Umwandlung Shop in Redaktionsbüro, Aalen, Allemagne

The offices of the local newspaper "Schwäbische Post" will move to the former “Schwäpo shops” in the city center of Aalen. The building will be renovated and Transsolar was commissioned with the climate and energy concept for its refurbishment.

Built in the 1920´s, one of the challenges of this project is to protect the architectural character of the building. During the consultation process, detailed thermal simulations were used to analyze different variants of ventilation concepts and refurbishment measures in terms of thermal comfort, user intervention and energy requirements.

To minimize heating requirements, the building envelope has a 16 cm external insulation and the windows have selective triple glazing. The new windows have an optimized frame proportion to allow as much daylight as possible into the rooms as well as preserving the character of the building. The offices and café are ventilated via vertically installed decentralized supply and exhaust air units next to the window with integrated heat recovery.

Effective night ventilation is realized via a ventilation sash in the upper window area as a supply air inlet and via a former lift shaft (chimney effect) for the exhaust air. The offices are equipped with ceiling fans which are locally and individually controllable during hot summers. Summer comfort is provided by passive measures only and the building does not require active cooling.

An exhaust air heat pump supplies the low-temperature heat for the decentralized ventilation units and the heating convectors. Photovoltaic elements integrated into the roof produce renewable electricity, which is used to supply the building itself.