Development of the building services engineering in Hong Kong
The 25th Anniversary of CIBSE HK Branch more or less coincides with my own involvement
with building services engineering, because it was in 1981 when, as a refugee from
electrical engineering, I entered the BSE education field and the ‘new’engineering discipline.
I remember joining many a discussion about CIBS and how it became CIBSE, and also
recollect that many, including myself, actually knew very little about what defines a BS
Engineer (and maybe we still are not too sure - go to CIBSE’s Website and see if this is
defined?). What I ask is, what is special about a BS Engineer that sets us apart from other
engineers whose work is associated with buildings? (and I do not just mean the CEng or RPE
tag alone!). Answers please on the back of an envelope containing some red notes!
Back to education. In the early 1980’s we only had Higher Diploma and Diploma courses,
not until mid-80’s did we start the first BSE degree. The fondest memory I have is the ability,
and not least the enthusiasm, of the students of the time. Some Dip and HD students of those
times would grace any degree course we offer today! It is nice to meet our graduates 10
and 20 years on (apologies if I don’t recognise you when we meet!). The growth and
development of the BSE discipline has run in parallel with the growth of BSE education in
Hong Kong. It is mutually supportive, and the influences extend beyond the borders of Hong
Kong. The development of the BSE discipline on the Mainland has been influenced to some
degree by our own development. However, in the future, we may be the ones who learn
from them. In a gathering we organised some years back bringing together CIBSE
representatives from UK and Hong Kong with similar souls from the Mainland I remarked
that maybe the C in CIBSE would soon be representing China!
As Hong Kong Representative some years back I was able to raise ‘our voice’ at CIBSE
Council meetings on a rather more frequent basis than hitherto. Maybe they needed to be
reminded that Hong Kong was there biggest branch, and as such wanted more say and
more from membership. Some of you may have the first CIBSE CD-ROM we produced in
Hong Kong, which set the scene for HQ to move with the times - provide value for money, or
loose membership.
I must remark that it is OK to expect value for money from our membership fees, but those
guides and books on the CD were mostly produced from the voluntary efforts of CIBSE
members and associates. Let us ask, as a body corporate in Hong Kong, what have we
produced that can be included as a valuable resource on these CD’s? Seems like we are
slow to ‘put pen to paper’and produce localised versions of some of the CIBSE guides. We
can say we are big, we are good, but are we contributing enough to development
for the greater benefit of mankind?
Besides the past, what about the future, what does CIBSE HK Branch mean to the future of
Hong Kong - and of course I refer to our role in sustainable development. Maybe this is too
big a pill to swallow whole but, again referring to HQ’s website, we have responsibilities,
but do we have the capabilities? Are we as engineers up to speed on the latest technologies
and techniques, and their application? Are the graduates we produce sufficiently adept to
respond to the needs of the times? Is the R&D effort targeting improvements to buildings
and the quality of life of our citizens, or just to fulfill academic demands? For each of us it a
personal as well as collective engagement - lets feel satisfied with the developments over our
short 25 year history, but realise that it is only the first few miles of a marathon!
So next time we meet, remember the envelope!
Naturally, my congratulations to the Branch on the occasion of its 25th anniversary, and
hope that we proper and expand in the next 25 year!
John Burnett
Prof. John Burnett, CEng FCIBSE
Chair of Building Services Engineering,
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
The Committee Members of CIBSE
Hong Kong Branch 2004/2005
Chairman
Mr. Ronald S. Chin
Hon. Advisor
Mr. K. O. Yeung
Vice Chairman
Mr. Thomas Chan
Immediate Past
Chairman
Mr. Victor Cheung
Hon. Advisor
Mr. Peter Wong
Hon. Secretary
Mr. Phili p Chan
Hon. Treasurer
Mr. Patrick C. K.
Kwan
Professional lnterview
Co-ordinator
Mr. Simon Chung
Conference
Co-ordinator
Dr. K. T. Chan
Training
Co-ordinator
Dr. Albert So
PRC Co-ordinator
Mr. Thomas Soon
Communications
Co-ordinator
Miss Priscilla Yeung
Technical Activities
Co-ordinator
Mr. K. K. Lam
Social Secretary
Mr. K. Y. Leung
Young Member Group
Chairman
Mr. Jason Chan
Co-opt member
(HKIE-BSD)
Mr. H. K. Yung
Co-opt member
Ms. Jovian Cheung
Co-opt member
Mr. Peter Long
Co-opt member
(ASHRAE)
Mr. Raymond Yau
Co-opt member
Mr. Victor Leung
Helper
Mr. Herbert Lam
Activities of the CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Ian Phills, President Lourie Hadly, Secretary Bernard Hodges
attended the Inaugural Meeting CIBSE Hong Kong Branch on
17 Jan. 1979
Joint Symposium Held in 80’s
Joint Symposium Held in 80’s
Joint Symposium Held in 80’s
Football Tournament 2001
Chungqing-Hong Kong Joint Symposium 2002
Activities of the CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Annual Dinner in March 2002
Presidential Reception and Speech 2002
Charity Technical Visit to Tseung Kwan O Extension in July 2002
President - Elect Visit to Guangzhou CAST in November 2002
Basket Tournament in October 2002
President-Elect’s Visit to HKIE in November 2002
Activities of the CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Annual General Meeting 2003
Bowling Competition in October 2003
Asia Pacific Conference 2003
Presidential Reception and Speech in November 2003
Technical Visit to Science Park 2003
Annual Dinner in March 2003
Activities of the CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
Shangdong-Hong Kong Joint Symposium in October 2003
Technical Visit to KCRC Kam Tin Depot in December 2003
Visit to Guangdong University of Technology in February 2004
Annual Dinner in March 2004
Annual General Meeting 2004
Shenyang-Hong Kong Joint Symposium 2004
Young Members Group of CIBSE
Hong Kong Branch
The idea of setting up the Young Members Group
(YMG) of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch, namely
CIBSE YMG, was brought up in the CIBSE Hong
Kong Branch Committee Meeting held on 14
May 2001. A Task Force on CIBSE YMG
comprising the Convenor, Mr. Patrick Kwan,
and prospective YMG Committee members was
set up on 17 Sept 2001 with a view to carrying
out all preparatory works for establishing the
CIBSE YMG.
CIBSE YMG Inauguration Ceremony was held
at Methodist House on 17 Dec 2001. CIBSE
HKB’s Chairman, Mr. Peter Wong, and committee members as honorable guests attended
the Inauguration Ceremony to share their fruitful experience and knowledge with the founding committee members of CIBSE YMG.
This new interest group is an affiliated body
under CIBSE Hong Kong Branch and aims at
catering for the needs and interests for all CIBSE
young members of any class, who are at the
age of 35 or below.
We are active and enthusiastic for :
• Promoting CIBSE image among local
students and young members.
• Bolstering cohesion among young members through their participation in CIBSE
activities.
• Identifying the needs of young members
and organizing various activities to suit their
interests and meet their expectations.
• Rendering logistic support to CIBSE HK
Branch in organizing technical and social
activities for CIBSE members.
• Facilitating the interflow of knowledge and
experience with other professional institutes
through their young member organizations.
CIBSE YMG Committee 2004/05
Founding Chairlady
Chairman
Chair
man
Chairman
Vice Chair
man
Honorary
Secretary
y
Honorar
y Secretar
y TTreasurer
reasurer
Honorary
Honorar
Public Relation Co-ordinator
nal Af
fairs Co-ordinator
External
Affairs
Exter
Inter
nal Af
Internal
Affairs
fairs Co-ordinator
Affairs
Social Af
fairs Co-ordinator
Ms. Jovian Cheung
Mr. Jason Chan
Mr. Eric Ngai
Mr. Alvin Lo
Mr. Antony Wong
Mr. Alvin Wong and Ms. Wendy Kwok
Mr. Howard Yeung and Erica Mok
Mr. Kenneth Tse
Mr. Kenny Lam
During the past few years, we have organized a
number of interesting talks, technical visits and
competitions for local students and young
members, including Building Services Career
Talks, Promotion of CIBSE and CIBSE activities; visits
to KMB Depot, two IFC buildings and Fed-
Supremetect Ltd., and CIBSE YMG Website Design Competition, etc. On 24 Sept 2004, a career talk with the theme “Go to be a Chartered
Engineer” was organized for CIBSE young
members and graduates of building.
We always try hard to collaborate with other
professional institutes through their young
members organizations to co-organize more
attractive activities and functions for young
members. On Sept 2003, we jointly organized
a gathering for ASHRAE / CIBSE / HKIE YMC
members so as to enhance the communication
among YMC members, and we played the
leading role in the organization committee. The
1st joint gathering with the theme “Back to
School” was successfully held at Laguna City
Clubhouse on 14 Jan 2004. We were pleased
to invite Mr. Victor Cheung, Chairman of CIBSE
HKB (2003/04), as an honorable guest jumping
for joy in the gathering with totally 33
participants. The 2nd gathering was held
on 29 Oct 2004 and there were five young
members organizations joined in this leisure
event, including ASHRAE, CIBSE, HKIE and
SOE.
The young members organizations of HKIE,
CIBSE, ICE, CIArb and the Law Society of H. K.
jointly organized a one-day symposium on
“Current Practice and Future Trend of Contract
Management, Construction Law and Alternative
Dispute Resolution” twice which attracted more
than 500 practitioners to attend on 27 Mar 2004
and 24 Jul 2004. There will be a half-day
technical seminar “Sustainable Buildings Winning Buildings in Quality Building.
Award 2004” jointly organized by HKIE BSD,
HKIE YMC, CIBSE YMG and HKIA on 27 Nov
2004. This talk will scrutinize the outstanding
features and contribution to sustainability of 2
winning buildings, No. 1 Peking Road and Jolly
Place, from the viewpoint of an architect and
engineer.
Besides, we have gained valuable and unforgettable experience and knowledge in assisting CIBSE Hong Kong Branch to organize various technical and social activities such as CIBSE
Annual Dinner, CIBSE Sport Tournament, China
- Hong Kong Annual Joint Symposium, Caring
Engineer’s Concert, Lecture Series in HVAC, FS
and P&D Systems, etc.
Basketball Tournament 2002
Shenyang - Hong Kong Joint Symposium 2004
Visit to Fed-Supremetect
Brief History on the Formation of
CIBSE Hong Kong Branch
In late 1977, Ian Phillis and Samuel W
ong
Wong
wrote repeately to CIBSE/UK regarding the
possibilities to for
m a branch in Hong Kong.
form
CIBSE/UK wrote back suggesting Ian Phillis and
Samuel W
ong get together which they did. The
Wong
second meeting introduced some others such as
Edwin TTao,
ao, Andrew Shillinglaw and Patrick Y
ip.
Yip.
Shor
tly after Nor
man Ludlow
frey Ar
nold, Alan
Shortly
Norman
Ludlow,, Geof
Geoffrey
Arnold,
Thompson, joined what became the streeting committee
man and Samuel W
ong was
Chairman
Wong
of which Ian Phillis was Chair
Secretary
reasurer..
Hon. Secretar
y, Andrew Shiilinglaw the Hon. TTreasurer
reasurer
A meeting was held in late 77 at Polytechnic to which all
m a Branch. V
oted upon,
form
Voted
member were invited and to for
the answer was yes. Thus a petition was drawn up and sent
Norman
Ludlow.. The memberto Nor
man Ludlow
ship at that time was approx. 80
corporate.
In Januar
y 1979 the Inagural session took place
January
ts Centre.
Arts
in the Shouson Theatre of Hong Kong Ar
The Hon President Mr. Lourie Hadly inagurated
chairman.
the Branch with Ian Phillis at its first chair
man.
Ian Phillis taking the Chair
In April 1979, the first AGM was held
ao took over Chair
man and
Chairman
and Edwin TTao
ong
Chairman.
Wong
Ludlow vice Chair
man. Samuel W
Secretary
remained as Secretar
y until April 1980
reasurer..
and Andrew Shillinglaw as TTreasurer
reasurer
Secretary Bernard Hodges conventing
Inaugural Meeting CIBSE HK Branch
on 17 Jan 1979
Review and Foresight
The Development of Building Services
Engineering in Hong Kong
KWOK Ping-ki, Albert DipEE MBA CLJ
RPE FHKIE CEng FIMechE FIEE FIE(Aust) FCMI
HonFCIBSE HonFASHRAE HonFInstR
Former Director of Electrical & Mechanical Services, Government of Hong Kong
Former Secretary & Director General of the Hong Kong Institution of Engineers
Introduction
The development of Building Services Engineering in Hong Kong relies heavily on the works
carried out by the biggest and most consistent
developer in building construction in Hong
Kong. Undeniably this incumbent must be the
tax payers and developers, who funded and
are still funding all works in the public and private sectors.By looking through the evolution
process of Building Services Engineering in
Government and in the private sector projects
throughout these years, one might grasp some
ideas how this Branch of Engineering is developed in this part of the world. The writer is proud
to be one of the key players who had participated and witnessed in nearly all the events in
Hong Kong.
were replaced by the Carrier higher speed ‘W’
type Freon machines in the mid fifties.
Queen Mary Hospital built pre-war was the most
equipped in Building Services Engineering at
the time. Senior members in Hong Kong might
still remember the main plant room, consisting
of ‘Y‘ type switchboard, diesel fired boilers situated at the ground floor of the Central Wing in
the Main Building. The whole building was
served with passenger and bed lifts, with lighting and ceiling fans, cold and hot water in the
wards and offices with heating by radiators,
town gas service in the laboratories, refrigeration in the mortuary and blood bank, medical
gases in the two operating theatres complete
with fire alarm break glass units, fire hydrants
and limited emergency electricity supply and a
primitive drainage service system.
Ser
vices in Pre-W
orld W
Services
Pre-World
War
ar II Buildings
Ser
vices in the 50’s
Services
Buildings in those days were equipped with only
lighting & ceiling fans. In secondary schools,
town gas was available in the laboratories. Until
in 1937, the Hong Kong Bank Headquarter
Building was the first one equipped with air
conditioning using J. E. Hall reciprocating compressors with ammonia as the refrigerant which
Immediately after the war on completion of the
restoration and refurbishment phase, reconstruction began. Air conditioning was first considered a luxury and slowly became a necessity in
Hong Kong because through air conditioning,
the ceiling height could be reduced and the
Review and Foresight
space per person could also be reduced. May
House, the old PoliceHeadquarter and the East
Wing and Central Wing of the Central Government Offices were build in the mid-fifties
equipped with the most up to date air conditioning plant which consisted of Sterne reciprocating vertical compressors modeled ‘3Y14’ running at 375 r.p.m. each equipped with three
14 inch diameter cylinders using sea water cooling in the condenser, unloaded by hot gas bypass with automatic pump down controlled by
the Honeywell step controller; treated primary
air, with face and by pass modulating control
in the air handling unit. All these were considered the art of the day. American Engineering
Corporation, the agent of Carrier and Sterne
systems, headed by the late Wilfred Wong Senior and Jardine Engineering Corporation, the
agent of York system, headed by the late John
Louie were happy rivals of the time. The lift installation was based on per for mance
specification.
Following the fire on the Christmas Eve 1953 in
the squatter areas at Sek Kip Mei, seven storey
high resettlement blocks were built within
months, with only limited facilities such as basic
supply of electricity, cold water and drainage
service which formed the first chapter of government housing. In those early days, specification for the electrical installations using concealed conduit system was just established and
a comprehensive specification was available in
the late fifties in the Electrical Section of the Architectural Of fice in the Public Works
Department. In addition, unit rates were incorporated into the maintenance contract. The Head
of the Electrical Section was Bernard Roach, a
Chartered Electrical Engineer.
Ser
vices in the 60’s
Services
In the early sixties, tenders for the construction
of the City Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hospital and
Kai Tak Airport Terminal were separately called
and accepted. Planning and construction of the
Lion Rock Tunnel also commenced.
In the private sector, Mandarin Hotel, Edinburgh
House, and Union House were fully air
conditioned. Existing buildings like the Old Supreme Court Building, Peninsula Hotel were
renovated with air conditioning. New hotels in
Kowloon like Empress Hotel, Park Hotel were
also completed. The New World Development
at Tsim Sha Tsui together with the Regent Hotel
was also started.
In the mid sixties, the services in the Hong Kong
Cross Harbour Tunnel was recognized and still
is the best equipped tunnel in the world, provided with the latest and most comprehensive
lighting, ventilation, traffic monitoring and public
address system, fire prevention, detection,
warning, fighting & communication system, electricity interconnecting and emergency supply
system, setting a bright and shining example
for other tunnels not only in Hong Kong but also
in the world. It became the biggest milestone in
the planning of fire services for the safety and
health of the general public.
Back to the air conditioning installation in the
Queen Elizabeth Hospital, performance specification was used in various clinical areas and
wards even with the main plant first specified in
absorption system. Due to the problem of crystallization in other part of the world coupled
with the fine control needed where the skill might
Review and Foresight
not available in Hong Kong, the system was
quickly changed to steam turbine driven centrifugal system. In addition, air conditioning,
steam and hot water service were the responsibilities of the Electrical & Mechanical Office
which was accommodated at Caroline Hill,
Causeway Bay area rather then at the Central
Government Offices Complex.
Due to the geographical separation of the design team from other members in various
projects in the Architectural Office, close liaison,
co-ordination and scheduling were difficult causing tender delays, co-ordination difficulties and
late completion of some projects, without mentioning the problem of resource allocation and
the division of responsibilities.
Embr
yo Phase of Building Ser
vices
Embryo
Services
Engineering
It was therefore decided that all project team
members should be controlled by the project
leader under one roof and the Air Conditioning
Section in the Electrical & Mechanical Office
was transferred to the Architectural Office in
May 1963 providing more efficient service to
the projects, elevating the Electrical Section in
the Architectural Office into Electrical Division
with Bernard Roach becoming the first Chief
Electrical Engineer in the Architectural Office,
Frank Au to look after the Electrical Section and
the late Anthon James to look after the Air
Conditioning Section.
The first task in the Division was to produce a
standard specification for the air conditioning
system, a proforma schedule of materials and
equipment, and a proforma schedule of unit
rates. This made the tender comparison an
easier task because any quantity and pricing
errors in the tender were easily identified. As a
consequence, the tender prices in government
air conditioning installations became very
competitive, eliminating the element of guessing at tendering stage. At the same time, staff
was strengthened by the recruitment of the first
qualified Air Conditioning Engineer holding Corporate Membership of the Institution of Heating
& Ventilating Engineers, the late Alvin Leung Sr.,
who used to be the British Council Scholar at
the National College of Heating & Ventilating
Engineering, then worked with the contractor,
Gibb & Livingston. Also, colleagues like W K
Lee, Alan Lee, David Chu, K S Ng, S Y Wong
and John Watt were sent to attend the
Associateship Course at the National College
at different times. As the writer completed the
institution examination of the Institution of Heating & Ventilating Engineers by private study,
without need to go to the National College, he
was offered to attend the Trane Training Course
in the U.S.A.
In the mid 1965, at the sketch plan stage of the
Princess Margaret Hospital, the Chairman of the
Steering Committee was the Deputy Director of
Public Work (Building) , the late George Norton
who noticed that in the project meeting, there
was a member from the Architectural profession,
a member from the Structural Engineering
profession, but there were three members from
the ser vices, i.e. one from the Electrical
profession, one from the Air Conditioning profession and one from the Mechanical profession,
and likely more to come. He first praised Bernard Roach for his full support of the project
and jokingly enquired in a whisper whether the
Review and Foresight
service sector could be represented by one member within the building boundary, for the sake
of better co-ordination, communication and
efficiency.
Bernard initially showed some doubt on the idea
but promised that should a suitable project be
available and a suitable engineer be identified,
he would try it. Professorial Block at Queen Mary
Hospital together with the writer was selected
in 1966 and proved to be a success, paving the
way forward with confidence.
The Name of Building Ser
vices Identified
Services
In the late 1966, discussion between the British
and Hong Kong Government on the Defense
Cost Agreement began. Public Works Department was tasked to takeover all the construction and maintenance works within barracks and
military camps, previously handled by the Ministry of Public Buildings and Works in Hong
Kong. Within the camp boundary, the quartermaster used to deal with only one representative from each profession, and this tradition was
preferred to be retained. Establishment of this
new profession was therefore imminent. Among
the several names proposed, Building Services
was finally accepted because it meant Services
within the Building Boundary.
The Bir
th of Building Ser
vices Engineering in
Birth
Services
Hong Kong
This took effect from 1st July 1967 and the Electrical Division was retitled Building Services
Branch where all colleagues were retitled Building Services in the Electrical Stream, Air Conditioning Stream in the grade of Engineers,
Foremen, Inspectorate, Draughtsmen etc. Extensive training on the job and attendance at night
schools coupled with more job rotation to facilitate cross fertilization were launched. Resistance
for the change was finally overcome. Hong Kong
became the first place in the world to adopt the
name of Building Services Engineering which
was also adopted in the United Kingdom when
the Institution of Heating and Ventilating Engineers was retitled the Chartered Institution of
Building Services Engineers upon receipt of
Chartered Status in 1976 when the Government
of Hong Kong fully recognized its Corporate
Membership as one of the qualifications for
Building Services Engineers. The sister institution in the United States of America, the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air
Conditioning Engineers formalized the Hong
Kong Chapter in 1984. In the Hong Kong Institution of Engineers, Building Services Engineering becomes one of the Disciplines for qualification and one of the Divisions as part of a
learned society.
The Steady Growth of Building Ser
vices
Services
Engineering in the Public Sector
Before the 1967 Defense Cost Agreement, several camps had been run down and with the
urge for air conditioning in all the military establishments and the need of accommodation
for Gurkha soldiers, several camps had been
refurbished with electricity supply strengthened
with additional high voltage or medium voltage
substations, overhead or underground distribution systems.
Air conditioning was installed to follow local
comfort level. Fire services installations were
converted into local standard. Sewage treatment
plant was installed in a new Gurkha Quarter
Review and Foresight
Complex. Re-assessment of water changes and
quality in swimming pools in various camps were
carried out. Complaint of low water pressure in
certain area in camp was ratified after repair
of cracked pipes and adjustment of pump heads.
Fuel for catering service was converted into town
gas or liquefied petroleum gas as electricity was
inefficient and diesel oil was unfriendly to the
environment. Liquefied petroleum gas became
very popular in barracks and camps, started
with bottles, and finally converted into bulk storage and distribution where town gas was not
available. At the same time, remote penal institutions in Government were provided with LPG
fuel for catering. Hot water was provided to
barracks in police stations and fire stations.
Existing diesel fired boilers and emergency generators were modified or replaced tocontain
noise and smoke emission.
Sustainable Growth of Building Ser
vices
Services
Engineering
The takeover of the military establishments exposed the importance of scales of provision,
standard of acceptance in various services. Due
to the inheritance of a comprehensive library
containing all the standard specifications, particular specifications, scale of provisions, technical memorandums, reports, practice notes,
safety and health codes, it was not too difficult
to convince both the United Kingdom and Hong
Kong governments to proceed with the installations acceptable to the military personals, yet
commensurate with a best balance between
user’s welfare and the tax payers’ aspiration in
Hong Kong and United Kingdom during the initial phase when one British standard and one
Hong Kong standard were actually in existence
in the Building Services Branch. The matter had
caused nightmare to the professionals, drafting
and inspectorate colleagues in the industry.
