Energy and water benchmarks for aquatic centres in Victoria, Australia

Aquatic centres are large and complex buildings which include at least one indoor swimming pool and several amenities such as gymnasium, café, office, spa, sauna and stadium. There are only a few studies that have investigated the energy and water use of aquatic centres. This study developed energy and water benchmarks for aquatic centres in Victoria, Australia using data from 22 aquatic centres. Statistical regression based benchmarking method was used to identify relevant correlations and significances of several variables in regards to the energy and water use of aquatic centres. The analysis indicated that conditioned usable floor area and the number of visitors have the strongest correlation and significance to the energy and water use of aquatic centres respectively. No strong correlation was found between energy and water use. The proposed energy benchmark for aquatic centres ranges between 648 kWh/m2 and 2283 kWh/m2 (conditioned usable floor area) and the proposed water benchmark for aquatic centres ranges between 11 L/Visitor and 110 L/Visitor. An attempt to identify energy and water efficient characteristics of aquatic centres was also undertaken using the detailed data collected.