Time-effective school project with a focus on energy optimisation

Summer 2023 was a hectic period for the Instalco company VFB in Malmö. Over the course of ten weeks, a project was carried out at the Cathedral School in Lund with a major focus on energy optimisation.

“To modernise energy optimisation, we replaced all old heating, air quality and recycling equipment throughout the school,” says Martin Lekland, VFB project manager in Malmö. 

VFB's commitment included replacing three old ventilation units with new and modern FTX units. In addition, a heat exchanger was replaced with a district heating system. VFB also updated the fire system, which included installing new fire dampers on the premises.

“Since this is a listed building, permission was required to open up the roof. We had to do that to rebuild the hoods.”

VFB also built a completely new fan room with two new units. The third unit is located on the entrance level.

“The previous units had been in place since the 1990s and were belt-driven. The are nowhere near as efficient as the new ones.”

The project started at the beginning of June and the final inspection was held before the start of the school year in August. This time-efficient project was made possible thanks to good planning, with planning and preparatory work starting early in the spring.

“We had ten weeks to get all the installation work done so we would be ready before the start of the school year. The schedule was the most critical part of this project and we had to stick to it, down to the smallest detail. That meant we had to focus extra closely on everything. During the implementation phase, about 30 people were working in the school. Out of those, we had seven or eight people on site from VFB, which is 20-25 percent of the company's capacity. The rest were subcontractors.”

Planning before the start of the project was meticulous: all materials and other items needed for construction were in stock for a long time. VFB had total responsibility for the project and brought in subcontractors for the parts that it did not carry out itself, for example pipe and sheet metal workers.

“When we had finished this project, the climate conditions in the building became significantly better. Our aim is for air quality and temperature to be optimal for students and teachers.”

FACTS
The Cathedral School is a listed building which was originally built in 1905. In 1991, the building was destroyed in a fire. It was rebuilt in the 1990s with a facade similar to that of the original building. Building D contains mainly a gymnasium, changing rooms, a strength training room, a dance hall, visual arts classrooms and staffrooms.