Sustainable Growth in the Housing Sector and
in the Private Sector
As more standard specifications, particular
specifications, operating and maintenance
manuals had been produced for various services absorbing the best practice from United
Kingdom and overseas, it was not long before
the authorities appreciate that adherence to the
latest practice and standard in Hong Kong was
the best interest and the only option for all, thus
eliminating the operation of two standards
within the Building Services Branch. The work
in Building Service Engineering had thus been
greatly extended in scope, with scales and standards greatly solidified and the documents produced become the easy reference of many international consulting, contracting and trading
organizations.
In public housing, Li Cheng Uk, So Uk, Choi
Hung, Ping Shek, Won Tai Sin and later Oi Man
were some of the well known estates completed
at the time, especially when the Li Cheng Uk
Estate and Victoria Park were each provided
with a swimming pool complex to serve the
people in the area. In the private sector, the
relocation of the oil depots in the Lai Chi Kok
area, closure of the Tai Koo Dock and Whampoo
Dock had created development opportunities.
Mei Fu Sun Tsuen, re-developed from the Mobil
Oil Depot was one of the earliest estates. It consists of 99 residential blocks each equipped with
four lifts with shoppers at podium and ground
levels offered one of the biggest contracts for
lifts at the time with Mitsubishi, one of the early
Review and Foresight
Japanese lift manufacturers penetrating into the
local market.Other lift manufacturers from Japan and other part of the world joint force especially in high rise office buildings like
Connaught Centre, exposing Hong Kong to the
latest technology even in high speed lifts.
the skills and proficiency in the design,
installation, operation, maintenance and management of Building Services Engineering in
Hong Kong especially on integration, co-ordination and harmonization at all levels and at
all stages of the development.
Although Tai Koo Shing and Whampoo Gardens developed slightly later, they seemed better planned and equipped. Relocation of the
Kowloon & Canton Railways Station to
Hunghom together with the construction of the
Hunghom Stadium created development opportunities in the Tsim Sha Tsui East. Construction
of the Mass Transit Railway started, with stations above built for commercial and residential purposes. In these population centres, the
welfare, safety and health of the general public
were looked after extremely well by the latest
Building Services Engineering Technology,
such as artificial and natural lighting, airconditioning, fire services and smoke extraction in atriums, water features in gardens.
Forerunners in Building Ser
Services
vices
Engineering
Due to the demand of cultural and sporting facilities in the Urban and Regional Councils,
swimming pool complexes, town halls, cultural
centre, museums were constructed. Building
Services works became more diversified and
sophisticated: modern filtration and treatment
of pool water, insulation and isolation of noise
and vibration, special lighting effects, advanced
stage and broadcasting engineering, odour
control at refuse collection points, to name but
a few. To combat traffic noise in schools, some
field tests and experiments were performed resulting in the provision of air conditioning to
some affected schools. As practice makes
perfection, all these developments had polished
All these projects could hardly be completed
without personalities. Although some deceased,
some emigrated or retired, many are still living
in Hong Kong with most of the early entrants to
the profession educated at the Hong Kong Technical College, the cradle of Building Services
Engineers, under the influence of S Z Sung, Dr.
Ching Yuen-Kai and William Millar to whom
our earnest tribute and salutations must be respectively paid. In the public sector, credit must
be given to the leadership given by the early
Deputy Director of Public Works (Buildings),
George Nor ton, Peter Shawe, Reginald
Donnithorne and David McDonald in the
seventies. In 1982 when the Public Works Department was defederalised to form seven works
departments, strong support and encouragement
were given by various Secretaries for Works,
Nicky Chan Nai-Keong, James Blake and is now
given by Lo Yiu–Ching, the Directors of Architectural Services, Joseph Lei, Paul Corser and
the Directors of Electrical & Mechanical Services,
Graham Osborne, Miao Chi and now Roger
Lai.
Other key players were: in electrical installations,
Pang Koon Sing, Ng Kan, and Arthur May in
1925-59, D. S. Hill, S. T. Yuen, Bernard Roach,
Frank Au, Yuen Kee, George Armstrong & James
Review and Foresight
Chiu from mid fifties to mid nineties. After the
War, in mechanical installations they were, Peter Metcalfe, D. W. Walker, Ken Baker, Mark
Mackenzie, Graham Osborne; in air
conditioning, Edmund Lee, John Lim; in
hospitals, Jim Parker; in the Airport, Ray Jenkins
and Ko King Fai; in fire services, Jim Pickett &
Arthur Gayne. They all had contributed, at various stages and levels, the most needed inputs
in the development and growth of Building Services Engineering in Hong Kong.
Education in Building Ser
Services
vices Engineering
Due to the lack of proper Building Services Engineering Courses in Hong Kong, government
scholarships were offered to civil servants to take
first degree course in the University of
Strathclyde, second degree courses in the University of South Bank and other universities. A
Working Party was formed in the mid-seventies,
to advise the Hong Kong Polytechnic to start a
Higher Diploma Course in Building Services
Engineering under the leadership of the Past
President of the Institution of Heating & Ventilating Engineers, Dr. Mike Marsden. Due to its
popular demand, it was soon developed into a
full time First Degree course, later extended into
Part-Time mode, and Second Degree mode. In
other Universities, Building Services option was
made available in the Mechanical or Electrical
Engineering stream, Higher Diploma, Post
Graduate Diploma, or Second Degree courses
were also developed in the City University and
the Hong Kong University of Science &
Technology. In education, special mention must
be given to the Head of the Department, Professor John Burnett in the Hong Kong Polytechnic University for his continuous leadership in
this field.
Honours’ List in Building Ser
vices
Services
Engineering
The profession cannot be successful without the
excellent supports from leaders in the industry,
in the consultancy sector, in the contracting
sector, the education sector, the trading sector
and the public sector. Apart from key players
mentioned before, many of them had served in
more than one sector: Edwin Tao, Samuel Wong,
L. T. Tao, John Buss, Ray Benhram, Derek
Thorney, F.K. Hu, Norman Ludlow, Otto Poon,
C. O. Synn, and many, many more un-named
heroes whose names were not listed due to
space limitation who however had part-taken,
supported and made substantial contributions
in various events throughout these years, and
who had served directly or indirectly in the Hong
Kong Branch of the Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers, the Building Services
Discipline and Division in the Hong Kong Institution of Engineers, the Hong Kong Chapter of
the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating
and Air Conditioning Engineers, the Air conditioning Contractors Association, the Electrical
Contractors Association, the Fire Services Contractors Association, the Lift Contractors Association and sister institutions like the Institution
of Mechanical Engineers, the Institution of Electrical Engineers and the Institution of Fire
Engineers, etc., etc., etc.
To Ser
ve the Community with Building
Serve
vices Engineering
Ser
Services
Having provided the general public with Building Services at various comfort levels in the built
environment, people’s welfare, safety and health
Review and Foresight
were never ignored by the Government whose
engineers always introduce timely Ordinances
to monitor the various services to ensure public
health and safety after consultation with the industry concerned.
Lift & Escalator Ordinance in 1961was one of
the early legislation to require all lifts and escalators in Hong Kong to be installed and regularly maintained by Registered Lift & Escalator
Contractors, inspected and certified by Registered Lift & Escalator Engineers; then the Electricity Ordinance to require all electrical installations to be designed, installed and regularly
maintained by the appropriate grade of Registered Electrical Workers, to be employed by
Registered Electrical Contractors; Gas Ordinance to require all gaseous installations to be
designed, installed and regularly maintained by
Registered Gas Workers to be employed by Registered Gas Contractors; Ventilation Ordinance
to require all air conditioning installations to
comply with minimum fresh air requirements,
adequate compartmentation to prevent fire
spread; Fire Services Ordinance to require all
fire services installations to be installed and regularly maintained by Registered Fire Services
Contractors, and to comply with the Fire Services Code of Practice, especially in public entertainment establishments like restaurants, hotels and guest houses. Even Amusement Rides
are carefully monitored to ensure public safety.
In office buildings, government had commissioned a consultant to study and recommend
the Overall Thermal Transmittance Value for use
in Hong Kong.
To promote the conservation of energy and preservation of the environment, Building Services
Engineers are working closely with allied Engineers in the development of district water cooling for air conditioning systems, energy saving
tips, energy efficiency labeling for appliances,
energy efficiency registration for buildings and
promotion of renewable energy for use in Hong
Kong. They are the back bone of the Energy
Efficiency Office in government. Whilst indoor
air quality was closely monitored by Building
Services Engineers in the last two decays, outdoor air quality was not ignored in Hong Kong
resulting in the replacement of diesel fuel in taxi,
public light buses and lorries by liquefies petroleum gas providing more opportunities for Building Services Engineers in the Gaseous Stream.
In addition, trading agencies in Hong Kong had
banned the importation of air conditioning
equipment operated with environmental unfriendly refrigerants for over a decade.
The W
ay For
ward
Way
Forward
Nowadays Building Services Engineers are in
heavy demand in services within the building
boundary who excels in efficiency, integration
and co-ordination not only to satisfy the user’s
physiological and security needs, the safety,
health and welfare of the general public but also
in the conservation of energy and the preservation of the environment for the benefit of the
future generations of Mankind.
Building Services Engineers must be pro-active
to identify the needs of new Ordinances for early
Review and Foresight
enactment by Government so as to establish a
Hong Kong brand of Engineering Excellence in
the dynamic life in this modern world city, to
cultivate new services with a comprehensive
standard to meet the modern day demand especially in high technology areas and to respond
quickly to assist the community to eradicate and
replace all the sub-standard services to the most
up to date standard without overlooking the sustainable development of their own professional
excellence and skill, so that the community is
well served by this highly praised profession to
whom the general public will have no hesitation to offer their fond support in return.
es
Hong Kong Cultural Centre, site inspection on 9th December
1987 with Graham John Osborne, Director of Electrial &
Mechanical Services
Tung Mun Hospital Topping Out Ceremony,
28th August 1986 with Graham John Osborne,
Director of Electrial & Mechanical Services
Acknowledgements
The writer is one of the most fortunate people
who have been always assigned to the right
position at the right time and is much indebted
throughout his career, to his senior colleagues
in the public and private sectors who gave their
timely and un-reserved advices or instructions
when leading, his level colleagues who
harmoniously integrated and cohered well in
all tasks and his junior colleagues who followed
up thoroughly according to instructions when
being led, without whose genuine leadership,
co-operation and supports, there would be a
totally different story.
Signing Ceremony for a Consultancy Agreement
on OTTV on 15th October 1990
Hong Kong Technical College before the demolition in June
1986 with Dr. Ching Yuen-Kai (Retired Principal)
Review and Foresight
Review of Building Services Development
in Hong Kong
Raymond K.S. Lin1 and K.F. Lau2
1
Chairman, The Hong Kong Air Conditioning and Refrigeration Association Limited
Operations Director, The Jardine Engineering Corp., Ltd
2
Former Chief B.S. Engineer, Architectural Services Department, Government of HKSAR, CEng FCIBSE
1.
INTRODUCTION
This paper gives a brief comment of Building
Services (BS) Engineering development in Hong
Kong in the past twenty-five years. In 1979, MTR
started operation of the Modified Initial System
and is now celebrating its 25 years operation
in Hong Kong, same as CIBSE Hong Kong
Branch. During that period, KCR was in the
process of double tracking and electrification.
Energy costs were still quite high and energy
saving was one of the important issues to be
dealt with in the whole BS industry. Variable
Air Volume (VAV) was one favourable choice
for air-conditioning systems for most major developments in Hong Kong. From eighties up to
1997, BS industry enjoyed a long period of fast
development and prosperity. A lot of our fellow engineers still remember those good old
days when the Hong Kong Bank new headquarter building was being constructed during 1983
– 1985. Not to mention the ten core projects
for the Chek Lap Kok New Airport and other
projects associated with the new developments
such as the new Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Center, new MTR Stations and etc. After a period of climax, BS development in Hong
Kong is still developing towards better customer
service and quality.
2.
APPLICA
TION OF COMPUTER &
APPLICATION
INFORMA
TION TECHNOLOGIES
INFORMATION
(IT) IN BS ENGINEERING FIELD
To mark the past twenty-five years of development in BS engineering field, the most significant impact comes from the vast application of
computer and information technologies. With
computer-aided drafting (CAD), BS design engineers are no longer required to start from
scratch. They can use the soft copy of the drawings provided by the Architect/consultant.
Therefore, the coordination works among various services are much easier, and save a lot of
time. Also, the system can provide bill of
quantities, cost estimation and maintenance
schedule of equipment. Application of
networking, digital signal compaction and other
IT are eroding many BS engineers’ job security.
Due to the fast development in computer
technology, the boundaries between various engineering disciplines become very vague. In
this respect, BS engineers become the fore-runner of the unification of the engineering
disciplines. Full automatic BS engineering systems might impair the career of the plant
operators. The bright side of this development
is that much better quality service can be offered to our customers and the public. After the
Review and Foresight
911 disaster happened to the World Trade Towers in New York City USA, the application of
computer technology in securing public safety
became dominant. CCTV recording, fire & explosion surveillance and etc became very
common. It can also be predicted that real time
measurement of bacteria and fungi will be available in the market in the next few years.
ited to a few projects in Hong Kong at the
moment, yet it is quite possible that this equipment will become the main trend in the air conditioning plant development. In the Wetland
Park, the running cost would be greatly reduced
due to the application of geothermal heat pump
air conditioning system with a higher system
efficiency.
With the relaxation to use fresh water for cooling towers, this enables reduction in power
consumption. In addition, proper separation of
unwanted solid from the water circuits further
reduces the power consumption, due to lower
fouling factors and hence higher efficiency.
3.
DEVELOPMENT IN THE AIR
CONDITIONING FIELD
3.1 Air Conditioning Plant
The only marked development is the development of the single screw compressors in the early
nineties. The coming back of ammonia chillers
is possible through enhancing safety measures
in cutting down the volume of ammonia and
quick safety measures taken in case of ammonia leakage. One significant development initiated locally is the development of the “Total
Energy Heat Pump” which aims to improve energy efficiency, enhancing the quality of air
conditioning, trimming down pollution to the
environment through minimizing heat rejection
and the most important effect is lowering down
the risk to public health through controlling the
growth of fungi and bacteria. Although the application of this Total Energy Heat Pump is lim-
Review and Foresight
3.3 Communication Between BMS & Air
Conditioning System
This is a significant issue yet needs to find a
satisfactory solution. The protection of privilege and interest makes this issue more complicated other than the actual technological hurdles
that have to be overcome. In the long run, networking and full automatic control of the air
conditioning systems will be the main line of
development in the air conditioning field.
3.4 Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) Measurement
3.2 Demand Control Air Conditioning
Real time indoor air quality measurement is
getting more common and with the help of the
developments in computer technology and IT, it
is now possible to provide quality air conditioning in accordance with the users’ demand.
Local floor fan terminal unit provides a pre-determined air volume at different temperature by
mixing the chilled supply air with room air to
satisfy user’s need. Variable speed drives for
both pumps and fans make it possible to control the output of the air conditioning system
exactly to match with the demand. As a result,
energy saving and enhancement of the quality
of the air conditioning service can be achieved.
IAQ is another hot topic that has been under
study for more than twenty years as it has a
significant impact on human health and comfort when people stay most of their time in the
indoor environment. BS engineers have the responsibilities to prevent the IAQ problems during the design, construction and operational
stages of the building. Since the factors affecting IAQ are thermal acceptability and air
contaminants, the on-site measurement method
needs to be accurate so that corrective and preventive measures can be provided when there
is a large deviation being found against those
set in the relevant guidance notes or international recognized standard.
The recent development of multiple gas sensors
together with other IT development makes it
possible of real time IAQ measurement. This
real time IAQ measurement (on exact bacteria
& fungi) offers the BS industry an opportunity
to increase our commitment in enhancing
public’s health and safety.
Review and Foresight
4.
DEVELOPMENTS IN THE BUILDING
MANAGEMENT SYSTEM (BMS)
4.1 Merging between IT network and BMS
A modern BMS generally comprises a number
of distributed, intelligent controllers plus one or
more operator interfaces while it can take the
form of a Windows-based software package
running on a standard PC. The use of IT network acts as BMS’s communication backbone
by connecting together the supervisors and controller LANs. Taking the advantage of the IT
system’s flexibility and high-speed, a system
supervisor can be placed wherever there is a
data port, which means anywhere in the
building. This feature is especially important
when office layouts are changed and people
moved around, which happens increasingly frequently in modern buildings. Furthermore, the
high data transmission speeds provided by IT
network are especially significant in those cases
where the BMS has an extensive monitoring role
and data traffic to the system supervisor can
reach high levels. Other communications media that have been successfully harnessed, including digital cellular technology and the allencompassing Internet, the latter enabling low
cost data transfer anywhere in the world.
much more from their systems and are looking
to exploit the technology’s potential as a sophisticated tool for knowledge management.
BMS can be a valuable source of knowledge
about the operation and performance of a
building’s energy consuming plant. The facility
they provide for monitoring and recording a
wealth of information has been used ever since
the first system was introduced. In the past, access to such data was largely confined to technical staff who had an interest in the building
services. Today, there are many other professionals within an organization who expect to
be able to tap this important resource so as to
improve efficiency and control costs. Thus, the
challenge for BMS manufacturers would be to
provide end users with the data that they want,
when and where they want it and in a format
that is easy to understand (e.g. dynamic
graphics, data record and playback and automatic energy analysis, etc.), as well as make
use of Windows operating environment to improve user friendliness. In the meantime, they
have to offer all these features at a cost that is
affordable.
5.
DEVELOPMENTS IN THE ELECTRICAL
INST
ALLA
TION
INSTALLA
ALLATION
5.1 Power Quality Monitoring and Control
4.2 Enhancing Knowledge Management
The key functions of BMS are to achieve optimum indoor environmental conditions, ideally
saving as much energy as possible, by means
of automatically controlling and monitoring
building services plants like Fire Services,
Security, Electrical and HVAC Systems Endusers, however, are increasingly demanding
Power Quality (PQ) is becoming increasingly
important to the customers as the electrical
equipments being used nowadays depend on
a much higher requirement on it and disruption-free operation is always expected.
However, with the increased usage of power
electronic or non-linear load devices (i.e.
computers, UPS, variable speed drive, discharge
Review and Foresight
lighting, etc.), they produce significant harmonic
distortion and PQ problems to the building
power system that creates serious and unexpected problems such as failure of electrical
equipment, overheating of cabling system, as
well as problem of electromagnetic interference
(EMI). It is therefore important for BS engineers
to familiar with issues of PQ, harmonic and EMI
problems. It is the best to resolve the potential
problems at the design stage, as it is relatively
straightforward to modify the building power
system design without the need of too much cost.
On the other hand, power-monitoring systems
have evolved over the years from electromechanical devices to transducers and recently to
digital meters. By carrying out Ad-hoc on-site
measurement or fixed installation for on-line PQ
monitoring, the PQ problems can be identified
and tackled by appropriate corrective measure.
5.2 Vacuum Gas Insulated Electrical
Equipment
This eliminates a lot of fire hazards and acoustic problems associated with the electrical
equipment, particularly for the high voltage (HV)
switchgears and transformers. As a result, above
ground switch rooms and transformer-rooms are
becoming more common. This helps to improve
the efficiency of the electrical power distribution and the reliability of the electrical power
supply since gas insulated electrical equipment
have a much higher overload safety factor than
oil/air insulated electrical equipment.
5.3 Maintenance Free Light Fittings
The development of the light emitting diode (LED)
makes it possible to develop lighting fittings that
can be claimed to be maintenance free. The
coating of titanium dioxide to the lighting fittings can make the outdoor lighting fittings selfcleaning. All these developments will minimize
the reliance to the maintenance team to maintain the quality of service to the customers and
the public.
6.
DEVELOPMENTS IN THE LIFT/
ESCALA
TOR INST
ALLA
TION
ESCALATOR
INSTALLA
ALLATION
6.1 User Friendly Lift/Escalator Control
Systems
This is very similar to the concept of the demand controlled air conditioning system. The
lift/escalator traffic pattern and the lift/escalator traveling speed are regulated in accordance
with users’ demand. Both the lifts/escalators
will be put to standstill when there is nobody
using it. This new development sounds magnificent but often a lot of lift users will soon find
the lift control system dictates the way the lifts
are used.
6.2 Machine-Room-Less technology
This revolution technology of machine-room-less
traction incorporated the latest permanent magnet gearless drive makes lift installation possible
in existing buildings where lift machine room is
difficult to be constructed. Saving in lift machine room construction provides a driving force
to create better lift service to the building users.
Review and Foresight
7.
DEVELOPMENTS IN FIRE SERVICES
INST
ALLA
TIONS
INSTALLA
ALLATIONS
7.1 Addressable Fire Detectors
This provides a more precise fire detection and
helps to eliminate false fire alarm. Automatic
periodic testing and recording/checking of fire
detector settings and conditions are now possible to be conducted automatically and in a
pre-setted programme.
7.2 Automatic Dry & Clean Fire
Suppression System
Due to vast application of IT, the valuable to be
protected may be intellectual properties, which
will suffer great damage due to water flooding.
The trend to move away from wet type fire suppression system became more dominant after
the 911 disaster. The gas fire suppression system is more expensive than the wet type fire
suppression system yet the saving in insurance
premium may render the dry type gas fire suppression system a much better choice than the
conventional wet type fire suppression system.
7.3 Aspirating Smoke Detection System
This system utilizes a structure of highly sensitive laser equipment to provide a reliable early
warning by generating a graded series of alarm
warning based on the early stages of smoldering fire. It is a system to protect the atrium and
prevent or minimize fire loss.
7.4 Water Mist System
This is a self contained, single fluid, pre-engineered fire suppression system and can extinguish a wide range of flammable liquid fires,
including fuel leakages. It provides a solution
to fire services upgrading of those buildings
where space for water tanks are limited.
8.
ENVIRONMENT
ENVIRONMENTAL
AL PROTECTION
DEVELOPMENTS
8.1 Protection of the Ozone Layer
The enforcement of the Montreal Protocol had
initiated the phasing out of CFCs and halons in
Review and Foresight
Hong Kong. The CFC refrigerants were replaced
by zero ozone depleting HFC refrigerants and
the halon fire suppression systems were replaced
by FM 200 systems, CO2 systems and etc. In
actual fact, both the public and the private sectors had been very efficient and effective in
phasing out the ozone depleting chemicals used
in BS installations.
8.2 Prevention of Global Warming
The use of energy efficient equipment and application of clean energy technology are two
important issues in the BS engineering field so
as to prevent the global warming problem. High
efficient equipment and systems have been
specified in the contract specifications, both in
the public and the private sectors. As the oil
price goes higher, more effort will be directed
towards designing more energy efficient BS
engineering systems. On the other hand, the
clean energy concept (such as solar energy,
photovoltaic panel, fuel cell and wind energy
applications, etc.) needs more general public
awareness and promotion before they can be
widely used in Hong Kong. However, further
research and development in lowering the production cost is also required.
9.
PROJECT MANAGEMENT
The BS Engineering challenges of recent decades
have been to design, develop and implement
new systems of a type and complexity never
attempted before, for example, apart from those
new BS installation systems mentioned above,
quality system likes ISO9001 and environmental management system likes ISO14001. The creation of these systems with performance capabilities not previously available, and within acceptable schedules and budgets, has required
the development of new methods of planning,
organizing, and controlling events. Hence,
managing a project nowadays is a complex and
challenging assignment.
To assist BS engineers or managers in performing their jobs efficiently and effectively, a wide
variety of computer software package has been
developed and the trend is toward interactive,
fully integrated systems. Many of them can
handle different aspects of project management
(such as configuration management, scheduling,
budgeting, cost control, resource management,
monitoring and control, etc.) throughout a
project’s life cycle. Furthermore, BS engineers
need to communicate and co-ordinate well with
people from various disciplines and different
trades. The widely use of Internet e-mail system
becomes one of the quick and convenient channels to achieve this objective.
