Subscribe to this blog's feedDisconnector is much taken by the news that Germany’s Reichstag is bidding to become the greenest parliamentary building in the world. The great man hopes the powers that be over there manage a bit better than City Hall and the Mayor of London’s London Development Agency.
The mayor’s “home” on London’s South Bank now has a custom-designed half a million quid photovoltaic system which provides, erm, about 1.5 per cent of the building’s power needs. The complex geometry of the roof of the Norman Foster-designed building needed an innovative design of PV panel – trapezoidal rather than the more conventional rectangular shape.
Meanwhile, over at the LDA’s headquarters (called Palestra) in Blackfriars Road the organisation is making a second attempt to harness green power with an array of roof-mounted wind turbines. The first array of Swift turbines was recalled after around six weeks in action thanks to a component failure. The building is also home to the mayor’s London Climate Change Agency (LCCA).
The LDA is going to trial another version of the Swift turbine, which now has re-engineered software.
The LDA issued a statement recently proclaiming: “The LCCA has worked continuously with Solar Technologies to re-install or replace the wind turbines following product recall. However, Scottish and Southern Energy has refused to re-install the wind turbines on behalf of Solar Technologies. Therefore
the LCCA has decided to re-install the new turbines outside of the Solar Technologies original contract.”
Hope that’s clear now.
