Post occupancy evaluation and internal environmental monitoring of the new BREEAM “Excellent” Land Rover/Ben Ainslie Racing team headquarters offices

This paper describes a study carried out on the office floor of the Land Rover/Ben Ainslie Racing (LR/BAR) Team headquarters building in Portsmouth, UK. The building was recently constructed and has a Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM) “Excellent” award/certification. The study examines the physically monitored thermal environment within the office floor of the building, and compares these measurements with both the occupant's perception of comfort regarding the same parameters, and the building management system's (BMS) input and output. The occupants perceptions are quantified by a post occupancy evaluation (POE) carried out by survey/questionnaire. Existing research suggests there is often a “performance gap” between parametric, objectively designed standards for comfort and subjective, user/occupants', experiences of comfort levels. This research suggests that early commitment to sustainable design, coupled with occupants that are knowledgeable of (and engaged in) this ethos, can produce good user experience and comfort levels. However, this appears to be contingent on the building being of low thermal mass, such that, the BMS is responding to something very close to the operative temperatures within the building. In addition to thermal comfort, occupants were questioned on other aspects of their perception of comfort e.g. light quality, air quality etc. The results also demonstrate the importance of seemingly small details to the level of comfort experienced by occupants.