10. COMMERCIAL /
CONTRACTUAL ARRANGEMENT
Over the past 25 years, the contractual arrangement of BS contractors for government contracts
has been changed from nominated sub-contrac-
Review and Foresight
tor to domestic sub-contractor. Now the government is consulting the industry regarding the Principal Building Services Contractor. For commercial sector, it has been changed from the traditional sub-contract at fixed price to “Partnering”
or “Guarantee Maximum Price”. Also, the “Design & Build” concept has been becoming popular for both public and private sectors. Promotion
to use electronic tender is in progress, and it is
widely accepted in tender issuance. However, it is
still not popular for tender submission, despite some
clients demand on-line biddings. For government
projects, when assessing the tender, not only the
price will take into account, but also the performance of the tenderers as contractors’ performance index system has been introduced.
In the past, for nominated sub-contract, the main
contractor has little involvement in monitoring the
BS subcontractors. The responsibility was on the
client, architect, or E & M consultant. Now, for
domestic sub-contract, the main contractor has full
responsibility on the overall success of the project,
including submission of BS equipment, monitoring the progress of BS installation, and thus requires a team of BS engineers.
All contractors are now required to register under
the ‘voluntary sub-contractor registration scheme’.
Also, the workers of various trades and different
disciplines have been or will be registered under
recognized organizations, otherwise they will not
be allowed to work. Apart from the registration
requirement, the Industry Training Advisory Committees of the Education and Manpower Bureau
has held discussion on the necessity of a Quality
Framework for the BS industry.
11. CONCLUSIONS
The challenge in front of BS profession is the basic
essential problem of “survival”. However, the industry needs to be self-discipline as well. In order
to secure the survival of the building services engineering professionals, we must make positive
contributions to the following 3 core service areas
that make better future development in the BS field
and benefit to the whole community:
11.1 Enhancing Public Safety
The 911 Disaster in World Trade Tower posted a
strong demand to the building services engineers
in enhancing their commitment and dedication in
securing public safety. Not only fire, but extending to even explosion suppression, suppression of
bio-terrorist attack and etc. have to be looked at
and properly addressed in building services system design.
11.2 Enhancing Public Health
The SARS event had alerted the public the importance of bacteria and fungi suppression. The public
is expecting more effort to be put to improve IAQ.
Bio-oxygen generators, UV bacteria/fungi suppression installations, titanium coated filters and
etc. are now of great demand.
11.3 Enhancing Environmental Protection
Not only energy efficient equipment and system
to be installed, it now even looks into the problem
of minimizing construction waste and waste production during the BS system operation. Maintenance free lighting fittings, automatic cleansing
air filters and etc. will be used widely.
Education, Research and Development
Development of BSE Education
in Hong Kong
K. T. Chan, CEng FCIBSE and J. Burnett, CEng FCIBSE
Department of Building Services Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University
With extremely limited developed land area
Hong Kong faces many problems in facilitating
the economic activities and accommodating a
population of seven million. Inevitably this has
given rise to sophisticated high-rise commercial
buildings and densely populated residential
buildings. As an international business centre
Hong Kong needs quality buildings in which to
conduct business, to uphold standard of living
and to support recreation and leisure activities.
In the absence of a significant equipment manufacturing industry in Hong Kong, the main employment opportunities for building services
engineers are in the fields of consultancy,
contracting, operation and maintenance. The
design and retrofitting of buildings needs to take
into account the dynamic interactions between
the external environment, the building envelope,
the engineering systems and equipment, and
the people and activities housed in the building.
Furthermore, efficient operation of large buildings needs a sound understanding of how the
entire building, the building services systems,
the operators and the occupants interact. This
requires educating a careful integration of the
various systems – building services engineering.
Building Services Engineering (BSE) may be
described as the art and science of designing,
installing, operating and maintaining engineering services systems and equipment in and
around buildings. With greater focus on environmental sustainability, and given the significant impacts that buildings have on the environment over their life cycle, building services
engineers have a major responsibility to improve the environmental performance of
buildings, including existing buildings. Building
services systems are intended to provide a
healthy and comfortable indoor environment (e.
g. clean water supply, proper drainage, thermal comfort, good indoor air quality, good lighting and acoustics, etc.), and a safe and secure
indoor environment (e.g. fire protection, security surveillance, public address and alarm
systems, etc.)
It was the need for a purpose-trained engineer,
crossing the traditional boundaries of electrical
and mechanical engineering and being able to
advise on the impact of architectural design
decisions on the building services to be
provided, which led to the establishment in the
United Kingdom of the Chartered Institution of
Building Services Engineers (CIBSE) in 1976,
and so is an active branch in Hong Kong.
Education, Research and Development
When BSE was young
For many years in the 70’s and 80’s, many new
comers to the building ser vices industr y
were graduates in mechanical or electrical
engineering. Study in building services engineering was rare, though there were specialised
streams of study in air conditioning and refrigeration in some mechanical engineering
programmes. The implementation of an Endorsement Certificate Course in Building Services dated back to 1966, which provided specialist training in building services by part-time
evening study for persons employed within the
construction or building services industry. Following the formal establishment of the Hong
Kong Polytechnic (HKP) in 1972, a Higher Diploma Course in BSE was in operation from
1977 meeting the academic requirements for
the associate membership of CIBSE. It served to
produce skilled higher technicians who could
work under the engineers with a minimum of
supervision and who could themselves supervise work in respect of design, installation,
commissioning, operation and maintenance. To
allow junior technicians working in the industry
to upgrade themselves, a part-time evening
Higher Certificate in BSE was first offered in
1979 by the Hong Kong Polytechnic, and the
students entering the programme are mainly
graduates from the Technical Institutes under the
Vocational Training Council, with an Ordinary
Certificate or Diploma in Mechanical or Electrical Engineering.
The increasing sophistication of user
requirements, the demand for higher standards
of comfort and safety, the more stringent specifications for process work, the concerns for the
environment and the need for more efficient use
of energy, have all led to substantial complexities in the building services needed, and the
importance of education to produce persons
equipped with the technical know-how escalates.
Developers, landlords and tenants have become
more knowledgeable about technical aspects
and their expectancies with regard to safety,
comfort and convenience have altered. Users
also demand high ef ficiency from airconditioning, ventilation, vertical transportation,
and building automation systems. Good design
of drainage, piped services and electrical installations also feature in user considerations.
The need for engineers, as opposed to
technicians, to take charge of the management
of building services systems increases as systems become more sophisticated.
It was this need in the construction industry that
educators in Hong Kong sought to produce well
educated graduates in the BSE discipline. When
established in 1981 the HKP’s Department of
Building Services Engineering assumed responsibility for a number of higher technician
programmes under the leadership of Dr. Mike
Marsden and Dr. John Burnett. A four year sandwich programme entitled BEng (Honours) in BSE
started in 1985 and was validated by UK’s
Council for National Academic Awards (CNAA)
in 1988 as an honours degree with retroactive
effect. For the professional requirement, the
programme was accredited by CIBSE and the
Hong Kong Institution of Engineers (HKIE) in
1989. This marked the first honours degree
programme in BSE in Hong Kong, having attained international recognition by both academic body and professional body. Since then
the Department of BSE in PolyU has become
Education, Research and Development
one of the largest education unit worldwide
devoted exclusively to building ser vices
engineering.
Philosophy of BSE education
It is anticipated that a building services engineer requires broad knowledge of design, construction and operational aspects of all major
building services systems. However, it is not
thought to be necessary or possible to acquire
specialist study in all of these areas within a
first degree. Consequently, a BSE degree
programme may concentrate on the main services which affect the building design, life safety,
human comfort and environmental performance.
In the evolution of the degree programme a
major consideration has been to provide a
broad education together with sufficient
specialised study to equip graduates for their
future professional development. A good academic foundation is required for subsequent
qualification as a professional and a career in
industry. Studies seek to develop the students’
intellectual and imaginative powers as well as
providing them with the necessary vocational
techniques and skills.
The building services engineer is seen to be responsible for the design, installation, operation
and maintenance of the engineering services
systems, and for the associated management
and administration work, e.g. tendering, contract administration, project supervision, operation and maintenance management, etc. It is
important to broaden students’ perspective of
the role of a building services engineer, develop personal skills to enable on-going selfdevelopment, and to provide sufficient technical skills of immediate use in their career. A
BSE programme should therefore aim at meeting a need in Hong Kong for locally-produced
professional and innovative building services
engineers. This implies providing an education
which not only enables the graduate to satisfy
the educational requirements of the professional
institutions – CIBSE and HKIE, but also equips
him/her to make an individual contribution to
the development of building services technology anywhere in the world. The programmes
produce graduates who can master the design
and operation of major building services systems embracing HVACR services, fire services,
piped services, electrical distribution and
lighting, and their integration in meeting with
the requirements of building users and environmental concerns.
The boom of BSE … education
The property market development prior to 1997
has served as an impetus for improving and
highlighting the importance of building services
and have raised the profile of the BSE discipline in Hong Kong. Educators have strived to
contribute to the development of professionals
through a variety of educational programmes
Education, Research and Development
and activities. This is achieved through a comprehensive suite of academic programmes at
sub-degree, degree and postgraduate level and
through very close links with the industry and
its professional organisations.
In response to the demand of BSE technologists
for the construction industry, educators in Hong
Kong did not hesitate to join the Hong Kong
Polytechnic in providing BSE education. A fulltime programme of Higher Diploma in BSE was
offered to secondary school leavers by the City
Polytechnic established in 1984, which was sub-
sequently renamed as Associate of Science in
BSE in 2002. Following the two Polytechnics,
the Hong Kong Technical College was established in 1993 under the Vocational Training
Council, which offered a programme of Higher
Diploma in BSE for full-time study and another
programme of Higher Certificate in BSE for parttime study. These programmes meet the academic requirements for the associate membership of CIBSE and HKIE. The PolyU’s BEng
(Honours) in BSE programme, with the recommendation by CIBSE, received the prestigious
Happold Brilliant award in 1997 for being best
BSE programme internationally.
By the time of 90’s, there was a large pool of
practitioners in the building services industry,
who were holders of higher diploma or higher
certificate in an engineering discipline and de-
sired to upgrade to professional level through a
structured part-time study for meeting the challenge of increasing expectation on practitioners
as well as enhancing personal career
development. For the first time of operating an
Honours BSE degree programme without subsidy from the government (i.e. self-financed),
PolyU established a part-time programme in
1992 for the practising BSE technicians to develop their technical knowledge, learning
attitude, intellectual power and professional
responsibility. It endeavoured to satisfy the academic requirements for the designation of
MCIBSE and MHKIE. By upgrading this group
of persons working in the building services
industry, the quality of the design and operation of buildings as a whole can be enhanced
in the context of health, safety and energy
efficiency.
This move of PolyU’s Department of BSE towards
self-financed higher education was joined by
the City University which started a similar parttime programme of BEng in BSE in the late 90s.
By the way, during this period of time the two
Polytechnics became much involved in higher
education at degree and postgraduate levels,
and in 1995 reformed into the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) and the City University of Hong Kong (CityU) respectively.
Another major expansion of BSE education is
the inclusion of normal full-time governmentfunded programmes of BEng in BSE in
universities, for which the BSE Department of
PolyU has been the only provider for 15 years
since 1985. By the time of 2002, we have the
PolyU, the CityU and the HKU operating government-funded programme of BEng in BSE for
Education, Research and Development
A-level entry, and the HKUST operating a BSE
stream in the mechanical engineering
programme.
In addition to the BSE degree graduates, many
mechanical or electrical degree graduates take
up work in the BSE profession without having
had any formal academic training in BSE. Some
sort of conversion programme therefore should
be beneficial to these non-BSE graduates in
gearing them to the profession. Also, along with
the rapid development in technologies and their
application in BSE, continuous professional development (CPD) for practising engineers is seen
to be essential to the industry. Study of a MSc
degree in BSE is logically an opportunity welcomed by both individuals and employers for
the aforesaid purposes. Such a MSc programme
in BSE was launched by the University of Hong
Kong (HKU) in 1991, followed by PolyU in
1992.
As the BSE profession is multi-disciplinary covering a wide range of technologies, it is believed that a BEng degree in BSE should provide a broad coverage, whereas specialisation
can be developed in postgraduate study. The
MSc programme in BSE is most suitable for the
non-BSE graduates, and specialized BSE-related
MSc programmes will be beneficial to BSE
graduates for continuing education.
Nevertheless, the MSc programmes are structured to enable individuals to choose a combination of subjects to suit their preferred professional development needs by part-time study.
In recent years, apart from the MSc BSE
programmes at HKU and PolyU, there are
programmes of MSc in Intelligent Building Technology & Management at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), MSc
in Facility Management and MSc in Fire & Safety
Engineering at PolyU.
No doubt that BSE practitioners in Hong Kong
are keen to upkeep their professional
knowledge. Other than studying a full academic
programme, many practitioners may pursue
professional development by studying selected
BSE-related modules from the BEng and MSc
programmes. In this aspect of continuous professional development, there are admirable efforts from the Building Services Division of HKIE,
CIBSE Hong Kong Branch and ASHRAE Hong
Kong Chapter, as well as other professional
bodies and academic institutions, in providing
fruitful professional activities and technical seminars on concerned BSE issues and new
technologies. A good example is the recent Professional Lecture Series in Fire Safety Engineering jointly organized by eight professional or
educational institutions, which has attracted
hundreds of applicants.
Education, Research and Development
Another important issue that should not be omitted in relation to BSE education in Hong Kong
is the academic validation and professional
accreditation of BSE programmes. In the 1980’s
and before, BSE programmes were academically validated by the UK’s Council for National
Academic Awards (CNAA). Afterwards, the
educational institutions in Hong Kong are empowered to validate academic awards by
themselves, let alone the accreditation by professional bodies for professional recognition. Up
to 1995, professional accreditations of BSE
programmes were sought from the CIBSE. In
June 1995, the HKIE was accepted into the
“Washington Accord” for the mutual recognition of engineering degree programmes, and
became the eighth signatory to the agreement
for“Recognition of Equivalency of Engineering
Education Programs leading to the Accredited
Engineering Degree”. Since then, the HKIE has
become the qualifying body for engineers seeking professional recognition in Hong Kong, and
set its own standards for education and training,
which are equivalent to those of the UK Engineering Council. HKIE and CIBSE have mutual
recognition of corporate membership, whereas
HKIE’s Building Services Discipline and CIBSE
Hong Kong Branch collaborate in both learned
society and qualification matters.
The road ahead
Building services engineers have an increasingly
important role in ensuring that system design
integration, co-ordination and commissioning are
optimised for safe and efficient operation. A significant part of the building services engineer’s
career will be spent in financial planning and
control, project management and administration,
whether in the government, contracting or consulting branches of the industry. There remains a
demand for BSE engineers to work on building
projects in Hong Kong, other areas of China and
in neighbouring countries. Educators and practitioners will have to upkeep an international dimension of BSE, not emphasizing merely on local
practice.
The legislative controls will include the requirement
for professional engineers to be responsible that
their designs comply with the requirements laid
down in codes. Therefore, the status of professional building services engineers will be raised
as the statutory regulations are imposed. Along
with the emergence of legislative controls over energy and environmental issues and the increasingly stringent client and end-user requirements
in various aspects, the design and construction of
buildings and building services systems will become more and more sophisticated. Holistic considerations and innovative solutions are increasingly in demand. Building services engineers need
to become more knowledgeable and have better
technical and management skills to cope with these
challenges.
To cope with the changing demand, the role of
BSE education and continuous professional development is emphasized in several respects. Skills
must be upgraded to meet the challenge of providing more sustainable buildings – improved indoor environmental quality, energy efficiency,
system adaptability, etc. More sophisticated computer modelling for design purposes, such as
smoke extraction, ventilation, daylighting, energy
use, etc., have emerged as a means of improving
designs. Robust and effective building automation systems which can perform control and main-
Education, Research and Development
tenance functions, cater for fire safety and security needs and can implement energy saving strategies are required. Building operation and
maintenance, fit-out and refurbishment are also
under scrutiny to improve the life-cycle performance of buildings.
Lastly, there remains to be seen a rationalization
of the range of BSE programmes provided by
educators in Hong Kong. Particularly, the co-existence of Higher Certificate, Higher Diploma for
secondary school leavers, Higher Diploma for Alevel entry and the new Associate Degree is
confusing. It is not beneficial that these
programmes present diversified names of awards,
but are supposed to be at the same level meeting
the academic requirements for Associate
Membership. The BEng degree programmes will
have to embrace the multi-disciplinary nature of
BSE, whereas the MSc programmes will contribute to the conversion of non-BSE graduates and
deepening in specific areas of BSE.
Education, Research and Development
Research Works on Building Services
Engineering in Academic Institutions of
Hong Kong
Dr. Albert So, CEng FCIBSE, Training Co-ordinator of CIBSE Hong Kong Branch Committee 2004/2005
Services in buildings such as lighting, heating,
ventilation, air conditioning, public health
systems, automation and vertical transportation
etc. constitute the main targeted scope of study
of building ser vices engineering (BSE
hereinafter). So far, research works on BSE have
been focusing on two aspects, hard and soft.
The hard aspect mainly deals with the technologies that can provide the services, involving
design, production, installation, commissioning,
maintenance and the long-termed operation of
the systems. The soft aspect mainly deals with
the management of processes mentioned above
as well as the computer aided tools to facilitate
these processes. In Hong Kong, most research
works on BSE have been carried out in the four
universities offering degree programmes in BSE
and the Institute of Vocational Education (IVE
hereinafter). The contents presented in this article are in no way exhaustive. The author aims
at describing some achievements in BSE in these
five academic organizations so that readers can
have a brief concept on what have been done
here. Readers who are interested in knowing
more are highly recommended to access the web
sites of these five institutions for more details.
My aim is to show our professional colleagues
and the general public that the research strength
in BSE in Hong Kong is comparable to, though
not necessarily superior to, international
standards. Since there is only one university in
Hong Kong that possesses a department in BSE,
the introduction will follow the sequence: Hong
Kong Polytechnic University, City University of
Hong Kong, University of Hong Kong, Hong
Kong University of Science and Technology and
IVE (Tsing Yi), according to the size of BSE undergraduate and postgraduate programmes. I
am not ignoring those relevant achievements in
Chinese University, Baptist University and others but space is limited here.
1. Research works in the Department of Building Services Engineering, Hong Kong Polytechnic University are mainly conducted in the two
research centres, namely the Research Centre
for Building Environmental Engineering (RCBEE
hereinafter) and Research Centre for Fire Engineering (RCFE hereinafter). As the department
is one of the largest departments of this nature
in the world, there are many more research
activities that cannot be described here due to
the limitation of space.
Education, Research and Development
According to their official homepage, the mission of RCBEE is to undertake advanced applied research and consultancy in issues related
to indoor environmental control systems. The
general aim is to achieve healthy, comfortable
and productive indoor environments with minimal energyconsumption. The centre particularly
encourages interdisciplinar y and multidisciplinary researches. Their activities, grouped
into six strategic areas, mainly focus on two
issues, namely the indoor environmental quality concerning the health, comfort and productivity of building users, as well as the energy
efficiency associated with heating and/or cooling buildings, concerning the sustainable development of modern economies. The six areas are: indoor environmental quality studies
such as air quality, thermal, lighting, acoustic
and electromagnetic environments etc., energy
efficiency and utilization of renewable energy
such as building integrated photovoltaics, solar
water heating and wind power etc., building
automation and intelligent buildings and optimized control etc., advanced system development such as modeling of radiant cooling and
desiccant dehumidification, electromagnetic interference control etc., advanced engineering
and computer simulation analysis involving computational fluid dynamics, and management and
operation and maintenance issues like diagnosis of building air quality and energy auditing
etc. One of the key research activities was the
development of HKBEAM (Hong Kong Building
Environmental Assessment Method) some eight
years ago.
According to their official web site, the RCFE’s
research activities are related to fire science and
engineering for solving practical engineering
problems, searching for advanced knowledge
in fire engineering and maintaining the quality
of teaching. They are involved in fire modeling,
sprinkler research and some advanced topics
such as studying atrium fires, hotel fires, industrial fires and even karaoke fires. The RCFE is
taking a leading role in fire research in Asia.
2. Research works in BSE in the Department
of Building & Construction, City University of
Hong Kong mainly focus on three aspects,
namely environmental sciences, fire and intelligent buildings.
Energy auditing, energy simulations and energy
conservation measures such as the utilization
of daylight in high-rise buildings belong to the
first category. This research team contributed
a lot in the development of performance based
energy code by the Hong Kong Government in
mid 90’s. Besides energy studies, the application of computer fluid dynamics in studying ventilation and distribution of pollutants has been
very active.
In fire sciences and engineering, there are various areas of study. Zone and field models for
fire and smoke spreading have been developed.
Computer aided simulation of smoke spreading and evacuation models involving human
Education, Research and Development
behaviour of occupants have also been the
major tasks in the recent decade. This team
contributed a lot in encouraging the Hong Kong
Government to adopt the concept of performance based fire codes versus the conventional
prescriptive codes.
In the area of intelligent buildings, the Johnson
Controls Intelligent Building Research Centre,
funded by the Research Grants Council (RGC
hereinafter), developed a formal definition of
intelligent buildings, resulting in the establishment of Asian Institute of Intelligent Buildings
(AIIB hereinafter). The Intelligent Building Index of AIIB, a comprehensive and 100% quantitative assessment scheme for intelligent
buildings, was also developed based on research findings of the research centre. The first
University Industry Matching Grant of Innovation and Technology Fund of the HKSAR Government was obtained by this research group
to develop a series of home automation devices
based on open technology (refer to Figure 1),
Figure 1 I-panel for home automation developed for the 1st ITF
UIM Project funded by the HKSAR Government
resulting in the establishment of Networked Control Training Centre, one of the six authorized
training centres of Echelon Corporation, the inventor of LonWorks technology, in the Far East.
Besides automation, this group is also taking a
leading role in research works on elevator engineering in universities around the world. Last
year, the group was funded by RGC to develop
a Virus Cleaner to stop the distribution of SARS
virus inside the hospital (refer to Figure 2).
Figure 2 The Virus Cleaner on Trial
Running at Prince of Wales Hospital
3. BSE is one stream of study within the Department of Mechanical Engineering of University of Hong Kong. Research works are obviously more mechanical engineering biased.
Active activities, according to their official web
site, include dynamic computer modeling and
simulation of HVAC systems, optimization of
HVAC system design and component selection,
air diffusion study and displacement ventilation
systems, building emulator and building
automation, and advanced intelligent control
and fault detection. Other activities in illumination engineering, information technology, energy studies and indoor air quality control are
on-going.
Education, Research and Development
4. BSE is also one stream of study within the
Department of Mechanical Engineering of Hong
Kong University of Science and Technology.
Research works are even more mechanical engineering biased. Research activities are essentially more fundamental in nature, having
implications on BSE. Projects such as indoor
air quality survey, control, assessment, heat pipe
applications, building heat transfer, underfloor
air-conditioning, air cleaning, smoldering combustion etc. are interesting.
5. The Automation Centre of Excellence of IVE
(Tsing Yi), established in 1998, has been working on the development of networked automation systems for buildings. It is also one of the
six authorized training centres of Echelon Corporation in the Far East, conducting training
courses on LonWorks technology. It is also
certified by National Instruments Corporation
to provide training on LabView technology.
