BUILDING DESCRIPTION
Pixel is a four level structure using
reinforced concrete floor slabs, lift core
and easterly shared wall.
Double glazed low-e external envelope
is used for the north, west and south
facades.
The building also has a green roof.
Significant design effort was invested to
ensure that a large proportion of the
building envelope is able to be removed
and re-used in order to reduce the
future footprint of the building when it is
demolished.
ABOUT THE SITE
The 1.6ha former Carlton Brewery site on Swanston Street, just to the north of
the CBD, is a key urban development site in Melbourne.
INTEGRATED ENGINEERING SYSTEMS
Daylight Glare Control Pixel
• has been designed to provide 100% daylight
penetration into the office space, whilst allowing
screen based technologies to be used without
the need for blinds on windows.
• Extensive 3D CAD modeling has been
undertaken to maximize the performance of the
external sun-shade system to enable this.
Gas Fired Absorption Chiller
• The technology originates from Europe where it
is widely used, but is unknown in Australia.
• The gas fired absorption chiller uses ammonia as
the refrigerant source and gas as the energy
source.
• As a consequence, the carbon emissions from
the energy are dramatically lowered when
compared with electrically powered chiller
systems.
• The use of ammonia as the refrigerant gas
means there is no ozone depleting potential in
the gas, nor is there any possibility of legionella.
The carbon-neutral Pixel in
Melbourne is the greenest
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA building in Australia,
completely self-sufficient in
its energy and water
requirements.
VENTILLATION
Free Night Cooling
• The Pixel facade includes smart window
technology that automatically opens the
windows on cool nights to enable the air to
flow into the building and cool the structure
– this process is termed “night purging”.
• The operation of the windows is controlled
by the sophisticated Building Management
System installed in the project.
100% Fresh Air
• 100% fresh air (ie no re-circulation) is
circulated throughout the building via the
floor spaces and is controlled via floor vents
at each work station.
• A heat exchanger captures energy from the
exhaust air to pre-heat or pre-cool the
incoming fresh air.
• The thermally active floor slabs directly
condition the office spaces through radiant
cooling, and indirectly condition the spaces
by pre-conditioning the incoming fresh air..
LAYING OF HDPE PIPES IN FLOORING
FAÇADE WITH SMART WINDOW TECHNOLOGY
GREY WATER REUSE
• The grey waste water is then filtered and
directed to the living edge reed beds.
• This process means there will be no grey water
waste leaving Pixel except for the wettest
month of the year in Melbourne – thus
dramatically reducing the waste flow to sewer.
• The anaerobic digester on the ground level
holds all of the black waste from toilets and
kitchen facilities.
• The methane is extracted and used as the
energy source for the hot water heaters on the
roof.
• These in turn provide the hot water to the
showers that subsequently produce the grey
water that irrigates the reed beds.
• The black waste is then sent to the sewer in a
liquefied form and with reduced methane
levels.
WATER USE
Three Uses of Entire Water; Irrigation,
Building Use, Reed Bed Irrigation
• Water falling on Pixel as rainwater will be
collected after it has been used to irrigate
the living roof.
• The rainwater will be stored in tanks before
being treated to potable water standard.
• This treated water will then be distributed to
all fixtures and fittings within the building.
VACUUM TOILET TECHNOLOGY
• Pixel is the first project in
Australia to implement small
scale vacuum toilet technology.
• This technology has been
sourced from northern Europe,
where it has been developed
for high quality office and
accommodation buildings.
• Vacuum toilet systems reduce
the water consumption to an
absolute minimum.
• Using just 1 litre of water per
flush, vacuum systems reduce
the volumes of water and
sewage associated with toilet
flushing by up to 90%.
ENVIRONMENTAL RATING ACHIEVEMENTS
Target To Achieve a Perfect Greenstar Score
• Pixel has been designed to achieve all the available rating credits under all categories of
the Greenstar Version 3 rating system, and is targeting to achieve all five of the available
innovation credits. This is an unprecedented outcome and puts Pixel at the forefront of
the Greenstar rating system in Australia.
Carbon Neutral Pixel
will be Australia‟s first carbon neutral commercial office building. This means the
renewable energy sources on the site are generating all of the electrical energy that Pixel
requires, plus surplus energy to be fed back into the grid to off-set the energy that was
used, and the carbon generated, in the manufacture of materials and equipment for the
building.
Water Balanced Pixel
has been designed to be water balanced. This means on the basis that Melbourne
maintains the 10 year rainfall average between 1999-2009, Pixel could be disconnected
from the mains supply and would be self sufficient.
ENVIRONMENTAL RATING ACHIEVEMENTS
Pixel has achieved the highest environmental rating ever for buildings using
the US LEED, UK BREEAM and Australian Greenstar environmental rating
schemes. To put that into context, there are approximately 740,000 buildings
registered worldwide under those three rating schemes, and Pixel would be at
the forefront of all of them.
A perfect 105 point score was achieved under the Australian Green Building Councils
Green Star rating system.
In addition, the building was assessed by the US Green Building Councils LEED
scheme and scored 105 points out of a possible 110
SIMULATION TOOLS
• Modelling of Pixel‟s energy performance was primarily conducted using the building
energy simulation tool Indoor Climate and Energy (ICE).
• Additional software tools were used to calculate photovoltaic and wind renewable
energy production, daylight levels (Radiance and Ecotect), and embodied carbon.
PIXELCRETE
• Grocon has developed a new structural concrete
design, with the ability to halve the embodied
carbon within the concrete mix.
• Pixelcrete achieves the same strength as
traditional concrete and can be used in the same
way.
• Includes a high proportion of both reclaimed and
recycled aggregates and dramatically reduces the
content of Portland cement. With worldwide
production of Portland cement accounting for
nearly 6% of all the world‟s greenhouse gas
emissions every year, this product has a very
significant potential international impact.
RENEWABLE ENERGY SYSTEMS
• Consist of fixed and tracking
photovoltaic and wind turbines on the
roof, in addition to a small amount of
biogas produced from an anaerobic
digester connected to the vacuum toilet
black water system.
• The wind turbines and photovoltaic are
grid connected and use the grid as a
„bank‟ where excess renewable
energy is exported.
• The nature and time of energy
generation was also considered.
• Peak loads in Australia are related to
cooling energy demand with
the biggest need occurring during
summer mid-days.
GREEN ROOF
