Bayer Eco Commercial Building in Indiaby Regina Enhuber | 10.03.2012

Eco Commercial Building

Bayer MaterialScience, a Bayer group enterprise, has launched the "EcoCommercial Builing-Program“. This program is about supporting so-called "zero emissions buildings", since 30% of the worldwide emissions come from energy consumption of buildings.

With a revenue of 12.2 billion Euro in 2010, Bayer MaterialScience is among the biggest polymer companies worldwide. Focus is on manufacturing high-tech polymer raw materials and thus in developing new ground-breaking solutions. The building industry belongs to the most important customers.

Sustainability all along

Bayer MaterialScience have erected their first EcoCommercial Building in India. A zero-emissions children day-care center in Monheim has been successful already, and another EcoCommercial building is planned for Belgium.

The five million Euro EcoCommercial office building in India is about 40 km away from New-Delhi. Here, you will find Bayer's Greater Noida site. The whole investment sums up to 26 million Euro, since in addition to the office center a color competence and design center for polycarbonate along with a system house have been placed here.

The design of the office center was made by the architectural firm Banz + Riecks Architekten, Bochum, Germany. However, today's facade is not as originally planned. The building has been constructed by making use of extensive computer simulations.

The office center's energy requirements are covered nearly 100% by renewable energy sources. The energy balance after one year: 67 tons of CO2 have been saved. This means that nearly 50% less energy has been consumed than with similar projects in the region. This is probably a result from the photovoltaics  system on the roof, producing 120,000 kilowatt-hours per year.

According to calculations, the additional costs will be amortized in less than 10 years thanks to energy savings.

Polyisocyanurate for Air-Conditioning

The cube of the EcoCommercial office building consists of three floors, the uppermost of which is partly surrounded by a balcony. The whole complex provides room for 50 employees.

The solar cells are enthroned on top of the flat roof, always directed towards the sun. The transparent domes below are arranged in such a manner that the interior does not heat up.

A third of the building consists of glass, another ideal precondition for the energy balance. The facade of rigid foam, polyisocyanurate (PIR), keeps away the moist tropical air and thus enables great savings regarding the building's air conditioning. The technology of the facade was actually developed for protecting buildings in Europe from the cold, however, it has been proven that it also works the other way round as a very good insulation against heat.

The India Boom

India is one of the fastest growing markets in Asia  and thus a very attractive target of new investments. However, especially in the building industry there is still plenty of work and awareness training to do. Bayer's EcoCommercial building project shows that efforts pay off and that there is huge potential here.Cooperating and exchanging know-how can make quite a contribution to the world's climate protection.