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Hong Kong Science Park - Phase 1
LI Kwok-keung, CEng FCIBSE, Suen Ming-tak, CEng MCIBSE & MUI Suet-yan
Architectural Services Department, HKSAR Government
ABSTRACT
The Hong Kong Science Park is a key infra-structural development that symbolises the beginning
of a new epoch for the development of innovation and technology in Hong Kong. It is a unique
project which aims to provide a focus to stimulate applied innovation from research
programmes undertaken in Hong Kong, to attract corporate research and development functions coming to the region and to provide a home
for the R&D functions of established Hong Kong
enterprises. It offers technology-oriented business and academic communities an integrated campus and a unique one-stop service centre which will promote interaction and innovation at both
local and global level, and promote the growth of Hong Kong’s technological capabilities and
knowledge-based economy.
Placed on a reclaimed site beside the beautiful Tolo Harbour at Pak Shek Kok, near Chinese
University, the Science Park covers an area of 220,000m2 and is being developed in three phases.
The Architectural Services Department (ArchSD) was responsible for the development of the master layout plan and also the project management, design and construction supervision of Phase 1
of the Park. Phase 1 consists of ten buildings providing a total of 120,000m2 gross floor area
(GFA) for researches in electronics, biotechnology, precision engineering and information technology / communication. The development aims to achieve a sustainable, environmental friendly
and functional design which will create a park-like setting with a relax, interactive and pleasant
working environment.
This paper introduces the design philosophies and approaches implemented in achieving the
goal.
Keywords: innovation, R&D, sustainable, OEA and environmental friendly.
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Figure 1 – Master Layout Plan
1. INTRODUCTION
The Hong Kong Science Park (HKSP) is designed
as an attractive park-like setting with sustainable environmental friendly and energy efficient
design to create an open and inviting
environment. The Park is developed in three
phases: Phase 1, 2 & 3. Research and
development, innovation and technology are the
main concepts of the Park. The total development area for the whole Park is 330,000m2 GFA.
The construction of initial group of buildings in
Phase 1 of the HKSP commenced in February
2000 and the last one completed in June 2004.
The total cost of the Phase 1 development is
about HK$3,380M.
2. THE MASTER LA
YOUT OF PHASE 1
LAYOUT
The master layout of Phase 1 (Figure 2) delineates the site into three areas designated as
Campus, Core and Corporate Zones. It is conducive to accommodate companies of all sizes,
from small firms and medium-sized operations
in the campus buildings to larger business and
multi-national conglomerates in corporate
buildings.
Figure 2 – Master Layout of Phase 1
Core Buildings - Building 1, 2 & 9
Corporate Buildings - Building 4A, 4B, 7 & 8
Campus Buildings - Building 5 & 6
Carpark Building - Building 3
Phase 1 of the HKSP consists of ten buildings:
two campus buildings, three core buildings, four
corporate buildings plus a car park building.
They were under the design responsibilities of
the ArchSD. The campus buildings and the car
park building (named as the Icon Tower) are
located along the southwest of the site next to
Tolo Highway to act as a traffic noise barrier.
The core buildings provide all the essential facilities such as communal and recreational
facilities, meeting and conference rooms, exhibition halls, shops, dining areas as well as office spaces for small-size companies. The medium-size tenants are to be accommodated in
the campus buildings while large companies
could hire the corporate buildings with carpark
facilities at the semi-basement level of the
buildings.
Efficient communication and interaction is one
of the main topics for architectural design in the
Park. There are no fences or boundary walls
around the premises. Roof gardens, water
features, walkways and parks are also care-
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fully integrated to provide a harmonious environment for the occupants. Although exterior
appearances of the buildings are different which
allow individual identities on site, they still
present a coherent look in general. On the other
hand, the low-rise buildings in phase 1 are
gradually stepped-down from 40m high to 30m
high from the Campus Zone along the highway
to the Corporate Zone along the waterfront. This
arrangement could maximize daylight to each
building as well as to enhance natural air movement within the Park.
3. THE ARCHSD’s OVERALL ENERGY
APPROACH
It is ArchSD’s green policy to pursue environmental initiatives in projects to enhance energy
efficiency of buildings and quality of the built
environment for the safety, comfort and well
being of the occupants through the implementation of the “Overall Energy Approach” (OEA)
[1]
in building design. OEA is a holistic and systematic design approach in achieving good
Figure 3 – Overall Energy Approach
quality in built environment while maintaining
the energy efficiency of buildings. The core strategies of the OEA are minimization of energy
flow into/out of a building and efficient use of
energy in the building (Figure 3). This approach
is adopted in the design of the HKSP Phase 1 to
enhance the building’s energy efficiency and
minimize energy consumption by close collaboration between architectural, structural, building services and landscape designers.
4. BUILDING SERVICES DESIGN APPROACH
4.1Sustainable Design
For the entire Phase 1, there is a service tunnel
to provide an underground backbone linking
all buildings. Major utilities such as power
supply, water supply, refuse collection pipe work
and drainage pipes are running inside the
tunnel. The tunnel not only helps to avoid problems to the underground services due to possible settlement on the newly reclaimed land but
also facilitate access for maintenance and replacement in the future.
In order to provide a pleasant environment and
to maintain good environmental hygiene, an
Automatic Refuse Collection System (ARCS) with
dual chutes is incorporated to connect all the
buildings and to collect wastes by vacuum
technology. Refuse collected is to be compacted
and stored in a refuse collection container before being taken to landfill sites or for recycling.
The system permits separation of refuse at source
and waste paper, plastic and aluminium can
be collected for recycling.
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Building-integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) electric
power generation system not only produces electricity from natural sunlight without pollution but
also forms part of the building envelope of the
Buildings in Phase 1. Individual solar cells are
interconnected inside a glass panel to form a
standard photovoltaic (PV) module. These modules are then connected together with cables
and wires to form a PV array. When sunlight
shines on the solar cells, it induces the PV effect
and generates DC electric power. This free DC
power can be used directly to power electrical
equipment, stored in batteries or fed into the
local power supply grid through inverters.
Besides, an automatic irrigation system with rain
sensor control is adopted to save water and
energy for irrigation. Furthermore, a centralized building automatic control and monitoring
system is provided to link up the building services systems of all buildings in the Park. This
system provides a single point of control and
monitoring which enables the systems to be finetuned for optimum system performance and energy consumption.
4.2 Indoor Air Quality
The buildings in Phase 1 are designed to comply with the Guidance Notes for the Management of IAQ in Offices and Public Places [2] issued by the IAQ Management Group of HKSAR
Government. Demand control on fresh air intakes is provided to assure optimum fresh air
rate in order to maintain the indoor air quality.
Cleanable electrostatic filters are used as the
main filter in the air-conditioning system for air
filtration. This will avoid frequent replacement
of filters and also minimizes the disposal of
building waste. Ionizers, chemical filters and UV
sterilizers are also installed in the air-conditioning system to provide active treatment of indoor
air.
4.3 Energy Efficient and Environmental Friendly
Installations
Building Services Installations are the major
energy consumers in buildings as their functions
are to provide safe and comfort built environment for the occupants. Use of energy efficient
equipment and proper system design contribute to building sustainability. The building services installations in Science Park Phase 1 are
designed to fully comply with the requirements
of the Codes of Practice for Energy Efficiency
issued by Electrical and Mechanical Services
Department of HKSAR Government. [3]
For lighting design in office area, a computerized addressable lighting control system is used.
In addition to the computerized scheduling
control, photo sensors and occupancy sensors
are installed at false ceiling level and connected
to the lighting system. With these sensors, the
lighting for a particular area will be switched
off automatically when there is no occupant for
a period of time or to be dimmed down when
there is sufficient natural light. To meet the flexible layout requirements for multi-tenant office,
the lighting layout and the switching circuitries
can be rearranged by the lighting control system through the computer. It saves unnecessary
rewiring works and modification to the lighting
due to revision in the office layout. Moreover,
energy efficient lighting equipment such as T5
fluorescent tubes, high efficiency electronic ballasts and high efficacy discharge luminaries are
used in most areas where appropriate. To fa-
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cilitate the building management in monitoring
the power consumption of the entire building,
sufficient metering facilities are provided for
continuous data acquisition and future energy
audit.
Optimizing energy consumption in air-conditioning and mechanical ventilation system is also
achieved by the use of energy efficient equipment and energy recapture/recover y
equipment. Water-cooled chillers with cooling
towers are adopted for the air-conditioning system for all buildings since they are more energy
efficient comparing with air-cooled system. In
the heating system, water-to-water type heat
pumps are used to provide hot water for space
heating and humidity control. Hot water from
heat pumps is also used to pre-heat the hot water
supply for domestic use. In fact, heat pump has
much higher Coefficient of Performance (COP)
than the other types of heating equipment. When
the cooling and heating systems are operated
at the same time, condensing water from water-cooled chillers will be pumped through the
heat pumps before circulating to the cooling
towers for heat rejection. This arrangement allows the heat pumps to recover the heat energy
from the condensing water for heating which is
other wise wasted.
For the air handling side, high-efficiency motors are used in air handling units and mechanical fans. Variable air volume (VAV) system is
designed for major air-conditioning spaces to
reduce fan power consumption when the airconditioning system is under par t load
conditions. Carbon Dioxide (CO2) sensors are
installed for demand control of fresh air intake.
The demand control arrangement will minimize
energy consumption in handling fresh air intake while still maintaining good indoor air
quality. Flexible zoning of air conditioning system in the office areas integrated with occupancy sensors allows individual air-conditioning zone to be operated at a higher room temperature set point when there is no occupant,
or to shut down the VAV box for a particular
zone automatically after office hours. Moreover,
the cool exhausted air from office spaces is discharged from the building through toilets and
pantries on each floor. Therefore, reasonably
comfortable environment in toilets and pantries
can be maintained without extra energy input
for air-conditioning. Thermal wheels are also
used to pre-treat the fresh air intake by the cooler
and drier exhausted air from the office space.
For the lift installation, “off-peak” lift control logic
is adopted which allows only one lift in the zone
to respond to calls while the others are switched
to standby mode during non-busy hours to save
energy. Lighting and fans inside lift car will be
switched off automatically when lifts are not in
use for more than 15 minutes.
For the escalator installation, automatic start/
stop control (or service-on-demand control) is
employed to save energy and reduce operating cost. A pair of infrared sensors is installed
at the lower and upper escalator landings to
detect passengers passing through. When there
is no passenger, the escalator will stop. If there
is a passenger detected by the infrared sensors,
the escalator will start running again.
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5. RECOGNITION ON SUST
AINABLE
SUSTAINABLE
DESIGN
The sustainable design of the Hong Kong Science Park Phase 1 has been well recognized
and the following awards/certificates have been
received:
“Intelligent Building of the Year - 2003”
awarded by the Asian Institute of Intelligent Building Ltd. (AIIB).
The highest ratings of ‘Excellent’ have
been achieved under the HKBEAM
(Hong Kong Building Environmental
Assessment Method).
courages the designers to use environmental
friendly, sustainable, high energy efficient building services installations as well as clean and renewable energy technologies. These measures will
definitely enhance the buildings’ energy efficiency
and minimize energy consumption. Furthermore,
they enable enterprises and professionals from all
over the world to work proudly and comfortably
in the HKSP.
REFERENCE
[1]
[2]
Certificates of Registration under the
Hong Kong Energy Efficiency Registration
Scheme for Buildings for Air-conditioning,
Lighting, Electrical and Lift/Escalator In
stallations issued by Electrical and Mechanical Services Department, the Gover nment of the Hong Kong Special
Administrative Region.
6. CONCLUSION
The HKSP is a project which sets to promote hitech and innovative ideas exchange. The Park aims
to create an environment where innovative enterprises and talent people can collaborate to build
world-class international technology clusters. The
building design of HKSP has applied the ‘Overall
Energy Approach’ to achieve sustainability which
opens up a new channel for linking up various
building professionals to strive for optimum use of
energy in the buildings. This approach also en-
[3]
[4]
Mr. Ronald CHIN, Assistant Director (Building
Services), Architectural Services Department – Overall Energy Approach in Achieving an Acceptable
Indoor Air Quality in Tomorrow’s Buildings, year
2001.
Guidance Notes for the Management of IAQ in
Offices and Public Places issued by the IAQ Management Group, HKSAR Government.
Electrical and Mechanical Services Department, The
Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region-Code of Practice for Energy Efficiency
of Lighting Installations 1998 Edition; Code of Practice for Energy Efficiency of Electrical Installations
1998 Edition; Code of Practice for Energy Efficiency
of Air-Conditioning Installations 1998 Edition; Code
of Practice for Energy Efficiency of Lift and Escalator Installations 1998 Edition.
Ir. K.K. LI, Ir. M.T. SUEN, Ir. S.C. Lam, Architectural Services Department – Hong Kong Science
Park Sustainable Building Design, presented at the
1st Hong Kong Shanghai Symposium for Sustainable Building in May 2004.
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The Development of Sustainable
Design of Building Services Installations
for Disci plinary Forces Buil
dings
Buildings
HO Sai-king, CEng FCIBSE
Chief Building Services Engineer
Architectural Services Department, HKSAR Government
ABSTRACT
In the design of building services installations for the disciplinary forces buildings from the 70’s,
80’s … and to the 21st century, there have been magnificent evolutions and design changes in
the building services provisions to meet the operational requirements of these types of buildings.
All the design developments are required not only to face with the ever-demanding public safety
and security requirements, but also to make use of the advancement of building services technology to address the prevailing concerns on energy effectiveness, environmental friendliness, health
and safety and the like. The paper will give a succinct account on the specific design for major
building services elements such as electrical power supply system with full harmonic control and
reliability measures, energy efficient air-conditioning installation and special feature for the indoor air quality, vertical transportation for specific operations, enhanced fire protection systems
to uphold the safety standards and the integrated security command and surveillance system to
safeguard the internal security of the building. Last but not the least, aspects in the continuing
improvement in the building services systems will be identified for sustainable design development of the disciplinary forces buildings in Hong Kong.
Keywords:
1.
Sustainability, energy effectiveness, operational reliability, round-the-clock operation
Introduction
There has been an ever-increasing demand in
the area of community security from the general public. Uplift of the quality of service rendered by the disciplinary forces departments is
the essence of meeting the public’s expectation.
In this context, continuing development and im-
provement of the accommodation requirements
have been made in the past decades.The aesthetics of some of the disciplinary forces buildings constructed from before the 70’s to the recently completed as shown in Fig. 1a, 1b & 1c
respectively. Likewise, the expansions of provisions of the building services installations are
no exception. In the 70’s, the air-conditioning
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Fig.1a- Built before the 70’s
design for the disciplinary forces buildings was
almost based on window type air-conditioner
and was developed into the central plant design of direct expansion type starting from the
80’s. Resilience of power supply was rather
vulnerable without adequate back-up facilities.
Fire safety was only taken care by fire hydrant
and hosereel systems. As to the internal security control, it heavily relied on manual attendance and operation by its own operational
staff. Nowadays, all the aforesaid building
services provisions are no longer compatible
with the client’s requirements as most of their
buildings are equipped with abundant number
of information technology and telecommunication systems to aid their operations. All the design and performance targets of the building
services installations are directed to uphold the
sustainable operations of the building.
2.
Fig.1b- Built in the 80’s to 90’s
Fig. 1c- Recently Completed.
Electrical Power Supply Installation
To cope with the increasing installation of electronic computing equipment for supporting of
the client’s operational need, the demand of
electricity supply and power quality standard
have been considerably increased. The growth
of power density for the office equipment load
has been rocketed to almost 80VA/m2 as compared with the loading requirement of 3040VA/m2 in the 70’s.
Given the vital importance of telecommunication to the client’s operations round-the-clock,
special attention has been paid to the reliability
of power supply. Conditioning of harmonic distortion generated by non-linear electronic equipment load is of paramount importance for maintaining power system stability. The design on
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hybrid harmonic filter as shown in Fig. 2 composing both passive and active filtering design
of fers a balance between the cost and
performance. Primarily, passive filter made up
of zig-zag transformer is designed to provide a
low impedance path for absorption of 3rd harmonic current. Secondly, deployment of active
filter mitigates majority of the 5th, 7th, 11th and
the higher order of harmonics. Such design
provides a full spectrum of harmonics filtering
for the electrical network.
3.
Air Conditioning and Mechanical
Ventilation (ACMV) installation
Use of window type air-conditioner is no longer
being compatible with the current design of curtain wall building structure. As ACMV installation consumes electricity energy as high as 30%
of the total energy consumption of the building
and the requirement of irregular hour operations for the disciplinary forces building, the system design in the direction of energy effectiveness is indispensable.
Use of energy efficient equipment installations
would not only consume less energy, but also
carry with it the positive effect on the protection
of environment. To achieve these goals, the following measures are incorporated into the
ACMV design for the newly completed projects,
where applicable:
Fig. 2 -Hybrid Harmonic Filter in shunt connection
Apart from the aforesaid measures, employment
of standby emergency generators and
uninterruptible power supplies increase the reliability of power supply. To further secure the
system, avoid the use of single machinery is one
of the common methodologies in the industry.
Use of static transfer switch between the redundant power supply sources is one of the prevailing technologies in ensuring power supply
availability. However, determination of the
equipment redundancy should commensurate
with the client’s operational need and cost effective analysis.
Use of water-cooled heat rejection/evaporative cooling method;
Use of heat reclaim technologies, such as
desiccant total energy wheel and heat recovery chiller;
Use of variable speed drives for water
pumping equipment and air fan
installations;
Use of presence sensors to regulate the airconditioning supply automatically;
Adoption of zero ozone depletion potential refrigerant for chiller plant;
Use of CFC free thermal insulating material;
and
Use of prefabricated air ducts, water pipes,
air handlers etc to reduce construction
wastage.
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ACMV design for the disciplinary forces building requires built-in flexibility to cope with the
irregular operating hours of the some open plan
and cellular offices without sacrificing the system efficiency. To meet this specific operational
requirement, air supply unit with local control
facility is provided at the cellar officers to allow
independent operation. A typical scheme is to
arrange two AHUs, each taking the load of half
of the floor, to maintain constant pressure at
the main supply air duct. Through the operating signal from the local control facility, the
AHUs will operate at the desired point by variable speed drive to meet the demand. Fig. 3
illustrates the concept for the above
arrangement.
Fig. 3 –
Air supply scheme for spaces operating in ir
regular hours
Given the growing concerns on indoor environment and health, indoor air quality (IAQ) plays
an important role in the ACMV design. In this
case, due to the restricted movement of staff/
visitors inside the building, provision of good
IAQ in individual office/area is particularly
important as people may stay in a designated
locality for more than eight hours. The following measures have been adopted in the air handling systems where applicable.
Central supply of pre-treated fresh air;
High efficiency air filter for removal of respirable suspended particulates;
UV sterilizing light and active-ion genera-
tor for removal of air pollutant;
Incorporation of re-heating coil for dehumidification;
CO2 sensor within the occupancy area to
ensure sufficient fresh air supply;
Separate exhaust system for significant
pollution sources, such as printing room,
indoor shooting range, kitchen / pantry
and toilet.
4.
Fire Protection System
In general, fire services installations including
fire hydrant and hosereel, automatic sprinkler
system, clean agent total flooding system,
drencher system, smoke extraction & staircase
pressurization system, addressable fire alarm
and control system, visual fire alarm system and
the like are provided especially for high-rise
structure.
Despite strict compliance with the fire service
regulations, internal security measures are
often incompatible with the fire safety
requirements. In the fire protection of restricted
areas, such as the detention facilities, door access controls of fail-secure operation mode require special concession from the authority and
a well-established emergency evacuation procedure must be put in place. To ensure prompt
alertness of the duty security officer in case of
fire, separate dedicated sprinkler zone is provided for the detention area in order to have a
clear identification of fire alarm and multiple
alarm initiation points are set inside the exhausted air ducts for each batch of detention
cells.
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5.
Integrated Security Command and
Surveillance System
Efficient internal security control of building is
crucial to the operations of a disciplinary forces
building. Security system of analogue technology is the common practice in the 70’s to the
90’s. Nearly all buildings are now equipped
with integrated security management system,
security alarm and door monitoring, radio frequency vehicular access control, door access
control, digital closed circuit television surveillance and inter-communication facilities.
In particular, due to the need of deployment of
vast number of staff and identification of visitors on a daily basis, automatic upkeep of right
of access for the staff members and visitors for
entering the respective buildings and outstations
is integrated with the central security administration system. The system operates by means
of smart card system in that the right of access
of the individual staff member and visitors to
the predetermined areas of the buildings and
outstations is assigned by the central security
administration system. Their movement within
the buildings and outstations can be recorded
and be traced back readily.
6.
Vertical Transportation
For security reasons, due consideration is given
to the planning of lift zone to have a clear and
full segregation of various functional
departments, such as detention facility, operational department and public facilities. Common
lift lobby approach for access to detention facility or restricted areas is undesirable. Sepa-
rated access is now provided for each dedicated lift group and for separate transportation
of the public and detainees. However, such segregation will inadvertently increase the number
of lifts for transporting the same number of
people.
In addition, specific lift control mode may be
installed to enhance some of the special
operations. Under this scenario, special key
control is provided at the designated security
control lobby to operate the lift car, when the
last passenger is out, to reach a specific floor
without responding to other normal calls and
drawing the attention of other personnel.
7.
Looking Forward
In the pursuit of improvement in the building
services systems to enhance sustainable development of the disciplinary forces buildings in
Hong Kong, it is envisioned that the trend is to
encompass the stat-of-the-art technologies to
meet the ever demanding client’s operational
requirements.
Because of the round the year non-stop operations of the building, total energy heat pump©1,
delivering the cooling energy while making use
of the rejected heat for dehumidification and
space heating, will offer substantial saving in
the energy consumption especially in the winter
night load conditions when the demand for cooling and heating are in the same order. Use of
variable speed chiller is a step for consideration
to further harvest the advantage of night duty
in the improvement of energy efficiency.
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Total integrated central control and monitoring
of building services system with the building
management and information system is another
promising development. With build-in infrastructure telecommunication cabling system, a platform for instant exchange of data, audio signals and video images can be established. The
link will enable optimized operations and scheduling of the building services systems e.g. preprogrammed operations of lightings at the required time and location according to operational schedules. Comprehensive tracking and
recoding of building services operational data
through web-based technology to a central control unit will enable proactive fault diagnostic
and proper scheduling of preventive
maintenance.This will uphold the reliability of
each of the building services systems installed
in the disciplinary forces buildings and outstations scattered around the territory in a costeffective manner.
8.
Reference
Ho S.K., Au P.S., Fung C.F., 2003, Clean &
Green Measures in Design of Electrical Infrastructure – The Case for the New Hong Kong
Police Headquarters, International Conference
on Electrical Engineering.
Sustainable operation of the disciplinary forces
buildings is not a single party’s purview. Involvement of the stakeholders in every stage of project
to translate the operational requirements, in
which many of them are of statutory compliance,
into feasible building services schemes and taking into consideration of energy effectiveness,
environmental friendliness, health and safety,
are the critical factors for success.
1
Copyright under Architectural Services Department,
Hong Kong SAR Government
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A Sustainable Design Solution
of Building Services Installations for
Public Health Laboratory Center
K F Leung, Raymond, CEng MCIBSE
Architectural Services Department, HKSAR Govevnmant
Abstract
In recent years, the Pearl River Delta (PRD) has
experienced tremendous socio-economic
growth. The quality of the living standard of
the people has also improved significantly.
