Fonterra Top 12 cooling ceiling as the ideal solution
Construction projects in hospitals are always subject to major cost constraints. At the same time, patient well-being makes great demands on implementation. At the Vivantes hospital in Berlin, Germany, the challenge lay in ensuring constant room temperatures in the psychiatric and geriatric wards whilst guaranteeing a large amount of natural daylight in the patients' rooms. Both are decisive health factors. The most technically suitable and cost-effective solution was, in addition to conventional heating, the installation of a Fonterra cooling ceiling.
Sanitation and dry construction specialists work hand in hand
The system panels Fonterra Top 12 from Viega were used for ceiling cooling. These are plaster boards containing polybutene pipes with a 12 mm diameter. The sanitation and dry construction experts worked closely together during installation and that without any problems:
After the dry construction experts had completed the conventional sub-construction for the ceiling panels, the sanitation specialists installed the manifolds and laid the lines to the connection points of the individual cooling circuits. The dry construction experts then assembled the system panels and left the edge zones open as per the assembly plan. In the next step, the sanitation specialists connected the heating circuits and the system panels. In the final stage, the pressure was tested. Only then were the dry construction experts allowed to seal the open residual surfaces with pipe-free panels and fill in the joints.
Cooling without a draught
Dipl.-Ing. Thomas Handke, construction manager at the engineering office Genius, regards this concept as an ideal compromise between construction costs, energy costs and the desired effect: "With the Fonterra system panels we are able to make optimum use of the entire ceiling area for cooling and reliably handle the peak loads with the supply temperature of 16°C. This means even at the height of summer, the rooms will remain a pleasantly cool place to retreat to for patients."
