The Australia and New Zealand region once again outshine at the CIBSE Awards night in London this month.
AMCA and Holmesglen won the Learning and Development category for the Victoria-based HVAC Centre of Excellence.
Established to address the chronic shortage of building services professionals in Australia, it is the first HVAC training centre to offer applied learning, and brings together industry, education and government.
AMCA Executive Director, Sumit Oberoi says, “There is growing expectation for increased sustainability, energy efficiency and occupant satisfaction in modern buildings. It is essential that industry responds to the current environment by upskilling existing technicians and training tomorrow’s mechanical services professionals.”
Using simulation and replication of entire systems found in today’s buildings, the centre upskills existing technicians and trains tomorrow’s mechanical services professionals using the latest technologies.
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Leading by example with projects and initiatives that the industry is calling out for.
The 2020 winner for the International Project of the Year was Mason Bros, Auckland – Mott MacDonald. The Mason Bros project demonstrated world leadership in sustainable design by using existing technology and methods in the best way possible, according to the judges.
"Our approach to achieving a sustainable design is to always look at options holistically. We prefer an approach where we put people and their experience of a building first- it is an outcomes based focus. As an example for Mason Brothers; in development of the HVAC systems we prioritised outside air rates and filtration efficiency ahead of energy efficiency to ensure better internal environmental quality for the occupants. With the pre and post occupancy survey results it is clear how a simple initiative such as this can make huge improvements. Get the basics right, start with passive design optimisation and then add energy efficient active systems." - Anthony Calderone, Technical Director at Mott MacDonald.
‘The Mason Bros project does not have any revolutionary technology: no ‘world first’ innovation. From the outside, there were no grand objectives (or the corresponding budget) to demonstrate world leadership in sustainable design – yet this is what was achieved.’
The BPA judges agreed with Mott MacDonald’s own assessment that it had achieved great results by applying existing technology and methods well, rather than by reinventing the wheel.
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The full list of winners at the 2020 CIBSE Building Performance Awards here