However, at the same time, the growth has resulted in a heavy burden on the natural environment in the region. The Hong Kong Special
Administrative Region (HKSAR) being part of
the PRD, should actively participate in the sustainable development of the PRD.
The Architectural Services Department (ArchSD) is one of the HKSAR Government’s works departments responsible for the development and upkeep of communal facilities. To protect the
environment in the long term, the Department has applied various sustainable design solutions to
achieve the target of sustainable future.
This paper introduces the “Sustainable Design Solution of Building Services Installations for Public Health Laboratory Center” illustrating some practical applications and experiences of sustainable building services design in this laboratory building. Through practising and wider sharing
of this approach in building services design, the Department would like to contribute in building
a sustainable future in the PRD and improve the building energy utilization culture in the long
term.
Keywords: sustainable design, laboratory building
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1. Introduction
The Public Health Laboratory Center is to provide high quality laboratory facilities to enable
the Department of Health to upgrade its pathology services so as to effectively carry out its
public health functions of surveillance, control
of infectious disease and statutory control of food
& drugs. In the past, laboratory facilities were
located in different clinics and hospitals scattered in Hong Kong. These laboratories were
old, or even dilapidated with inadequate supporting building services provisions (e.g. window air-conditioning units and window mounted
fans being provided serving laboratories and
some fume cupboards being made of wood) to
meet the stringent health and safety standards.
The project design was first started in 1996 with
an aim to provide a high quality laboratory
environment to meet the installation and operational requirements of modern and sophisticated
laboratory equipment. The laboratory building allows the Department of Health to house
the laboratories of pathology services under one
roof. Moreover, it also accommodates labora-
Different zonings of the
Public Health Laboratory Center
tories and offices for the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department and Government
Laboratories. It is a 15-storey L-shaped building which comprises 130 laboratories, 20
Biosafety Hazard Level 3 (BL3) laboratories and
7 animal houses. Supporting facilities including sterilization, incubation and cold rooms,
offices, carparks, a lecture hall and a multi-function hall is also provided.
The building services design of such a laboratory building is of high complexity and full of
challenges. In light of the nature of the laboratory building, a sustainable building services
design with high hygienic & safety standards
and at the same time with energy saving and
environmental friendly features are provided.
This is especially of paramount importance as
the building is located at a dense urban area of
Shek Kip Mei. Major sustainable building services design is briefly described below.
2. Energy Saving Features
2.1Laboratory Exhaust System and Central Jet
Fan System
All laboratory areas are kept under negative
pressure to provide directional airflow control.
There are more than 110 biological safety cabinets and fume cupboards installed in the laboratory building. To control the air flow in
laboratories, fast response pressure independent variable air volume (VAV) “valves” are
provided so that they will respond within one
second to track with the required supply, makeup and exhaust air flow rates in response to the
sash movement of fume cupboards. The VAV
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valves combine a mechanical pressure independent regulator with a high speed airflow controller to cater for the variable sash exhaust control system, which not only fulfils the safety requirements of laboratory airflow, but also results in energy savings.
Their exhaust of fume cupboards and safety
cabinets is designed to meet the requirements
of the Hong Kong Air Quality Objectives of the
Environmental Protection Department. Central
exhaust system is provided for safety cabinets
of same classes and types. While for the fume
cupboards, central exhaust systems are provided in groups for general fume cupboards.
Built-in water scrubbers and dedicated jet fans
are installed to filter the acid vapour for perchloric acid fume cupboards. Moreover the
exhaust air of BL3 laboratories is treated by UV
light, bio-oxygen generators and filtered by bagin/bag-out HEPA filter exhaust system before
discharged to the atmosphere. This kind of bagin/bag-out HEPA filter exhaust system is the first
time installed in Hong Kong. After appropriate
treatment, the exhaust air is discharged through
the jet fan system(constant flow) installed at roof.
The jet fans, with standby fans, are equipped
with a jet nozzle so that the effluent can be dispersed safely. The use of the central jet fan
system (total 17 sets) greatly reduces the number of exhaust fans. This kind of jet fan system
is also the first time to be installed in Hong Kong.
Fume cupoard
Central jet fans at roof
Jet fan system
Public Sector
2.2 Laboratory ventilation and Heat Pipe
System
Safety and reliability are two vital elements for
laboratory ventilation design. Meanwhile, the
concept of sustainability has been incorporated
in different ways to achieve energy savings. For
example, all the air handling systems are
equipped with variable frequency drives of VAV
design to cater for the fluctuating thermal load.
During winter season, free cooling mode would
be provided when the internal enthalpy is higher
than the ambient enthalpy.
To reclaim the energy “remained” in exhaust
air of BL3 laboratories and Animal Houses, a
balance should be struck between safety and
energy saving. In this case, two 180kW heat
pipe systems are installed instead of a normal
thermal heat wheel system. There is no mechanical moving part in a heat pipe system and
the exhaust air and fresh air systems are separated so that the risk of cross contamination
could be avoided.
Heat pipe system
2.3 Total Energy Approach
Demand control devices to save energy are
provided. Air handling systems are completed
with Variable Frequency Drives of variable air
volume design to cater for fluctuating thermal
load. Moreover, fresh air intake flow rate of
lecture theatre and multi-purpose hall will be
varied based on the desired carbon dioxide level
of space occupant density for demand control.
Similarly, two speed exhaust fan systems are
provided in the carpark to vary the exhaust flow
rates to reduce carbon monoxide concentration
down to an acceptable level. These allow the
environment to be kept at a good air quality.
Furthermore, hot water supply system is essential to serve the laboratories for washing and
humidity control and two 320TR air-cooled chillers are equipped with heat recovery device and
compact unit system to pre-heat the central laboratory hot water, shower hot water and the low
pressure heating water systems.
2.4 Energy Saving Electrical Device
Different types of energy efficient electrical
nstallations are adopted in the laboratory building.
For lighting system, energy-saving T5 fluorescent
lamps fitted with low loss ballast and compact fluorescent tubes are used. Through connecting the
lighting system to the Central Control and Monitoring System (CCMS), lighting for the public areas including corridors and circulation areas can
be limited to the minimum illumination after the
operation hour. Furthermore, optic fiber light system is installed along the aisles of Lecture Theatre
and Microscopic Laboratories to save energy and
facilitate easy maintenance.
To improve the efficiency of the electrical supply
system, static contactor type capacitor banks are
installed to achieve not less than 0.95 lagging.
The large power tariff applied in summation metering contributes to around 15% saving in elec-
Public Sector
tricity charge. In addition, network analyzers are
provided to the outgoing risers and incoming risers for energy audit purpose and power quality
monitoring. In addition, all lifts are of Variable
Voltage Variable Frequency(VVVF ) design.
3. Environmental Friendly Design Features
3.1 Prefabrication System
In order to minimize waste materials during construction and in-use, most of the ductwork and
pipework for the building services are prefabricated off-site. For example, air duct and water
pipe are prefabricated with insulation materials
before delivering to the site for final fixing. By
adopting precise computer modeling, the contractor can calculate the exact length of ductwork and
distance between flanges. Moreover, the water/
gas pipework and electrical ducts of the laboratory bench installations are also prefabricated and
tested prior to deliver to site. Also, the common
composite bracketry system is provided for combined services installations in the ceiling void above
corridors. These measures greatly reduce on-site
material wastage. Moreover, mechanical coupling joints are used for sprinkler pipework.
Pre-insulated water
3.2 Protecting Ozone layer
All materials are chosen with due care. For
instance, R134a refrigerant is used for chiller plants
which has zero ozone depletion potential (ODP).
In addition, all thermal insulation materials
for pipework and ductwork are CFC
(Chlorofluorocarbon) free.
Pre-insulated water
Public Sector
3.3 Waste Water Treatment
4. CONCLUSION
Organic and inorganic waste is separated. Inorganic waste through the lab sinks, diluted and
taken in a neutralization tank. The tank is installed
to treat laboratory waste water contaminated with
traces of chemicals and disinfectants prior to its
discharge to public sewer. The treatment plant
system provides automatic neutralization under pH
control and the effluent is monitored in compliance to Water Pollution Control Ordinance. Organic waste will be collected into separate containers for dispatch separately.
3.4 Indoor air quality (IAQ)
The project was completed in 2001. In 2002,
the laboratory building was submitted for certification to HK-BEAM (the Hong Kong Building
Environmental Assessment Method) and its sustainable design features had accomplished the
highest rating of “Excellent”. In 2002, it was
registered in the Hong Kong Energy Efficiency
Registration Scheme for Buildings for the “Airconditioning”, “Electrical”, “Lighting” and “Lift
& Escalator” Installations. This project has also
won the Hong Kong Institute of Architects (HKIA)
Merit Award 2003 and won the Quality Building Merit Award 2004.
AHU serving offices and laboratories are equipped
with bi-oxygen air purifiers and UV sterilizer lamps
to remove bacteria, air borne particles and odour
so as to provide a better air quality and health to
the occupants. The IAQ of the laboratory area
was certified by an independent laboratory to
achieve the Level 1 of the indoor air quality objectives of the Environmental Protection Department’s
guideline in 2001.
There is always a better solution in doing
anything. The success of the laboratory building vitally relies on the careful consideration of
sustainability at the early design stage of building services installation. Architectural Services
Department will certainly continue to commit for
innovative sustainable design and contribute to
the sustainable development of the Pearl River
Delta Region.
Public Sector
Development of Building Services
Engineering in Public Housing Estates
Development and Construction Division, Housing Department, HKSAR Government
The serious fire in Shek Kip Mei squatter area
in 1953 marked the beginning of the
government’s involvement in the construction of
multi-storey resettlement buildings to accommodate the needed. The Public Works Department
started to build Government Low Cost Housing
in 1961 for low income families to cope with
the acute housing shortage in the territory at
that time. Following the announcement of the
Big Ten-year Plan in 1972, the Hong Kong Housing Authority was established in 1973 with the
Housing Department as her executive arm.
Series of improvement to the facilities and living environment of public housing estates then
began. The Building Ser vices Section
(Construction Branch) of the Housing Department was set up in 1974 to provide building
services design, installations and services for
public housing development.
Provisions in The 70’s and 80’s
In the early years, building services provisions
were designed to meet basic needs only. Services provided inside domestic flats in the 70’s
were: 1 no. 15A and 1 no. 5A socket outlet in
the living/dining/bedroom area, 1 no. 15A
socket outlet in kitchen, 1no. TV/FM outlet, and
1 lighting point. There was no connection unit
for room coolers, but spare MCB was provided
for subsequent surface wiring by tenants.
Doorphone and CCTV surveillance systems were
not provided in public housing estates at that
time. They were only provided for Home Ownership Scheme (HOS) buildings.
For public area, lighting level was in the range of
16 to 24 lux. Lift was not provided in all block
types and lift landing was not provided to every
floor. For earlier estates, provision of lifts was
mainly aimed at fulfilling the fireman lift requirement and minimal lift service to tenants. In the
70’s to mid 80’s, with lower building height design,
lift speeds usually ranged from 0.5 m/s
to 1.6 m/s.
Public Sector
For fire services system, provisions were designed in compliance with the requirements of
the Fire Services Department at that time. In
public housing blocks of earlier years, dry riser
was adopted for the fire hydrant system and
there was no sprinkler provision for facilities such
as carparks or commercial premises. Starting
from late 80’s, emergency generator set was
generally provided for new buildings in accordance with Fire Services Department’s revised
Code of Practice.
Enhancement and Improvement in Building
Ser
vices Standards in the Past Decades
Services
In the past two decades, there were continuous
evolution in building designs to enhance the living
environment and provision standards, and to cope
with different requirements and aspirations. From
the 80’s onward, different standard domestic block
types had been developed. These included the Htype, double/triple H-type, Slab, Linear, Trident,
Windmill, Cruciform, New Cruciform, Harmony,
Harmony Rural, Concord and New Harmony
blocks and specific block types designed for housing senior citizens. There were also parallel evolution in the standards of building services provision to enhance the overall living standard in public
housing estates.
Electricity Demand and Electrical Installations
As a result of the continuous economic growth
in Hong Kong and aspiration for better living
standards, there was increasing electricity demand in public housing estates due to the use
of more electrical home appliances such as ricecookers, television sets, washing machines,
refrigerators, room coolers etc., which have
become part of basic household furnishings. To
cope with such changes, the number of power
points, lighting points etc. inside individual flats
were increased. These included additional
power points for kitchen equipment, more socket
outlets in living/dinning/bedrooms, and connection point for room cooler in each living/
bedrooms. There are as many as 20 power
points for large flat types. The increase in electricity demand required corresponding upgrading of the electrical supply system. The electrical supply capacity of each flat was increased
from 40A to 60A single phase, and the electrical riser capacity was increased by more than
a twofold. For some block types, up to three
1500kVA transformers are now required.
Public Sector
On the construction side, surface wiring was
used in early years until late 1980’s. Concealed
For public areas, more lighting was provided
to serve both functional and security needs. The
lighting level was also designed to align with
the standards of private housing developments.
More variety and different types of architectural
lightings were used in landscape areas for better aesthetic effect.
Lift Services
wiring system with galvanized steel conduit was
subsequently adopted to replace surface wiring . PVC conduit was then adopted in the mid
90’s due to ease of installation and the need to
cope with the shortened floor-to-floor construction cycle. The concealed conduit system resulted in a much better and neater wiring arrangement for the whole building. In the 90’s,
more advanced building methods and prefabricated building components were adopted in
public housing construction. These also led to
associated changes in building services construction methods and enhanced workmanship.
With the gradual increase in building heights
to 40-storey or higher and the increase in population in each block, there were substantial
changes in the lift provision in order to maintain an acceptable service standard. Four to
six numbers of lifts were provided for standard
domestic blocks with higher population. The lift
speed had been increased to 3.5 m/s in some
block types and each floor was served by 2
lifts. Types of lift drive had also evolved from
the early AC2, ACVV, DC-MG set to the currently adopted ACVVVF and DC thyristor control drives, which provided more comfortable
and faster rides, and energy efficient operation.
Plumbing
In order to maintain good potable water supply
quality, UPVC lined galvanized steel pipes was
adopted in early 90’s for the potable water
plumbing system of public housing estates, and
subsequently, copper pipe was also adopted.
Starting from 1995, Housing Department also
set up a re-plumbing programme to replace the
unlined galvanized steel pipes used in earlier
public housing blocks.
Public Sector
As public housing blocks become taller, water
supply for flats at higher floors could no longer
be fed directly from the supply mains. However,
arrangement to provide water supply through
roof tank immediately above the user floors
could not cope with the pressure drop of devices such as water heaters at the topmost floors.
In earlier days, additional raised water tank was
erected at roof to maintain the required water
pressure for the topmost floors. Booster pumps
and pressure vessels for potable water supply
were later provided at roof for the purpose. Intermediate pressure reducing valves or break
tanks were adopted to regulate the water pressure to within a proper range at different floors.
Noise nuisance from the plumbing and upfeed
pumping system was once a problem. It was
eliminated by incorporating various mitigation
measures, such as modulating pressure reducing valve, modulating ball float valve, water
hammer arrester, soft motor starter, night duty
pump, floating slab and spring/vibration isolating hangers etc.
For flush water pumps, full stainless steel construction were specified to cope with the corrosive nature of flush water in order to prolong
the service life to at least 4 times longer than
that of conventional cast iron pump together with
tremendously less routine maintenance cost and
down-time.
Energy Efficiency
In late 2000, the Electrical & Mechanical Services Department issued a series of voluntary
Code of Practice and Guidelines for Building
Energy Efficiency to promote energy efficiency
in the building industry. As a responsible
designer, the Housing Department critically examined and revised the building services design to follow the suggestions and recommendations of the Codes and Guidelines. These
included revised design in electrical distribution
system and wider use of electronic ballast and
energy efficient lamps. The standard New Harmony Block is now in compliance with both the
Codes of Practice for Energy Efficiency in Electrical Installations and Lighting Installations. The
energy saving achieved for this block type is
over 10%. The Housing Department was one
of the forerunners in the territory to achieve registration certificates in the Hong Kong Energy
Efficiency Registration Scheme for Buildings. The
Choi Ming shopping centre was also the first
building in Hong Kong registered under the new
performance-based Building Energy Code in
2004.
Public Sector
ENVIRONMENTAL AND HYGIENE
CONSIDERATION
Environmental friendliness and hygiene are
major considerations in building services design of public housing estates. In 1996, the
Housing Department firstly introduced the new
Automated Refuse Collection System (ARCS) to
public housing estates. Two pilot ARCS were
installed at Shek Yum East Estate and Wah Sham
Estate respectively. Refuse chutes in the domestic
block were connected to an ARCS central plant
via a network of underground refuse conveyance duct. Refuse was sucked by vacuum to
the central plant and then compacted into a
container for storage and subsequent removal.
The whole refuse collection process was carried out in a fully enclosed manner such that
spillage of refuse and odour was eliminated.
After the trial run in these two estates, ARCS
was widely adopted in large public housing
estates since 2001. In fact, ARCS adopted in
Hong Kong’s public housing estates are amongst
the largest in domestic application around the
world.
block for the DCS. Semi-automatic mechanical
bin cleaning devices will also be provided to
enhance the hygiene of the refuse-handling
process.
Hygiene and odour problems in refuse storage
areas are also carefully controlled. The odour
abatement technologies which mainly address the
odour problems in confined space situations could
be broadly classified into two groups. First, the
bacteria or radicals that generate bad odour are
removed by micro-organism and organic agents
(the BioTech system). Second, de-odourizing is
carried out by degradation of odour radicals/
molecules using oxidation process.
The organic or biological agent is formulated to
tackle airborne organic pollutants and inhibits the
proliferation of pathogenic bacteria. Complete
toxicological studies indicate that the BioTech system is environmentally friendly and harmless to
human health. A nozzle system that creates an
ultra-fine and non-wetting mist of the agent is provided to enhance the effectiveness of the biological agent.
Starting from 2005, more economical refuse
handling systems to maintain the hygiene of both
large and small estates will be adopted. The
Central Compactor System (CCS) and Distributed Compactor System (DCS) will be used in
large and small estates respectively. Amount
While the BioTech system is best used for larger
Refuse Storage Areas (RSAs) where the odour
problem might be more acute, the application of
oxidation process for de-odourizing is more appropriate for smaller RSAs. The oxidation techniques that have been applied include Photo-cata-
of refuse transferred from the refuse chute to
the refuse storage bins will be controlled either
by a volume control chamber or small scale
compactor in each block to prevent spillage of
refuse and odour. Refuse collected will then be
compacted into a container in the refuse collection point for the CCS or compacted directly
inside the ground floor refuse chamber in each
lytic Oxidation (PCO), Nano Confined-space
Catalytic Oxidation (NCCO) and Catalytic Oxidation using Manganese Oxide. The hardware
required are much more compact and their sizes
are comparable to air cleaners commonly used in
domestic applications. Therefore, such deodourizers are termed as Packaged Deodourizers.
Public Sector
There are over 50 BioTech systems and 200
Packaged De-odourizers installed in public
housing estates. The performance in terms of
odour abatement against cost effectiveness has
been satisfactory.
QUALITY ASSURANCE
Housing Authority, being always conscious of
quality, is committed to providing quality housing for the public. She was one of the very first
few organizations who attained the ISO 9000
certification in the early 90s. To strive for better
quality in building services installations, the
Housing Authority has been implementing the
Building Services Performance Assessment Scoring System (BSPASS) since January 2002 with
a view to monitoring and comparing the performance of building services contractors in an
objective manner. The BSPASS assesses contractors’ performance directly against prescribed
standards, thus providing a fair means of comparing the performance of individual contractor.
The BSPASS assessments are conducted by the
assessment teams through site inspections, desktop assessments and record checks against prescribed standards. The system is implemented
to three types of BS installations, namely
electrical, fire services and water pump, lift and
escalator installations.
The contractors attain their scores through the
BSPASS assessments. In addition to performance monitoring, the scores are used in considering preferential tendering opportunities as
well as in assessing tenders with a view to
awarding the tenders to better performing
contractors. It also has the added advantage
of encouraging the contractors to strive for continuous improvement.
Since its implementation, the system has been
proven to be a useful tool for selecting better
performing contractors to tender for and carry
out Housing Authority projects.
CONCLUSION
As a responsible public housing developer and
owner, the Hong Kong Housing Authority has
been continuously reviewing the design of public housing blocks, associated building services
facilities and quality assurance process to ensure the efficient use of public resources and to
upkeep the relevant safety and quality standards
in accordance with statutory requirements and
good practices in the industry. The Housing
Department will also continually enhance the
services provided by keeping abreast of the
development in technologies and responding to
feedback obtained through users’ opinion
surveys. etc.
Private Sector
Two IFC
Joseph Leung, Director, BSc(Eng) MBA CEng FIEE FHKIE FIEAust FCIBSE RPE
Victor Leung, Technical Director, BEng MBA CEng MHKIE MIMechE MCIBSE RPE
Albert To, Technical Director, BEng CEng MIEE MCIBSE MHKIE RPE
J. Roger Preston Limited
ABSTRACT
The skyline of central district area has been redrawn by the completion of an 88-storey skyscraper called Two IFC, which stands at 420m
off the ground and the one of the tallest building in the world. Two IFC is a grade A office
building with a total gross floor area (GFA) of
more than 180,000 sqm and an estimated working population of 15,000 person. The tower is
divided into 7 lift zones with twin sky lobbies
and 4 mechanical floors to service each individual zones of the building in the most economical and energy saving manner.
The building services design represents a challenge to all engineers not only because of its shear
height but the complexity, security and reliability of the electrical and mechanical engineering
systems which are designed to serve those world class grade A tenants locally, as well as the
multi-national financial institutions.
INTRODUCTION
The IFC story begins when the Hong Kong Station Comprehensive Development Area (CDA)
was originally perceived as a simple extension
of the Central Business District (CBD) onto Phase
1 of the on-going Central and Wanchai
Reclamation. With the decision to move the
airport at Kai Tak to Chep Lap Kok, the site was
identified as the location for the terminal line of
the direct express railway link from the new
airport.
In 1996, the development rights were awarded
to a consortium of Developers by the MTR Corporation Limited the land grantee. As the gateway for arrivals from the new airport and with
the potential to create a landmark in this expansion of the CBD, the original plan of 5 towers with a maximum height of 46 storeys was
reconfigured. Two of the office towers were
combined into what would become Two IFC.
Private Sector
Together with the 4-level retail mall, which will
contain a ready mix of shops, indoor and outdoor food and beverage, cinemas
1.
HVAC SYSTEM AND SEAWATER
COOLING PLANT
Each floor is served by 2 air-handling units supplying conditioned air to VAV units. Perimeter
VAV units have electric heater for winter heating.
Fresh air is provided by primary air handling
units on mechanical floors.
1.1 System Overview
The Two IFC office tower HVAC system consists
of seawater cooled chiller plant serving VAV air
conditioning system on individual floors. Aircooled chillers with essential power backup provide a reliable source of chilled water supply
for critical tenant facilities.
