Prefab Solar School

In 2020 New Zealand government stated that all government needs to show leadership to reduce its own emissions to demonstrate what is possible to other sectors in the New Zealand economy and agreed to establish the Carbon Neutral Government Programme (CNGP) that aims to make the government carbon neutral by 2025.

The New Zealand Ministry of Education, is the second largest social property portfolio holder in New Zealand, consisting of over 33,000 classrooms spread over 2100 schools, of which a good proportion of the buildings were built in the 1950’s to 60s to thermal performance standards that are lower than the currently required levels. However many of these older buildings are solidly constructed. In response to the carbon neutral program, the Ministry of Education has commenced a carbon reduction program to upgrade its building stock.

Many school buildings of this era are solidly built and rather than demolishing and replacing these classrooms, this thesis aims to develop an innovative kitset recladding solution for bringing these existing buildings to a high standard of environmental performance. All without compromising the carbon already embodied within the structure. The solution proposed is to integrate the existing technologies, prefabrication, and solar heating and ventilation systems, with a significant focus on providing low-cost heating and vastly improved ventilation capabilities to classrooms.

For this research, the Nelson plan school block provides the basis for the concept to be developed acting to gauge the feasibility of such a system. The resulting design proposed is a panelised, modular, retrofit kitset system designed to facilitate off-site manufacturing, rapid installation, adaptability, and modularity. This includes the capacity for varying levels of architectural intervention within a single system. This research provides insights into how existing, established cladding systems can revitalise aging school infrastructure. All while improving the buildings by the way of low-cost heating and vastly improved ventilation capabilities for existing school buildings.