The chiller plant seawater cooling system delivers seawater from the pump house located at
the harbour water front via dual plus standby
seawater supply mains to seawater cooled chiller
plant located in basement providing 20,000 TR
cooling capacity for the entire development
(office tower, retail podium and hotel). The seawater cooled chiller plant for the Two IFC Tower
has 10 nos. 1,000 TR direct seawater cooled
chillers with titanium tube condenser. Chilled
water distribution is separated vertically into 3
circuits coupled by plate type heat exchangers
on the 2nd and the 4th mechanical floors. This
limits chilled water distribution operating pressure on office floors to within 16 bar for cost
effectiveness and system reliability.
seawater pipe tunnel
Chilled Water System
chiller plant
Private Sector
1.2 Pre-fabrication, Pre-commissioned and
Constructability
The size (72 office floors served by 144 AHU’s
and 8,400 VAV units) and elevation (400m
height of entire chilled water circuit) of the HVAC
installation necessitates a particular attention to
the aspects of hydraulic zoning, hence the cost
effectiveness and constructability. Accordingly,
design and contract packaging has aimed at
maximizing factory assembly / off-site fabrication to reduce on-site installation and testing /
commissioning. Other than facilitating quality,
this also helps to reduce vertical transportation
of personnel / material on site which has been
identified at the onset of the project as one of
the critical construction management issues.
Based on this consideration, design using packaged type air handling unit with factory assembled / tested electrical / control equipment
/ wiring is adopted. The unit as delivered to
site only required connection of ductwork /
chilled water piping / electrical power supply /
DDC network wiring to commence operation.
Other than reducing site activity and improving
quality control, this also provide better enclosure / protection of electrical / control components (all of which are within AHU casing) avoiding damage during construction stage and lifetime maintenance.
AHU Plan View
AHU Elevation
Private Sector
seawater pump
1.3 Reliability
With the envisaged tenant requirement for 24
hour uninterrupted operation, system reliability
is a major design focus and the following features are incorporated:
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Chiller plant seawater cooling system has
dual supply mains with standby and split
seawater pump / chiller headers.
Primary chilled water riser mains has
standby pipe.
Office floor has two stacks of AHU each
with individual chilled water rising mains.
The 2 nos. of AHU on individual floor are
connected by ring mains supply air duct
with section damper.
Air cooled chillers with essential power
backup (2 x 300 TR on each of the
mechanical floors) and independent sup
ply mains provides essential chilled water
supply for 24 x 7 critical tenant facilities.
Seawater Cooling System
Typical Floor Air Conditioning System
Private Sector
1.4 Indoor Air Quality and Energy
Conservation
Primary air handling units have run around coil
to reheat primary air with incoming outdoor air
to deliver unsaturated (70%RH) to suppress bacteria growth in the otherwise saturated primary
air stream. Quantity of primary air supplied to
individual air handling unit is modulated to
maintain esirable carbon dioxide content in return air stream.
The design has aimed at achieving desirable
air distribution performance with respect to
avoidance of air draft and uniformity of space
temperature. In addition to careful selection of
supply air diffuser configuration by using smoke
test to visualize air delivery performance, full
scale laboratory test of selected mockup room
was carried out to air distribution performance.
A particular challenge of the project is to maintain adequate separation between air intake and
discharge on mechanical floors due to the limitation of external façade louver area for aesthetic reasons. This is further complicated by air
intake / discharge requirement for air cooled
chillers / generators on mechanical floors which
together occupy more than 75% of available
louver area. To achieve desirable air intake /
discharge separation, partitioned cavity voids
were erected behind external louver to form an
array of 3 dimensional air paths to direct intake / discharge ducts to appropriate locations
of external louver. Due to the complexity, mechanical floor model was being used to confirm
ventilation plenum arrangement prior to
construction.
The design has taken due considerations to facilitate inspection / cleaning of air distribution
path and / or detachment of particle / fibre
from air distribution path component into air
stream, this includes:
-
-
-
-
use of air handling unit with internal sheet
metal lining and plug fan to facilitate
cleaning
VAV units are provide with internal
membrane to avoid detachment of fibre
from VAV internal lining into air stream
silencer is only used where necessary (eg.
AHU discharge is not provided with
silencer) to reduce obstruction to duct
cleaning
air duct access panel is provide at regular
interval to facilitate duct cleaning /
inspection
Mechanical Floor Model
Mechanical Floor Layout
Private Sector
1.5 Energy Efficiency
The installation has extensively utilized variable
speed drives including seawater / chilled water pumps and air handling units to optimize
operating efficiency throughout the range of
load profile. To further enhance energy
efficiency, equipment operating speed is being
controlled to maintain opening position of modulating control valve / damper within desired
range instead of commonly adopted control
strategy of maintaining constant pressure at
supply mains and / or index circuit. This allows
supply pressure control to be based on actual
system requirement and adoption of lower design pressure drop for modulating control device both of which contribute to reduction of
system supply pressure. Last of all, by reducing
the likelihood of modulating control valve /
damper operating at extremely small opening
position due to unnecessarily high supply
pressure, this will also improve stability of system control and reduce wear and tear of modulating control device.
Similarly, supply air temperature of VAV air
handling unit is modulated to maintain supply
air quantity of individual VAV unit within desired range. Other than allowing chilled water
supply temperature to be raised during part load
condition, this also provides more desirable air
circulation within accommodations for better
comfort.
Plate type heat exchangers have been selected
for variable flow operation by reducing the dependence of heat transfer on turbulent flow and
hence reducing pressure drop under partial load
condition. The effect has been noticeable since
resistance of plate type heat exchanger being
significantly higher than that of air handling unit
dominate system supply pressure requirement.
Similarly, chillers operate on variable chilled
water flow to reduce the dependence on using
bypass which increase pumping energy and
reduce the capability of system control to maintain chiller operating under optimum condition.
2.
BMS
2.1 Overview
The necessity to effectively control and monitor
the substantial M&E installation (77,000 analogue points and 36,000 binary points) in order to maintain a satisfactory operating environment presents a challenge to the building
management team. The BMS system has been
designed to provide a facility for the building
management team to meet with this challenge
and design has aimed at achieving reliability /
connectivity / efficiency of the BMS system.
The BMS system is based on a powerful communication system which is a vital part of the
BMS system in view of the substantial amount
of information being managed. The communication network is composed of 1,000 BASE
single mode optic fibre backbone connecting
Ethernet switches to headend server. Ethernet
switches in turn are connected to supervisory
DDC controllers with Cat 5e UTP cables. Communication system is fully addressable TCP/IP
addressable for ef ficient data traf fic
management.
Private Sector
BMS control room
2.2 Reliability
Reliability has been a prime focus of the BMS
system design. Whilst only robust proven equipment / material were to be adopted, the design
has aimed at minimizing impact of failure /
accidental damage of individual system
component.
Accordingly, the communication network has
dual optic fiber backbone individually connected
to hot standby ethernet switches and with hot
standby server. In addition, there is an individual network for major HVAC equipment
(seawater supply system, chilled water system,
primary air handling units), which operate in
parallel with the BMS system as hot standby in
case of BMS system failure. Central / supervisory DDC controllers and communication network equipment are provided with distributed
UPS.
System architect is based on distributed intelligence with independent controller for \individual equipment (such air AHU, VAV, heat
exchanger). This limits the impact of communication network failure to disabling of interaction between different items of equipment but
automatic operation of individual equipment
remain intact.
TRUE Reddundancy Configuration
Private Sector
2.3 Connectivity
The BMS design emphasize on the ability to
communicate with user, compatibility with other
network / system, and adaptability to future
modification / expansion.
Comprehensive BMS interactive graphics and
interlinked multi-path (schematic / location /
equipment type / etc) data access structural
provides ready means for operations to conveniently obtain system / equipment information.
Efforts were devoted to developing BMS interactive graphics reflecting as far as possible the
actual location / image of individual item of
equipment to facilitate instant recognition by
user. In addition, the BMS system provides various means of remote access including SMS
message, WAP, telephone, Web Browser. All
these aim at ready and instant access to BMS
system and to draw necessary attention of building management team at the first instance to
fault alarm or other situations. To further enhance the ability to enable user to focus on particular M&E system, the BMS control has a large
size video wall displaying selected BMS
graphics.
The BMS system has designed for maximum
connectivity with other network / system in order that the system can communicate with a
large variety of M&E installations in the building and also to facilitate future modification /
expansion. The field level network operate on
LonWorks while headend controller operate on
open protocol platform which supports a variety of industrial standards including common
ones such BAC net, Modbus, OPC, DDE. This
enables the BMS to serve as a nerve centre integrating a variety of M&E systems via high level
open platform interface allowing abundant and
convenient data exchange in between.
Open System Platform
Private Sector
3.
ELECTRICAL SERVICES DESIGN
The electrical power distribution plays an important role in providing a reliable energy
source for the proper function of all the mechanical and electrical engineering systems. The design needs to cater for the needs of the end
users with sufficient spare capacity built-in with
the design for the ever changing user behavior
and pattern.
3.1 HV Supply Network
The central seawater cool chiller plant (~23,000
refrigeration tons) serving the whole of northern site is located in basement level. As this is
the major load center, HV supply (11kV) is
employed and fed from the power company’s
HV supply network and terminated at the consumer side HV panels. 7 nos. of 11kV radial
feed HV feeders running along the dedicated
riser duct are provided to serve the HV distribution panels in basement. The reason of choosing the HV scheme is due to the economical
reason as well as the voltage dip caused by the
starting of seawater cooling chillers. A total of
8 nos. of 2MVA and 6 nos. of 2.5MVA package type cast resin transformers were used in
Basement Levels (total 80,000 sqm of construction floor area) to serve general lightings, power
and carpark / smoke extraction ventilation
system.
3.2 Above Ground Substation
Due to the shear height of Two IFC, above
ground substations are definitely required in all
the mechanical floors to contain voltage drop
and to efficient deploy of energy to various loads
centres. In order to comply with Power
Company’s requirement with respect to the delivery of transformer, a 4,000 kg service lift is
required to accommodate the selected size of
1,050 kVA transformer which is used throughout the building. The service lift car cage and its
shape is specially designed which can facilitate
transportation of transformer as well as bulky
furniture for tenants up and down the tower. A
total of 16 above-ground substations accommodating a total of 46 nos. of 1,050kVA transformer with installed capacity of 48MVA are
provided. Each transformer loading is pre-calculated to cater for any incidental taking offline of one of the transformers within the same
substation, while still maintaining continuity of
normal power supply to tenant.
3.3 Servicing Strategy
Reliability of power supply system is of paramount important to ensure the normal operation of the building. A number of measures
have been adopted as follows:
HV dual supply : Currently, the Power Company is feeding their power supply from their
separate sub-stations, including Connaught
Road zone substation, Rumsey Street zone
substation, and Tamar zone substation to ensure dual HV infeed are maintained at all time.
Dual HV riser : Power Company’s 11kV
cables are running in two independent risers
Simplified HV Schematic Diagram
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rising through the core of the building to eliminate the possibility of total blackout in case of
fire or accident happened in one of the risers.
Dual tenant riser : Each tenant floor will be
served by dual riser LV busduct system feeding
from different transformers sources. In case of
power failure, it would be possible to
changeover the tenant loads to other healthy
risers.
Reduced loading capacity : Each transformer shall be loaded to only up to ~ 60%
(approx.) of rated capacity of the transformer.
This would allow additional loading transfer
from other tenant riser in case of emergency
situation.
Within the building core, dry and wet services are planned to divorce from each other
thus minimizing risk of flooding impact. Leakage alarm devices are installed at strategic locations to report leakage via BMS for immediate response by the building operator.
zones. Leakage detectors are installed at strategic location along the entire vertical riser whilst
the horizontal fuel pipes are enclosed in separate compartment of appropriate fire rating filled
with sand. A total of 4 nos. FSI generators are
installed with installed capacity of 6.2 MVA. The
FSI generators serve:
-
Sprinkler system and detection system
Hose reel / Hydrant system
Drencher system
Staircase pressurization system
Essential lighting which are also backed
up by battery with charger
All Firemen’s lifts
3.4 Emergency Power Supply
Two categories of emergency generators are
provided, namely the FSI generator and nonFSI generator (including Tenant’s backup
supply).
In order to maintain the integrity and full backup
for the fire services installation (FSI), it was decided in the early design stage that all FSI equipment should be served by its dedicated FSI
generators. All FSI generators are connected to
a centralized fuel supply system which consists
of 2 x 20,000 litre bulk fuel tank at G/F, upfeed
pumps in fuel tank room; intermediate transfer
tanks are provided on mechanical floors with
transfer pumps to transfer fuel to the higher
Simplified Centralized Fuel Supply Schematic
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As Two IFC is also targeted to serve financial
institutions who will demand a highly reliable
power supply system. In this respect, non-FSI
generators are provided within the building to
cater for:
This would also facilitate the building management personnel to conduct regular critique of
energy consumption and implement measures
to conserve energy with a handy energy audit
data bank created at wish.
-
All power analyzers are connected to a dedicated fast Ethernet network which in turn connects to building automation system via DDE link
for effective cross-transfer of useful energy trail
audit data enabling building operation monitored and controlled at its peak efficiency. The
following parameters are measured:-
-
-
All essential air-cooled chillers in mechani
cal floors are backup by generators. This
will ensure that critical computer equipment
(such as tenant’s on-site data center, UPS,
CRAC, TBE room, etc) is backed up 100%
with chilled water supply even for the very
remote case of the failure of power supply
for seawater cooled chiller in basement.
At least one of the lifts in each zone,
including the shuttle lifts for sky lobbies,
are backed up by generators for tenants
emergency operation.
Base building critical equipment are also
backed up by generators. This includes
the security system, CCTV system, carpark
control systems, emergency broadcast and
the building automation system.
3.5 Power Quality Monitoring
The tremendous increase in the use of information technology has dramatically increased the
importance to monitor the quality of power supply system throughout the building. Traditionally,
power quality could be measured by a
standalone type harmonic analyzer which can
only measure data for a short duration of time
on a need basis. Such approach will be expensive and ineffective. It is therefore the Two IFC
has adopted a state-of-the-art fully computerized power analyzer system which can monitor
the power quality on real time basis continuously for almost all major loads and circuits.
-
Current, voltage, frequency, power factor
KVA, kVAr, maximum demand, kWh
Harmonic content up to 15th order
Graphical image to display min/max, trending,
histogram of harmonic, waveform, surge, etc
are tailored made for ease of use as reporting
log sheets by the building manager. There are
more than 500 nos. of power analyzers with
22 nos. of DDE servers linking the power analyzer and building automation system to achieve
the energy performance and auditing objectives.
3.6 Lightning Protection System
Considering the great height of this building and
its geographical location, it is expected that Two
IFC will be subject to a relative high frequency
of lightning strike. On top of the building is a
passive type early streamer arrester which will
be able to protection the utmost part of the
building. The early streamer is then connected
to a number of dedicated re-bar down conductors embedded inside the mega columns evenly
spread around the building perimeter. A counter
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is also installed to monitor and record the number of lightning strike year round.
The entire curtain wall system is also designed
to be electrically continuous and hence act as a
faraday cage. The curtain wall is bonded to the
dedicated re-bar embedded in each of the mega
column at every three floors intervals to protect
building from the attack of side-flashing. The
re-bar as mentioned above is then connected
to Basement earth pit systems used as a low
impedance path for effective and fast discharge
of the lightning energy.
3.7 Lighting Design
The design is based on then the LG3 issued by
the CIBSE. In general, the lighting level is designed at average 500 lux on desk level with
uniformity better than 0.75. Category 1 louvre
is used all for 22 nos. of trading floors and
Category 2 louvre is provided for the remaining 45 nos. of typical office floors. Integrated
air handling fluorescent panel complete with
double parabolic and low brightness diffuser
using T8 tube and high efficiency electronic
ballast are used throughout the office area.
4.
VERTICAL TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM
Two IFC has divided into 7 passenger lift zones
with 2 sky lobbies serving by double deck shuttle
lifts. In total, there are 64 off high-speed lifts
serving different floors. A number of unique features have been adopted for this building including the crowd control system to alleviate the
sky lobby congestion and sway control to monitor the lift operation in case of building sway.
4.1 Lift Zoning
From architectural planning point of view, one
of the constraints for planning the lift zones is
that all lifts must be located within the 24m x
24m structural core wall in order to free up the
floor plate outside core wall for the use as valuable office space. This requires a very careful
virtual 3–D planning so that the lift shaft spaces
are fully utilized without clash with different lift
zones where different lift zones may be staggered on top of each other to maximize value
of construction cost.
Before come to a final configuration, the test
models need to be cross-check with the architect and structural engineer in order to ensure
the compatibility of various design elements.
After long and exhaustive co-ordination with
design team, it was decided that Two IFC should
have 2 sky lobbies with 7 local lift zones.
Zone 1 and Zone 2 shall be accessed directly
from 1/F main lobby. A bank of double deck
lifts shall be provided to serve the first sky lobby
which will then serve the floor for local lift zone
3 and zone 4. Another group of double deck
lifts shall be provided to serve the second sky
lobby, which will then serve the local, lift zone
5, zone 6 and zone 7. As a single tenant will
occupy zone 7, 2 off passenger lifts with rated
capacity of 1,600kg at 2.5 m/s are provided
to serve solely for these floors.
In addition to local passenger lifts, a VIP lift is
also provided serving the selected floors from
G/F to 88/F. As this lift is reserved for a relatively small number of user group, the capacity
of lift car is 1,350kg running at 8 m/s. To pro-
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vide a high level of user comfort, car shrouds to
improve the overall aerodynamic performance
are installed at top and bottom of lift car in order to achieve a ride comfort of +/-10mg (where
’m’ is 10-3 and ‘g’ is acceleration due to gravity
which is 9.8 m/s2).
In accordance with this configuration, computer
simulation was carried out to assess its lift traffic performance. In general, the traffic performance complies with the design criteria as specified in the CISBE Guide D in which the 5 minutes handling capacity for local passenger lifts
are better than 12% whilst the average interval
are in the range of 25s to 20s.
4.2 Building Sway
The resultant tall and flexible structure has made
Two IFC susceptible to wind effect that in turn
creates a very complex torsional movement of
this building. This torsional movement (or called
building sway) causes not only perceptible within
human thresholds but also impact on the vertical transportation system from safety point of
view. As a consequence of this building sway,
the damage to lift equipment will be imminent
if it has not been considered carefully. In fact,
the oscillation of roping systems is a function
of the following factors:
-
quencies of this building in order to assess its
implications, possible damages to lift equipment
and its remedial proposal.
The natural frequency of the building has a detrimental and knock-on effect on lift equipment. This
is very similar to playing a guitar in which resonance of string creates the necessary sound effect
audible by human beings. If the roping system
have the same natural frequency of the building,
resonance will take place with resultant higher
magnitudes of different type of ropes. The over
excited ropes may tangle the moving lift car and
hence endanger the passenger within.
Unfortunately, present technology and material
science is not advance enough to prevent this kind
of building sway as our mother nature will always
prevail. It is therefore computerized model has
been carried out to predict the resonance of various roping systems. This result was then verified
against the actual result carried out in the
manufacturer’s test tower. Accordingly, the following algorithm has been programmed to minimize
the effect to the passenger when they are traveling inside lift car.
Height of lift shaft
Tension on roping systems
The natural frequencies of this building
Sway Control Algorithm
Whilst the height of lift shaft is a given architectural form and tension on roping system is a
’controllable’ factor, it is therefore of paramount
importance to understanding the natural fre-
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In order to detect the amplitude of building sway,
3 nos. of very simple but effective pendulum
switches are installed. The pendulum switch
consists of a metal weight connected to a string
with a metal ring mounted at the same level
within lift shaft.
but effective pendulum switch is virtually maintenance free whilst it will provide accurate measurement of the sway imposed by high wind
acting on this building.
Pendulum switches are is mounted in the lift shaft
of zone 7 as computer analysis indicated that
this position would be most sensitive to building
As total capacity of local lift is normally greater
than the total capacity of shuttle lift, congestion
at sky lobby may occur at certain period of time.
The built-up of population in sky lobby will
gradually reduce the overall lift performance
and hence the lift services will break down at
some point. In order to control the population
built-up, a CCTV camera is installed in each
sky lobby. Image from CCTV camera will be
analyzed by using progressive scan technology
to ‘count’ the number of people in sky lobby.
Should the population exceeds certain threshold,
all shuttle lifts, but except one, will switch to down
peak. Under this down peak condition, one of
the shuttle lifts will always park at main entrance
lobby to minimize waiting time of a passengers
should they wish to travel in opposition. This
will ensure that maximum capacity of shuttle lifts
will be available to discharge the population in
the shortest possible time.
Pendulum Switch
sway. Should there be any building sway, the
pendulum will swing. If the metal weight of the
pendulum hits the metal ring, it will give a signal to the lift control system, which will then reprogramme the lift services according to the
algorithm as, described above. The length of
pendulum is based on the computer simulation
and actual test result carried out in test tower in
order to ensure that the sway control operation
will be functioned only when the building sway
exceeds the pre-determined value. This simple
4.3 Crowd Control
4.4 Ride Quality
Lift performance is evaluated on the basis of
the time it takes for a passenger to arrive at the
destination floor. This value along with the movements (i.e. vertical and horizontal vibration of
lift car) and noise created by such functions are
then perceived as ‘ride quality’. There are a
number factors affecting the vibration of lift car.
This includes: -
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-
Rail alignment
Smoothness of lift shaft
Roller guide configuration
Static balance of car frame
Air displacement
All these factors have been vigorously reviewed
in order to achieve the ride comfort of +/-15mg.
As far as noise is concerned, double-skin lift
cab is installed to prevent wind noise entering
the lift cab.
ing from upper level in an attempt the stati
cally balance the air pressure within the
lift shaft as far as possible.
Computational fluid dynamic analysis was carried out to predict the anticipated vibration. It
was noted that the provision of openings within
lift shaft will not be able to complete over the
vibration of lift cab due the piston effect. It is
therefore car shrouds are provided to further
improve the aerodynamic performance of the
lift cab concerned. On-site measurement indicated that the ride quality of +/- 10 mg could
be achieved for the 8m/s VIP lift.
4.5 Dynamic Lift Supervisory Graphics
A tailor-made dynamic lift supervisory graphics is installed in order to display all the critical
information on a single graphical page. The
information consists of: -
Ride Quality Measurement
Due to the building configuration, some of the
high-speed lifts are accommodated within the
single shaft. This imposes a challenge to the
engineer, as piston effect will inevitably induce
vibration to the lift cabs. There are a number of
measures to alleviate the problem as follows:
-
At the lower part and upper part of lift
shaft, an opening of about 1.5m by 1m is
provided and interconnected to the lift shaft
for other zones. This will ensure pressur
ized air under the lift cab will be released
to other lift shaft whilst air will be supple
mented by the air coming in from the open
-
Position of lift car
Alarm status
Security status
On-off status
In addition, hall call or car call function could
be controlled via the workstation.
Lift Supervisory Graphic
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All lift cars (including services lift and firemen’s
lifts) are installed with real time Octopus access
control system. Extensive integration tests were
carried out to ensure the full integration between
the lift controller and access control system. Preregistration of Octopus card by tenants will allow them to access their floors after office hour.
All lift cars and lift lobbies are installed with the
state-of-the-art CCTV surveillance cameras to
monitor every single entry / exit point of this
building. These camera signals together with the
signals from different lift controllers could be
transmitted to a 4m by 2.5m video wall inside a
purpose-built BMS control room so that the building manager will be provided with all necessary information in a single location in case of
emergency such as fire condition or people trap
inside a lift car.
A customized reporting function is also provided
so that the building manager could retrieve the
necessary information from the database with
just few clicks of keyboard button.
5.
reliability, simplicity of maintenance / operation other than code compliance.
5.1 Sprinkler System
In order to avoid excessive system hydraulic
pressure due to building height, the sprinkler
system has been divided into three hydraulic
zones each with individual sprinkler tank / pump
and vertically interconnected by booster pumps
to FS inlets. Sprinkler alarm valves of individual
sub-systems are located at G/F, Refuge 2 and
Refuge 4 respectively. Hence, the sprinkler system is effectively composed of three sub-systems
and this has limited sprinkler head operating
pressure to below 1,200 kPa. To avoid pump
cavitation, booster pumps are maintained in
filled condition by priming tanks. To simplify
operation for fire brigade, the sprinkler booster
pumps will operate simultaneously by on/off
switch at sprinkler inlets.
FIRE SERVICES
Two IFC being a super high-rise building involving substantial building occupant life safety necessitate a more than code compliant fire services engineering design. Other than hydraulic zoning to cater for the building height, statutory codes do not entirely cover all aspects of
super high-rise building. Whilst performance
based design is adopted for a number of
instances, the design has avoided substantial
deviation from conventional standard as such
will have impact on operational and fire fighting procedures which may not be desirable. To
summarise the design has emphasized on
Simplified Schematic for Sprinkler System
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5.2 Drencher System
5.3 Fire Hydrant and Hose Reel System
Drencher system is provided to protect all vertically interconnected external wall openings. To
limit system operating pressure, the drencher
system is composed of two sub-systems, one
serving Refuge 1 / Refuge 2 and the other serving Refuge 3 / Refuge 4. Each sub-system has
capacity to cater for the largest external wall
opening for 1 (one) hour duration. The system
operates when either pilot sprinkler or refuge
floor protection sprinkler is being activated.
The fire hydrant / hosereel system is composed
of 4 sub-systems each with individual FS pumps.
The sub-systems are vertically interconnected by
booster pumps to FS inlets on ground floor.
Intermediate storage tanks are provided on
Refuge 2, Refuge 3 and Refuge 4. Fixed outlet
pressure reducing valves set have been provided
to maintain the fire hydrant pressure within a
desirable range. To avoid water pump
cavitation and to allow immediate starting, all
pumps are maintained in filled condition. For
simplicity of operation, all booster pumps will
operate by any one of on/off push button at FS
inlet, but in sequence to avoid pump cavitation
due to the arrangement of pumps operating in
series.
Simplified Schematic for Drencher System
Simplified Schematic for FS?HR System
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Hong Kong Convention and
Exhibition Centre
Vincent Tse, CEng FCIBSE
Thomas Chan, CEng FCIBSE
Herbert Lam, CEng MCIBSE
Parsons Brinckerhoff (Asia) Ltd.
ABSTRACT
Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre
(HKCEC) is one of the major developments in
Hong Kong to meet the demand of expanding
trade in 1980s. The design of electrical and
mechanical systems in HKCEC was therefore
challenging to meet client’s requirements. In this
paper, the major electrical and mechanical sysHK Convention and Exhibition Centre
tems in HKCEC including heating, ventilation
and air-conditioning system, electrical distribution system, plumbing & drainage system, fire services system, security system, etc. are introduced.
The issue of energy management in building is becoming important in Hong Kong and an energy
management study on HKCEC is also discussed in this paper.
1.
INTRODUCTION
The Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC) is an integrated building complex
of over 400,000 m2 for the trade expansion in
Hong Kong. The complex provides an integrated
venue of exhibition floor space, hotels, conference and business facilities that would increase
the attractiveness of the territory to the international conference circuit. It provides an overall
floor area of 50,000 m2 for trade shows, exhibitions and conferences with two exhibition halls,
a conference hall, an auditorium and many
meeting rooms. It is also served by restaurants
and a fully serviced ground floor container load-
ing annex with lifts and cargo handling facilities.
The four towers rising above the podium accommodate two hotels (a deluxe hotel of 600
rooms and a 5-star hotel of 900 rooms), an
office block of 60,000 m2 and 600 fully furnished serviced apartments.
To achieve the client satisfaction and to meet
various requirements of the project, a good
design with close collaboration with owners,
operators, architects, structural engineers and
various specialist consultants was a must for the
project. In this paper, the design of engineering
systems in HKCEC will be introduced.
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2.
ENGINEERING SYSTEMS
2.1 Air-Conditioning System
The central refrigeration plant in HKCEC is a
combination of 3,800 TR chillers, 1,800 TR heat
recovery chillers and heat pumps for cooling
and heating purposes i.e. summer space
cooling, winter space heating and year round
domestic hot water heating. This energy-saving
application was granted First Prize for Energy
System Design by American of Society of
Heating, Refrigeration and Air-conditioning
Engineers (ASHRAE) in 1985. The total plant
capacity of chillers in HKCEC is 43,000 kW (15,
000 TR) and heat extraction is by high efficiency
sea-water cooling condensers via titanium plate
heat exchangers for anti-corrosion purposes.
2.2 Electrical Distribution System
The 11 kV electrical supply system is provided
via 7 nos. of 1,500 kVA transformer to the main
distribution board for the Trade Development
Council (TDC) area. Emergency power supply
provided by 2 nos. of 820 kW diesel-generator
set and uninterrupted power supply (UPS) is
provided for electrical backup supply purposes
for the TDC areas.
Electrical Distribution System
Central Refrigeration Plant
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2.3 Plumbing & Drainage System
Potable water is from city mains and each building element has its own water meter, distributing pumps and storage tanks. The flushing water is taken from the seawater intake header
and is distributed to each building element from
a central seawater pumping station in the chiller
plant room. Sewage from each building element
is collected and transferred to a common pipe
of public drainage system.
system with supervised point monitoring, selflocking push bottom alarms, magnetic door
contacts to monitor access to restricted areas
and infra-red detection units to sense the infrared level.
2.4 Domestic Hot Water System
The domestic hot water system designed for each
building element consists of groups of double
bundle storage type calorifiers. The primary
heating source of the 65 oC hot water is from
heat pumps and from electric water heaters in
case of emergency. The heat pump system can
provide a low cost domestic hot water supply
system through waste heat recovery from
heating, ventilation and air-conditioning system
2.5 Security System
Supervision and surveillance in HKCEC is by
closed circuit television (CCTV). Video signals
from cameras are transmitted sequentially to
CCTV monitors located in the security control
room. CCTV cameras are equipped with pan/
tilt/zoom functions to improve coverage. Twoway communication system between the security room and the intercom unit location is provided in case of emergency. Fast, accurate reporting and processing of burglar alarm system is the criteria of a good security system.
The major elements of security system include a
central computer and peripherals, multiplexing
Security System
2.6 Other Systems
Other systems include state-of-the-art integrated
building management system, eighteen computer-controlled high speed lifts with design
velocities of 4,6 and 7.5 meters per second to
reduce traveling time, two freight lifts with 45tonne container lifts each, and telephone and
telecommunications services.
3.
ENERGY MANAGEMENT
Apart from the engineering design of HKCEC,
an energy management study on HKCEC was
also performed in 1993. The objectives of energy management study are to investigate
whether further energy cost savings was feasible and to ensure comfort conditions and design criteria within the building are achieved.
After the preliminary work on the breakdown
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of energy use in HKCEC, Energy Management
Opportunities (EMO) were identified and
weighted against additional capital investment.
Some particular areas of investigation are:
Review of sequence and operation of
chiller plant as well as the water supply temperature control;
Verification of variable speed pumping operation in chilled water pumping system;
Optimization of pumping system for sea
water pumping and screening system;
Optimization of hot water supply temperatures and equipment utilization in
heat pump system; and Recommendations on HVAC system control during
unoccupied periods and review of
space temperatures and equipment
scheduling;
Review of lighting system operation,
light intensity level checking, and recommendation on energy efficient lamps
and ballasts;
Feasibility study on car park exhaust
fan control with CO monitoring;
Review of laundry operations;
Review of food and beverage outlets;
Implementation of accurate energy
monitoring system and review
ofequipment scheduling & set-point
control for building management
system; and
Review of power factor correction and
peak demand control operation in electrical system.
4.
CONCLUSIONS
Major electrical and mechanical systems in Hong
Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre
(HKCEC) are introduced. An energy management study on the investigation of further energy saving in HKCEC is also discussed. Energy Management Opportunities (EMO) are
also recommended for reducing the operating
energy cost savings without compromising comfort conditions and design criteria within the
development.
Acknowledgement
Parsons Brinckerhoff (Asia) Ltd. would like to
thank the full support and permission from
HKCEC Management Company to allow us to
publish this paper.
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Tseung Kwan O Hospital
Vincent Tse, CEng FCIBSE
KB Leung, MIHEEM
Julie Wong, CEng MCIBSE
Parsons Brinckerhoff (Asia) Ltd.
ABSTRACT
Tseung Kwan O (TKO) Hospital is a district acute hospital built in 1990s. It was developed under
a design-and-build contract arrangement. With the concept of energy efficiency, the design of
building services in TKO Hospital is very innovative and there are many features that are different
from that in traditional hospitals in Hong Kong. In this paper, design features of building services
in TKO Hospital will be introduced. Some energy saving installations and benefit of work coordination between architects and engineers are demonstrated in this hospital design.
1.
INTRODUCTION
Tseung Kwan O (TKO) Hospital is situated in
the heart of the fast-developing Tseung Kwan
O New Town surrounded by residential high
rises. The hospital is located on an area of 3.7
hectares and is easily accessible by public
transport. It was developed under a design-andbuild contract arrangement. It was built to provide quality healthcare services to the growing
population in the Sai Kung and Tseung Kwan O
districts. The decision to build this hospital was
announced by the former Hong Kong Governor in his 1994 Policy Address. Site preparation started in 1996 and construction work was
completed by mid 1999.
Tseung Kwan O Hospital
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The hospital is designed as an integrated hospital complex comprises of three triangular
shape tower blocks of five levels for inpatient
wards and a 5-storey podium block for outpatient services, ambulatory care services, diagnostic and treatment services, back of house and
other administrative support services. The central core is located at the center heart of the
complex with vertical transportation services
linked up the podium and tower blocks. The mid
to high rise approach has been adopted in
which all the functions are combined into a single
integrated structure. The hospital provides 458inpatient bed for nursing services. It provides
services in major specialties of medicine,
orthopedics, obstetrics, gynasecology and
pediatrics. Services for psychiatry, eye and ENT
are provided as outpatient and ambulatory
activities, with in-patient beds concentrated at
the United Christian Hospital. The ambulatory
care services with 120-day beds forms a large
component of the hospital, providing day
surgery, day care, outpatient and community
services. The hospital also provides 24-hour
accident and emergency services with 14 A&E
observation beds.
In the following, design features of building services in TKO Hospital will be discussed. Some
features introducing the concept of energy efficiency will also be emphasized.
2.
TRIANGULAR WARD CONFIGURATION
Working with the architect, the most attractive
feature of the hospital is the cost-effective three
triangular ward blocks. With wards on three
sides of blocks while a nurse station in the
middle, this user-friendly layout allows nurses
to view every patient bed from their central
position. Another advantage of the design is
that the triangular layout significantly reduces
the traveling distance to reach every bed by
nurses, which unlike traditional hospitals where
medical staff has to patrol up and down long
corridors. Thus this design minimizes the fatigue
they would experience in a conventionally designed facility. The layout makes it possible for
a few staff to serve a relatively high number of
patients without undue stress, thus improving
operational efficiency. The spacious nurse station allows adequate storage space within the
station that solves the problem of traditional
nurse station design.
3.
SARS-WARD PROVISION
The two existing general wards namely Ward
2A and 2B are renovated to become infection
control wards (SARS wards) subsequent to the
outbreak of SARS in early 2003. Parsons
Brinckerhoff (Asia) Ltd. was engaged by the
Government to provide full scope of consultancy
including M&E, architectural, structural and
quantity surveying services. The key design
features of the SARS ward are described as
follows: 3.1 The isolation rooms are designed to
operate under the negative pressure for
the purpose of infectious control. Air
flow pattern within the ward cubicle is
uni-directional from clean to dirty zone
and 100% exhaust to outdoor.
3.2 Ward cubicles are provided with air lock
and automatic interlocked airtight doors
to ensure the air-tightness and to prevent the risk of cross contamination
amongst the cubicles.
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3.3 Emergency power back up air handling
and ventilating equipment are provided
to ensure the reliability of pressure differential of the isolation room.
3.4 Other provisions include, pressure-monitoring device, auto-tap for every hand
washbasin, SARS prevention drainage
system and patient intercom system.
4.
type filters, high efficiency particulate air (HEPA)
filters and electrostatic filters are also provided
to filter out the contaminants in the area of the
hospital.
ENGINEERING SYSTEMS
4.1 Air-Conditioning System
One of the building facade features in TKO
Hospital relating to the design of air-conditioning system is the window design. With the small
green tinted strips of windows, it not only delivers the environmentally friendly message to the
public, but also effectively reduces the cooling
load of the hospital from the sunlight and hence
reduces the energy use for cooling. The central
refrigeration plant in TKO Hospital comprises
of 6 nos of 350 TR air-cooled chiller to match
the load profile over a 24-hour cycle. Another
energy saving feature is the use of a sophisticated temperature control system with over 5,
000 monitoring points to optimize the energy
use and to provide thermal comfort to patients
and staff.
With the requirements from the hospital and the
awareness of indoor air quality, specialized airconditioning equipment is installed in different
treatment rooms. Air terminal units with laminar flow pattern are provided in both Operating Theatre (OT) and Intensive Care Unit (ICU)
to reduce the cross air-contamination between
health workers and patients. High efficiency bag
Operating Theatre
4.2 Electrical Distribution System
The 9 MVA 380/220 V 3-phase electrical
supply system is provided by CLP Power via 6
nos. of 1,500 kVA transformers to the main low
voltage switchboards. Emergency power
supply for essential loads such as medical
equipment and fire services equipment is
provided by 2 nos. of 1,300 kVA diesel generator sets. Uninterrupted power supply (UPS)
is provided for continuous electrical backup sup-
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ply to sensitive equipment. The risk of electromagnetic interference to sensitive electronic and
hospital equipment is mitigated by careful planning of various electrical rooms and risers in
relation to this equipment.
4.3 Boiler Plant and Heating System
Three dual fuel boilers with capacity of 4,000kW
each provide centralized steam supply for the
sterilizing equipment, space heating and hot
water generation. The high efficiency dual fuel
boilers are capable of using oil as well as gas.
This feature increases the flexibility of fuel supply and the backup provision so that the boiler
operator can select a reliable fuel for the continuous steam supply over time.
Dual Fuel Boiler
4.4 Lighting System
With a four-storey atrium, the main pedestrian
access to the hospital is covered by a skylight
with sun-shading devices. These devices not only
can reduce the energy use on lighting system,
but also can introduce the sense of open nature
inside the hospital. Provision of lighting complete with low loss ballast at corridor and function rooms is another example to further reduce
the energy consumption in the hospital.
Skylight with Sun-shading devices
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4.5 Medical Gas Pipeline System
5.
Medical gases including medical & non-medical air, medical oxygen and medical nitrous
oxide are provided from individual medical gas
cylinder via the pipeline system to the terminal
units at each ward of different blocks. This pipeline system can provide a continuous and reliable medical gas supply to the wards as well as
to eliminate the cylinder transfer problem.
Major engineering systems designed in TKO
Hospital are briefly described in the paper. The
design of cost effective, energy efficient and
environment-friendly equipment is stressed. The
benefit of work coordination between architects
and engineers is one of the crucial factors for
leading the success of this project. While the
design of the project was 10 years ago, it is still
an advanced technology in hospital design at
this moment.
4.6 Pneumatic Tube Transportation System
The pneumatic tube transportation system is a
pipeline system commonly found in the hospital.
The purpose of the system is to provide a speedy
transmission of specimens and documents from
one station to another station. This system provides a network to different departments of the
hospital so that the human effort and time on
document transfer can be eliminated or reduced.
Thus, the hospital operational efficiency can be
significantly increased.
4.7 Other Systems
Fire services installations including the latest gas
and heat detection system, automatic sprinkler
system, automatic fire alarm system, etc. protect human life in case of fire. Provision of system lifts and escalator, plumbing and drainage
systems, burglar alarm and security systems and
broadcasting reception services achieves the
best practice in hospital operations. Computerized Control and Monitoring System (CCMS)
monitors the status of all systems and equipment and controls them remotely inside the
CCMS room without local control.
CONCLUSIONS
Acknowledgement
Parsons Brinckerhoff (Asia) Ltd. would like to
thank the full support and permission from Electrical and Mechanical Section of Hospital Authority of HKSAR to allow us to publish this
paper.
Private Sector
Sustainable Development of E&M
Off-Site Fabrication in Hong Kong
Thomas Soon, CEng MCIBSE
NWS Engineering Group Ltd.
Majestic Engineering Co. Ltd.
Abstract
Before 1980, all of the building services installation are carried out on site. This has created
safety, environmental and hygiene problems. In the past decade, off-site fabrication becomes
popular and such methodology has brought about prominent benefits in terms of cost, safety,
quality, environmental and programme.
This article briefly describes the development of the off-site fabrication and its advantages. An
example of residential development at Fu Tei is also highlighted to demonstrate how off-site
fabrication is applied to the building construction.
Of course in adopting this methodology, design factors such as economic considerations plus the
perspectives on constructability, compatibility, modularisation, standardisation and sustainability
should be well addressed.
In view of sustainable development and environmental friendly considerations, it is anticipated
that off-site fabrication will be further developed and increasingly adopted by the construction
industry.
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Private Sector
Design of Air-Conditioning System
for SARS Wards
Yuguo Li and SARS Busters*
Background
The hospital care workers (HCWs) have been
the most severely affected professions during
the SARS epidemics in Hong Kong and elsewhere between November 2002 and June
2003. 20% of the infected were HCWs
worldwide. 22% of the confirmed cases in Hong
Kong were HCWs; which occurred in many
hospitals, including the teaching hospitals of the
two medical faculties in Hong Kong. Overcrowding in the ward and ventilation systems which
were not designed for the handling of SARS
were suspected to be contributing factors, although no detailed epidemiological studies were
available.
SARS-Busters’ Ef
for
ts
Effor
forts
The effectiveness of the air conditioning system
in existing hospital wards has been a great concern since the SARS outbreak. In response to
this concern, the Hong Kong Institution of Engineers formed an expert group in early May the SARS-Busters to investigate and develop an
air-conditioning system that is suitable for SARS
wards. A new SARS ward air conditioning design was completed in late May. The new design takes into the major recommendations by
the WHO, CDC (US), the Chartered Institution
of Building Services
Engineers (CIBSE, UK), the American Society of
Heating, Refrigerating and Air-conditioning
Engineers (ASHRAE) and local practices for
handling of airborne infectious diseases. The
new design is well supported by extensive computational fluid dynamics simulations (SARS
Busters, 2003) and a full-scale test room study
at HKU (Li and SARS Busters, 2003). The main
idea of the new design is to minimize air mixing and improve virus removal effectiveness in
the SARS wards.
Complexity of Indoor Air Distribution Design
One difficulty when attempting to design and
predict indoor airflow is that there are many
factors; which influence or govern the airflow.
Quite often some of these factors are difficult to
analyse. These factors may be summarised as
follows:
1. The geometry of the room, i.e. a deep
or a short room, a narrow or a broad
room;
2. The type and location of supply air
terminals and the location of extract air
terminals;
3. Supply air parameters such as velocity,
momentum flux and buoyancy flux;
4. The location, shape and buoyancy flux
of heat sources;
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5. The location of obstacles and furniture;
6. Radiation and heat loss through the
walls;
7. Infiltration and exfiltration through door
gaps and other leak areas;
8. Movement of equipment and people, etc.
As demonstrated in the SARS-Busters project,
both computational fluid dynamics simulations
and full-scale test room studies (see Figure 1)
are shown to be useful for analysing the air flow
patterns and virus-laden aerosols dispersion in
hospital wards.
(A)
(B)
Figure 1. Smoke visualization of the exhaust (A) and supply (B)
air streams in the full-scale test room at HKU..
Design Guidelines
Based on the preliminary results obtained from
SARS Busters’ study, design guidelines from
CDC, WHO and ASHRAE and local practices,
the following design principles are recommended for the SARS Ward:
If possible, single occupancy ward design with a separate air conditioning system is always preferred.
Negative pressure in the patient room
needs to be maintained.
A minimum of 12 air changes per hour
outdoor air supply is recommended.
Low-level exhaust is preferred together
with a ceiling downward supply. For
ceiling level supply, the supply air velocity should be maintained between 0.
1- 0.3 m/s.
If space and budget is allowed, task ventilation is recommended with each supply grille and exhaust grille for each bed
as well as dedicated supply grilles for
HCWs in the middle corridor region to
minimize cross-infection between patients and/or HCWs.
The bed-head exhaust is very effective
for sleeping patients. This should be promoted if space allows and if hospital infection control has no objection to its
position. Other designs such as retractable hoods may also be considered.
If a bed-head level exhaust is used, a
30 to 70 ratio between the bed-head
level and below-bed extraction is found
to be suitable. Noise could be a problem if exhaust grille air velocity is too
high.
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The ventilation system designed by SARS
Busters appears to provide good contamination control for HCWs and the
opposite patient beds. Adjacent patient
bed is not as well protected. It is recommended to always put patients in opposite beds first.
Air distribution in SARS wards is shown
to be a complicated turbulent process
and proper design using computational
fluid dynamics simulations, laboratory
testing or even field mock-up is considered to be very important.
Testing and commissioning is critical.
Apart from the conventional items such
as flow balancing etc, testing and balancing should include a check of supply
air streams, which can be easily done
by using smoke visualization.
CDC: SARS Infection Control and Exposure
Management.
http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/sars/ic.htm,
Last accessed, 18 September 2003.
SARS Busters: Air-conditioning System for
Hospitals dealing with SARS. To appear in HKIE
Transactions, 2003.
Li, Y. and SARS-Busters: Experimental investigation
of the SARS busters’ new air-conditioning system
for SARS wards. To be presented in Asia Pacific
Conference on Built Environment, Hong Kong, 1819 November, 2003.
WHO: Hospital Infection Control Guidance for
Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS),
http://www.who.int/csr/sars/infectioncontrol/
en/, Last accessed, 18 September 2003.
Infor
mation About SARS Research
Information
WHO: http://www.who.int/csr/sars/
CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/sars/
HKU: http://www.hku.hk/sars/medicalinfo/Research_Pub.htm
Figure 2. A schematic diagram of the basic air flow design
SARS Reference: http://www.sarsreference.
com
by SARS Busters (2003)
Major References
*
ASHRAE, HVAC Applications Handbook,
Chapter 7 – Health Care Facilities, 1999.
Center for Disease Control and Prevention:
Guidelines for preventing transmission of
Mycobacterium tuberculosis in health-care
settings. Morbidity Mortality Weekly Report 43
(RR-13), 1994.
The SARS-Busters is a team of professional engineers
from the Hong Kong Institution of Engineers, the University
of Hong Kong, Chinese University of Hong Kong, the
Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers, UK
(HK Branch), the American Society of Heating,
Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (HK
Chapter), Building Services Operation and Maintenance
Executives Society and the Hong Kong Air Conditioning
and Refrigeration Association.
Private Sector
Cyberport Development at Telegraph Bay,
Hong Kong
Ove Arup & Partners Hong Kong Ltd.
1.
Background
“The Cyberport has just received the internationally acclaimed Intelligent Building of the Year
Award 2004 from Intelligent Community Forum
(ICF), presented in New York City on 11 June
2004. The IT flagship of Hong Kong is being
praised, not just for its state-of-the-art IT infrastructure and beautiful architecture, but more
importantly the role model that it sets for future
IT-connected community.” SCMP 6 June 2004.
The Cyberport development provides an essential information infrastructure in the form of a
world-class working and living environment to
attract companies and professional talents specializing in applications of information
technology, information services and multimedia content creation. The development is located at Telegraph Bay, South-West of Hong
Kong Island and occupies a site area of 24
hectares. The estimated investment of the entire
development is HK$15.8 billion, in which an
innovative project is created. This landmark
project aims to provide a creative and interactive environment that will be home to a strategic cluster of more than 100 IT companies and
over 10,000 IT professionals.
Cyberport is being completed in phases from
early 2002 to late 2004. The commercial portion consists of 100,000m2 intelligent offices, a
27,000m2 shopping mall [The Arcade], a 5-star
hotel [Le Méridien Cyberport] with 173 room
as well as associated supporting facilities, such
as public transport terminus, carparks, cycle
track and jogging circuit, landscaped terraces,
outdoor cafes, lake and gardens, etc. The
Cyberport commercial portion is being leased
out, owned, and managed by the Government,
through a private limited company owned by
the Financial Secretary Incorporated.
Private Sector
Cyberport Development – Cyberport
(Commercial) Por
tion
Portion
Developer : Cyber-Port Ltd.
Architects : Wong Tung & Partners,
Arquitectonica, Jerde Partnership
Building Services Engineers : Ove Arup &
Partners Hong Kong Ltd.
Fire Safety Consultant : ArupFire
IT & Communication Consultant :
ArupCommunications
Façade Engineer : ArupFacade
2.
Introduction
According to ICF’s definition, a community can
only be described as “intelligent” if it can realise
five critical success factors, namely broadband
infrastructure, knowledge workforce, innovation,
digital democracy, and marketing. In presenting Cyberport with the Intelligent Building of the
Year Award, ICF noted that “because of its
broadband and wireless communications
infrastructure, Cyberport follows the intelligent
building model of creating an atmosphere where
‘next-generation’ companies and tenants will be
attracted.”
The context of energy efficiency is one of the
most important considerations in the built form
and building services design. Advanced design tools, in consideration with the latest technology and innovative design notions were
adopted both in the preliminary and detailed
design stage of building services systems. The
building performance in terms of sustainability
can be demonstrated by the following design
objectives.
Minimize the consumption of energy and
impact to the environment: All buildings in the
commercial buildings have been assessed by
the HK-BEAM. (6 nos. individual buildings)
Provide a healthy and comfortable indoor
environment: Design to meeting EPD guideline
of IAQ, field IAQ measurements, …
Sound system performance and costeffectiveness: Numerous technical analyses and
life cycling costing exercises were conducted.
Design with innovation: Computational simulation methods widely adopted in design options evaluation and feasibility studies
3.
Provision of W
orld Class ICT Facilities
World
Cyberport’s IT provisions were designed in three
layers:
1. the wide area telecommunications network
2. the campus network
3. the in-building network
The physically and virtually interconnected buildings contain miles of fibre optic cables that will
allow tenants to exchange digital data at 10
gigabits per second (GB/sec), which really
packs a punch, considering the average broadband connection in Hong Kong operates at 1.5
megabits per second. This truly enables oncampus collaboration and does not rely on using third party, external telecommunications
services.
To make Cyberport attractive to its target tenants,
a digital media centre, a wireless application
development centre and a digital library have
been set up in the complex, amongst other
facilities. Making these hi-tech provisions work
requires ensuring the architectural and engineering design would accommodate the IT
infrastructure, that the implementation sequence
was taken into account, that the building services are resilient and highly redundant, that
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the provisions were scalable; and that the spatial planning is future-proofed.
The future-proofing is about achieving the three
Rs: rooms, routes and risers. Cyberport has a
combination of good infrastructure, providing
a platform and shared facilities for tenants and
outside users. Spatial planning has been influenced by the adoption of shared equipment
rooms, driven by convergence of ICT systems
and the related adoption of structured cabling
that integrates the voice, data and video type
services.
Integrating different applications to meet the
needs of diverse users requires multiple systems
and software applications to work together without failing. Because this is so critical to the whole
strategy, a master system integrator was appointed to take care of system integration issues.
The second challenge is the timing of the
implementation. Convergence is accepted now
and the IP networks are fully implemented, but
at the time the strategy was designed, back in
1999, this was not the recognised trend.
A “last responsible moment” approach is
adopted. This centres on not making decisions
too early, because a technology would be
obsolete, and equally not too late because then
the equipment may not be installed in time. It
has to be timed carefully.
4.
4.1
4.1.1
Sustainable Design for Building Ser
vices
Services
Systems
Central Systems
District Cooling System
The space cooling requirement in Hong Kong is
high due to its hot and humid climate, particu-
larly in the spring and summer periods. District
Cooling System (DCS) is a cooling technology
that supplies chilled water from a central plant
to the surround buildings. Compared with the
traditional decentralised chiller plant, the
centralised system design offers economical
advantages: The total installed cooling capacity at the centralised plant is smaller than the
sum of decentralised plants in individual
buildings. By accumulating the cooling load
demand of individual buildings, DCS does not
suffer from extreme part load operation and is
able to generate higher operational efficiency
when compared to the individual plant
operation. Computational energy modelling
was carried out to determine the chiller plant
optimisation. In this process, the predicted cooling load of the cluster of buildings and the optimum chiller combinations were determined.
Meanwhile, high system reliability and maintainability can be achieved by sharing of duty
and standby chillers amongst all buildings.
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The district cooling system, which comprise of a
central chiller plant (7,500 TR installed capacity for duty and 1,000 TR installed capacity
standby), 6 nos. 1,000 TR water-cooled centrifugal chillers, 5 nos. 500 TR water-cooled
centrifugal chillers, 2 nos. 150 TR air-cooled
chillers as back-up for the Network Operating
and Control Center, a primary chiller water circuit with constant speed horizontal split casing
pumps, 4 secondary chiller water circuits with
variable speed horizontal split casing pumps,
refrigerant recovery system, refrigerant leakage
alarm system, standby generators, computer
control and monitoring system, and so on. Five
nos. of 1,500kVA diesel generators are assigned
to provide back up electricity for the essential
chiller installations. The refrigerant used is R134a with zero ozone depletion potential.
4.1.2
Cooling Tower System
17 nos. of salt water / fresh water evaporative
type cooling towers together with titanium plate
heat exchangers, side-stream filtration system,
chemical dosing system are installed in the development to serve the central chiller plant. The
cooling tower installations joined the EMSD Pilot Scheme for Wider Use of Fresh Water in
Evaporative Cooling Towers for Energy-efficient
Air Conditioning System. The cooling tower installations in Cyberport are the largest cooling
tower system in the Pilot Scheme to date.
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4.1.3
Electrical Power Supply
The electricity distribution network for the
Cyberport Development is 22kV supply and is
designed and provided by Hong Kong Electric
Company. The 22kV distribution system is obtained from the new Cyberport 275kV Zone
Substation and is in a closed-ring configuration.
The power supply system for the consumer side
is 380/220V, 3-phase 4-wire, 50Hz.
From the power supply company view, it is not
cost effective to provide 100% redundancy of
the consumer substation plant equipment.
However, there is a need to provide a highly
secured power supply. It compromises of HEC
to utilise the full emergency rating of the installed
transformer inside HEC’s consumer substation.
This involves increasing the main breakers with
associated protective devices, main busbar of
switchboard and the transit blocks to 3200A.
In the event of the loss of one transformer, the
consumer (with HEC consent) will make use of
the emergency rating of the other healthy transformer in parallel to backfeed the other half of
the switchboard which suffers a loss of supply
via the bus section switch. Given a normal design rating of 2250A incomer, the backfeed
capacity is very much limited and cannot make
the full use of the emergency rating of the
transformer.
45 HEC transformers are installed at 15 consumer substations and are strategically located
in each phase of the Development. Ten transformers are dedicated for the central chiller plant
and associated A/C equipment for NOCC and
data centres.
4.1.4
Essential Power Supply
Diesel generators are installed to cater for the
life safety and fire services installation in accordance with FSD requirements. A centralised
generator plant of five diesel generators, each
with a 1500kVA capacity, is provided to support the essential air-conditioning system. A
generator plant of two diesel generators, each
with a 1200kVA capacity, is provided to support the NOCC and data centre, one of these
provides redundancy.
In order to stabilise the power supply and continuous operation of the NOCC, data centres
and main IT equipment, a centralised
Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) system complete with battery back up is installed. Two independent UPS systems (in 2N configuration)
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are installed in the UPS rooms; each UPS system has two UPS modules in parallel to provide
redundancy operation. Each of the parallel redundancy UPS systems is equipped with a common static bypass and a maintenance bypass.
The two UPS systems are supplied from two different transformers which to provide two independent sources of UPS to dual feed to the critical loads. The UPS system includes a dual
autonomous, high reliability and low maintenance batteries. Each UPS module is backed
up two strings of batteries, each string of batteries sustain the UPS system fully loaded for at
least 5 minutes.
4.1.5
Lifts and Escalators
Generally, most of the lifts are Alternate Current Variable Voltage Variable Frequency
(ACVVVF) geared drive control. The benefits of
this over the conventional control include reduced capacity of power source; energy saving;
excellent floor-to-floor levelling performance;
smooth and silent operation; long term
reliability. For escalators, two speed control for
the escalator motor drive is adopted. Under a
preset time with no occupant use, the motor will
operate in low speed for energy saving.
4.1.6
Intelligent Building Management
System (IBMS)
The Intelligent Building Management System
(IBMS) is a computer-based system, operating
in open system protocol for control and monitoring of other building services systems. Its
distribution control is decentralised. It is based
on open building automation architecture. It in-
terfaces with other building services systems via
equipment such as operator workstations, network controllers, DDC controllers, relays, voltfree contacts, and the communication network
– Ethernet, to provide control and monitoring
functions such as:
Monitoring and controlling (optimisation,
time, temperature, humidity, interlocking, energy
meters, chiller and standby/duty equipment
sequencing control, energy control, demand
control and generator load control).
Interfacing with lighting controls for external/landscape area and public area, fire alarm
system and security system.
Recording of energy consumption for the
landlord equipment (daily, monthly).
Providing a preventive maintenance management program.
Auto-metering of energy/chilled water
consumption.
IBMS of different phases are linked with each
other via Ethernet, so that overall monitoring
can be achieved for these systems and also,
when authorised, to modify the system. The
network interface is based on an Ethernet connection to IEEE 802-3 standard.
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4.1.7
Security and Access Control System
(SAC)
Security and Access Control System of Cyberport
Development comprises the following systems:
Closed Circuit Television (CCTV) Surveillance
System
Door Status Monitoring and Alarm Lock
System
Watchman’s Tour System
Access Control System
Panic Alarm System
Carpark Control System
The above sub-systems are integrated together
and connected to the SAC operator workstation such that the operator can monitor the status and execute control functions for the subsystems through the SAC operator workstation.
The SAC operator workstation has graphical
displays of the status of SAC system. Integrated,
hardware-based, real-time clock is installed for
each SAC operator workstation and the time is
synchronized among the intelligent security controllers and IBMS operator workstation.
The SAC system of each phase is operated
independently, but different phases are linked
up together at high level via the IBMS backbone to form a network covering for all phases.
Through the connection, the SAC system of any
one phase can monitor and control the SAC
system of other phases such as the remote monitoring and control of CCTV camera and accessing the alarm status and card reader status of
another phase.
4.1.8
Automatic Fire Alarm and Detection
System (AFA)
Microcomputer-controlled and fully addressable
AFA system is provided. Localised AFA control
panels are provided for each phase and
centralised AFA panel is provided for Cyberport
2. The localised AFA control panels are operated independently, but are connected to the
centralised AFA panel. The AFA system is integrated with an operator workstation and connected to the IBMS backbone at high level. Common fire alarm signal will be transmitted to the
Intelligent Building Management System (IBMS)
and the centralised AFA panel for continuous
monitoring in case of fire.
AFA system interfaces with the public address
system of each phase. Emergency announcement messages will be broadcasted through the
public address system at the highest priority in
case of fire.
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4.2 Of
Office
fice Buildings
4.2.1 Typical Office Floor
Multi-zone variable air volume (VAV) system and
swirl ceiling diffuser are adopted for all openceiling office areas. PAU pre-treats fresh air
and then distributes to individual floor AHU via
CAV box. The open-ceiling air distribution system provides a higher adaptability for the future change of space usage and equipment
relocation. Hence, waste generated from the
future tenants’ decoration works can be kept to
minimum.
To further improve the indoor air quality, each
of the office AHU is equipped with a solid-state
type air purification unit. IAQ field measurement in accordance to the EPD guidelines on
IAQ was conducted on office floors. In addition to the traditional provision for a typical
office, a dedicated exhaust air duct is provided
for the office tower as the provision of FM200
gas purge and pantry / copier room exhaust.
4.2.2 Power Supply for Office Floor
Power supply risers for office tower are generally split into two zones. Each zone is fed by
two plug-in type total insulated busduct/prefabricated branched cable risers. To provide secure power supply to office tenants, each riser
is designed to be rated at 200% of designed
load capacity. In case of failure or maintenance
of a busduct/cable riser of each zone, the other
busduct/cable riser of the same zone can take
over the load of the failure busduct/cable riser
to maintain the power supply to the office tenant.
This arrangement is also minimises the energy
losses in the distribution system. To provide a
reliable and efficient emergency back-up power
supply to the office tenants, a standby diesel
generator also provides 20% of normal power
load demand.
Private Sector
4.2.3
Hot Smoke Test in PTI
A hot smoke test was conducted in the PTI in
2002, with FSD officers and a fire engine
present. The test aimed to demonstrate that the
dynamic smoke extraction system would operate correctly and smoke would be efficiently
extracted. Temperature measurements and
video recordings were also conducted for the
first hot smoke test in a PTI in Hong Kong.
4.2.4
Displacement Ventilation
Low velocity displacement ventilation supplies
cooled air, at low level in the partition wall at a
very low velocity. The chilled air is diffused to
the entire room floor and then raised up by the
effects of stratification. Heat and pollutant generated at the occupant level is raised to the high
level return air path. The low velocity air supply can reduce the risk of cold draught such
that thermal comfort is enhanced. Also, the IAQ
is improved by removing air pollutants to the
return air path in a single direction. The pollutant removal effectiveness is undoubtedly better
than the conventional ceiling supplied fully mixing system.
Since the effect of stratification is prominent in
high headroom area, the system is adopted in
office tower main entrance lobby, which is four
stories height. In the design stage, in order to
determine an effective system configuration, CFD
and dynamic thermal modelling techniques were
applied to determine the temperature and air
distribution in the entire room.
The smoke temperature was measured at 2m
away from the fire source and at 1m below the
ceiling. It was concluded from the measured
temperatures that smoke was effectively
extracted, and there was very little smoke at a
distance of greater than 8m from the fire at ceiling level. It was also observed that there was
no smoke at the low levels. With the other
observations, which included a prompt activation of the system and the proper drop down of
the smoke curtains, it was concluded that the
performance of the dynamic smoke extraction
system was acceptable.
Private Sector
4.2.5
PTI and Carparks
The mechanical ventilation systems inside the
Public Transport Interchanges (PTI) and Carpark
were designed to meet the relevant EPD
ProPECCs. Dual-purpose (general ventilation
and smoke extraction) ventilation fans and horizontal displacement jet fan systems are installed
in the PTI and carpark respectively. Air quality
sensors are installed in various sensitive positions inside the PTI and carpark for air quality
monitoring and fan control. A jet fan system
was adopted together with horizontal displacement ventilation to ensure all pollutant generated from vehicles can be withdrawn from the
exhaust air ducts. Compared with the conventional fully ducted mechanical ventilation system,
a jet fan system can eliminate all ductwork in
the parking area, and the headroom requirement can also be reduced.
4.2.6
Feasibility Study of Underfloor Air
Supply in Office
A feasibility study on underfloor air supply system was carried out for the low-rise office towers.
The system supplies conditioned air through floor
grilles from pressurised floor plenum, in which
space can be shared with electrical and IT
cabling. Return air is collected through air grilles
at high level via a ducted air path. Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) simulation was carried out by specialist engineers to investigate
the floor plenum depth, the air flow pattern inside the air plenum, and temperature profiles
at the occupied zone. The terminal air velocity
of each group of floor diffusers was determined
so as to maintain acceptable thermal comfort.
Private Sector
4.2.7
Close Control for the Network
Operating Center
More than 20 close controlled Computer Room
Air-conditioning (CRAC) system with dual fed
(chilled water from water-cooling chiller system
and air-cooled chiller system) CRAC units are
provided for the Network Operating & Control
Center. Computer room water leakage detection system with addressable distance indication is also provided.
4.2.8
Greywater Recycling
Cooling tower bleed-off water and condensate
from AHU/PAU is collected and conveyed to
the water treatment system before conveying to
the flushing water tank. The greywater is recycled and resued for flushing.
4.3 The Arcade
Private Sector
4.3.1
Innovative Fabric Roof & Technical
Analysis
The Arcade is an architecturally dynamic space
with spiral type spatial arrangements, for shops,
restaurants, ser vice center, cinema, bar,
exhibition area, foodcourt, water features as
well as the latest interactive technology. The
roof of the entire building is fabricated by lowe glazed skylight and translucent Telfon fabric,
which is the first large-scale commercial building
using fabric roof in Hong Kong. Despite the
roof being entirely covered by glazing and
fabric, the building is still able to satisfy the OTTV
requirements by optimizing the façade design.
One of the benefits of using translucent fabric
roof is to utilize more sunlight during the day.
Subsequently, energy consumed for electric
lighting is reduced. Technical comparisons with
fabric roof, metal roof and concrete roof options
are evaluated to determine the cooling load,
lighting energy and cost implications. In
addition, computational daylight simulation was
carried out for the atrium area to evaluate the
daylight penetration to the interiors, as well as
to coordinate with the landscape architect on
the choice of flora species.
4.3.2
New Dehumidification Method
One of the challenges for the fabric roof is the
risk of surface condensation on the inner surface
and interstitial layers. This is due to the existence
of many water features and soft landscape inside
the buildings and the vapour permeability of
the roof fabric being higher than conventional
solid roof materials.
As a result of a condensation study, 4 electric heatpump type desiccant dehumidifiers were installed
to dehumidify the humid air at the upper level of
atrium and circulation area, to minimise the risk
of water dipping from fabric. The heat-pump type
desiccant dehumidifiers were the first application
in a commercial building in Hong Kong.
The electric heat pump system can achieve
higher energy saving and better utilisation of
waste heat. The evaporator of the unit cools
the regenerated entering air and then the air
dries by desiccant wheel. The condenser of the
unit can regenerate the desiccant wheel for bet-
Private Sector
ter energy utilisation from both the evaporator
and the condenser. Technical analysis was carried out to compare the feasibility and applicability of gas-fired and electric type desiccant dehumidifier that fully address the spatial
limitations.
4.3.3
Air Side Systems
The air distribution in the public areas are supplied from VAV and CAV type AHUs, to cope
with the daily variation of occupancy and solar
heat gain. Jet nozzles and air totems are the
main air distribution devices for the open arcade and circulation area.
Electrostatic precipitator was adopted for kitchen
exhaust pollutant removal serving foodcourt
areas. Water scrubber was adopted in the refuse
storage chamber to minimise the exhaust air
odour effect towards the surrounding areas.
Private Sector
4.3.4
Smoke Spread Control
The Arcade consists of a large atrium and many
large open circulation spaces. A mechanical
smoke extraction system is not feasible due to
the constraints of fabric roof and the overall
architectural design. Hence, static smoke extraction system was adopted for the building. The
Arcade is divided into six smoke zones. In the
case of fire inside one smoke zone, sufficient
fresh air would be drawn in from smoke vents
of the other zones and maintain the smoke layer
in the atrium at high level. The static smoke
extraction system was evaluated by means of
CFD for different fire locations and sizes. The
smoke propagation and transportation inside
the Arcade were analyzed and are illustrated
below. Given sufficient depth of smoke barriers
and area of smoke vents at the roof, the smoke
can be trapped and vented out in one smoke
zone and the escape route at low level was kept
clear and safe.
Numerical verification was carried out with the
well-known commercial CFD code STAR-CD. A
body-fitted co-ordinate system with non-uniform
mesh is applied in the grid system of the model.
Finer meshes are adopted at the area near the
fire sources; smoke extraction vents at the roof
to increase the resolution of the simulation.
The total size of the grid system was about
150,000 cells. All major architecture details
such as the curved fabric roof, food court, atrium
and open circulation areas were incorporated
in the CFD model.
Private Sector
4.3.5
Air-to-Air Heat Recovery
All primary air handling units in the shopping
mall are equipped with both total enthalpy wheel
and sensible heat wheel. The total enthalpy
wheel can exchange the heat and moisture between fresh air and exhaust air. The sensible
heat wheel then further reduces the sensible load
of fresh air. This system is particularly suitable
for a hot/warm and humid climate like Hong
Kong. A technical study was carried out to compare the potential energy saving from this system and other systems that only use a desiccant
wheel or a sensible heat wheel.
4.3.6
Feasibility Study of Displacement
Ventilation in Cinema
CFD simulations were carried out to study the
feasibility of using underfloor supply displacement ventilation system in the cinemas. The air
flow and temperature profiles inside the cinemas
demonstrated that the limited headroom and
spatial arrangement of the cinemas caused energy inefficiency when using the floor supplied
system due to spatial constraints. Hence, use of
CFD simulation technique to study the feasibilities
of design options is an effective method in a
design process.
Air flow simulation for the floor supplied air-conditioning system using CFD in the cinema
Private Sector
4.4 Hotel
The Le Méridien Cyberport Hotel is located next
to The Arcade. The building consists of
guestrooms, restaurants, lobby lounge,
gymnasium, wine bar, lounge & executive
lounge on guestroom floor at 13/F. 2 waterto-water heat pumps are provided to pre-heat
the water before it is conveyed to domestic hot
water system. The water source of the heat
pump is the condenser water circuit of the campus-wide central chiller plant. This provision is
able to reclaim the waste heat from the heat
rejection plant and then reuse it in the hot water
system to reduce heating energy consumption.
In addition, several heat exchangers are provided to pre-heat the water for the swimming
pool & hot water supplies for the guestroom fan
coil units for winter heating.
Guestrooms are provided with four pipe system
fan coil units to allow flexibility in operation
during summer & winter time. During occupancy
mode, a fan coil unit is controlled by wallmounted thermostat via the room control unit.
During vacant mode, the fan coil unit control
will be preset to 27°C via the room control unit
to save energy & reduce unpleasant smells.
The entire hotel has full coverage of wireless
LAN and DECT PHONE system and the
guestroom can be contactable in any
circumstances. The guest can connect to the
outside world via the broadband service provided in each guestroom near the working desk.
The guest can enjoy selecting their favourite TV
channel & program via the media centre &
plasma TV. In each guestroom, IP phone & DECT
are provided for the guest to make long distance call via network.
5.
Summar y
Through innovative engineering coupled with
imaginative architectural design, Cyberport has
established itself as a landmark development in
Hong Kong. Its campus comprises offices, a
shopping arcade and a hotel, all enhanced with
a state-of-the-art IT infrastructure and sustainable building services design. Cyberport aims
to become the IT flagship of Hong Kong, providing a creative and interactive environment
to attract and nurture a strategic cluster of IT
and multimedia companies. The engineering
design for both building services and IT should
help to realise this goal. This latest award from
the ICF has acknowledged the technical merit
of the development and should be help to raise
awareness of Cyperport in the local and international business community.
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November 2004